The Man Who Stole Infinity<br /> by [[Joseph Howlett]] in Quanta Magazine on 2026-02-25<br /> accessed on 2026-02-26T09:01:10
Dedekind proved that the set of algebraic numbers is the same size as the set of whole numbers.
Cantor plagiarized his proof and later went on to prove that the set of real numbers is larger than the set of whole numbers.
The letter from Dedekind to Cantor, dated November 30, 1873, that went missing for more than a century. In it, Dedekind provides a proof that the set of algebraic numbers is the same size as the set of whole numbers — a result that Cantor later plagiarized.
The basis for our intuitive set theory is the Zermelo—Fraenkel set theory developedby Zermelo (Untersuchungen tiber die Grundlagen der Mengenlehre J) andstrengthened by Fraenkel (Zu den Grundlagen der Cantor—Zermeloschen Mengen-lehre). Their work rests on the researches of Cantor in the 1870’s which first putmathematics firmly on a set-theoretic base. Zermelo’s work, in particular, was adirect response to the Russell paradox.