Mathematical manuscripts of Karl Marx

The Mathematical manuscripts of Karl Marx consist mostly of Karl Marx's attempts to understand the foundations of infinitesimal calculus, from around 1873–1883. A Russian edition edited by Sofya Yanovskaya was eventually published in 1968, and an English translation was published in (Marx 1983). Marx appears to have been unaware of the rigorous foundations of the calculus that had been developed by Cauchy and Weierstrass (Hubert 1978). His views on calculus have had little influence on mathematics, except that his interest may have been used during the cultural revolution to refute charges that mathematics was insufficiently Marxist. This may have contributed to an interest in nonstandard analysis among Chinese mathematicians (Dauben 1998).

References

• Dauben, Joseph W (1998), Marx, Mao and mathematics: the politics of infinitesimals, "Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians, Vol. III (Berlin, 1998)", Documenta Mathematica III: 799–809, ISSN 1431-0635, MR1648209, http://www.emis.ams.org/journals/DMJDMV/xvol-icm/19/Dauben.MAN.html 
• Kennedy, Hubert (1978), "Marx's mathematical manuscripts", Science and Nature 1: 59–62, ISSN 01933396, MR515991 
• Kennedy, Hubert C. (1977), "Karl Marx and the foundations of differential calculus", Historia Mathematica 4 (3): 303–318, doi:10.1016/0315-0860(77)90058-1, ISSN 0315-0860, MR0441649 
• Kennedy, Hubert C. (1982), "Marx, Peano, and Differentials", Science & Nature 5: 39–42, ISSN 01933396, http://www.autodidactproject.org/other/sn-peano1.html 
• Marx, Karl (1968), Yanovskaya, Sofya, ed., Matematicheskie rukopist, Moscow, Nauk 
• Marx, Karl (1983) [1881], Yanovskaya, Sofya, ed., Mathematical manuscripts of Karl Marx, London: New Park Publications Ltd., ISBN 978-0-86151-028-3, MR710831, http://www.scribd.com/doc/22731491/Mathematical-Manuscripts-of-Karl-Marx-1881 
• Struik, Dirk J. (1948), "Marx and mathematics", A Centenary of Marxism, Science and Society, New York, pp. 181–196, MR0024378, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40399882