Need help identifying a Chinese topology book (probably translated from Japanese)

chrka

August 22, 2007, 02:08 PM posted in General Discussion

I have found a topology book which I would like to know the author and title of (I have only the table of contents and the main text of the book). I am fairly certain that it has been translated from Japanese since there are comments by the translator on the levels of the Japanese school system.

It begins with an introduction where it, somewhat jokingly, traces the development of the study of topology back to ancient times since our hunting forefathers obviously had knowledge of Jordan's curve theorem (basically by surrounding the hunted animals, dividing the surface into an inside and an outside).

In the second chapter it discusses sets and uses the same forefathers as an example of a set (a family named 林).

The 林 family returns in the following chapters on mappings and relations (possibly other chapters as well, I have only just begun reading the book).

Later chapters include chapters on the real number line, topological spaces, properties of topological spaces, topologies, vector fields etc.

I'll be grateful for any information.

aeflow

August 22, 2007, 02:48 PM

Topology = 拓扑 (tuòpū) or 拓扑学 I only know this because this word ranks abnormally high in the phrases.zip list of Chinese words/phrases ordered by frequency, which I recently downloaded for making flashcards using spaced repetition. Overall, the word frequencies in that list seem to be curiously skewed towards mathematics and old political terms (四人帮 also ranks very high). In case that word list might be useful to some of you, see http://technology.chtsai.org/wordlist/ for a downloadable link. None of the above actually answers your question. Perhaps you could try typing random phrases from the text into Google or Baidu and see if you get any hits. It sounds like you already have an online text for it rather than a paper version, so there's a reasonable chance that someone already uploaded it to the web somewhere.

chrka

August 22, 2007, 03:59 PM

I have already tried googling for phrases but I haven't found anything. I am not really certain if it is ok to download it from the internet (copyright, and such) but if there is a copy available on the web somewhere, chances are that it is in the form of a pdf of scanned images from the book (which implies no searching of the text). It is also probable that the filename is a string of random digits that a search engine is unlikely to find… Thanks for the link, I'll take a look at it later. Although the dictionary I use (新时代汉英大词典) is rather good at mathematical and scientific words there are some surprising omissions. (Luckily, most scientific and mathematical terms in Chinese seem to be very easy to understand, I'd even say they are far more logical than in English. )

goulnik

August 22, 2007, 05:58 PM

wouldn't it be more effective to go ask that question on a forum specialized in maths, Chinese students or such like?

chrka

August 23, 2007, 12:46 PM

Yes, it probably would, and I probably will if no one here has heard of the book. I just thought it might be interesting to look here first. I have noticed that there seems to be quite a few that are familiar with both Japanese and Chinese, and I would expect there to be a bunch of people interested in mathematics and science here (that is at least my experience from regular Chinese classes.) Oh, and I feel a bit shy asking in Chinese forums, I must admit (I don't write or speak very well). But I suppose it would be good practice. And, of course there are English speaking forums as well.