Description
Book SynopsisThis is the only book to chart the history and development of modern probability theory, showing how in the first thirty years of this century probability theory became a mathematical science.
Trade Review'… von Plato has consulted and drawn on a substantial body of archival material: letters, unpublished manuscripts, and drafts of later-published papers. Thus his book does not just (as is sometimes the case) simply revisit the standard chestnuts of the field, but substantially adds to our knowledge of them … In sum, this is a welcome addition to the literature: timely, informed, and technically competent.' Isis
Table of ContentsPreface; 1. Introduction; 2. Pathways to modern probability; 3. Probability in statistical physics; 4. Quantum mechanical probability and indeterminism; 5. Classical embeddings of probability and chance; 6. Von Mises' frequentist probabilities; 7. Kolmogorov's measure theoretic probabilities; 8. De Finetti's subjective probabilities; Supplement: Nicole Oresme and the ergodicity of rotations; Bibliography; Index of names; Index of subjects.
