Zeitschrift für Angewandte und Computermathematik

Examination of the History of Mathematical Intuition and its Possible Applications to Education

Abstract

Wararat Wongkia

In light of current psychological and educational research, I examine two of L.E.J. Brouwer's hypotheses regarding the origin of mathematical intuition in this article. Processes related to the perception of formal properties of sensory stimulation, attention, and memory that emerge in early infancy, it is argued, can be understood as the unfolding of the fundamental intuition of mathematics, the abstraction of the relation of n to n + 1. In addition, I contend that over the course of a person's lifetime, these fundamental processes facilitate the creation of more intricate mathematical entities. Mathematical entities constructed from the abstract properties of perceptual activity are expressed and communicated, albeit imprecisely, through language and logic. Last but not least, I think about what the intuitionistic perspective means for teaching mathematics.