Euclid and his Modern Rivals Euclid and his Modern Rivals Euclid and his Modern Rivals is a mathematical book published in 1879 by the English mathematician Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832–1898), better known under his literary pseudnym "Lewis Carroll". It considers the pedagogic merit of thirteen contemporary geometry textbooks, demonstrating how each in turn is either inferior to or functionally identical to Euclid's "Elements". In it Dodgson supports using Euclid's geometry textbook "The Elements" as the geometry textbook in schools against more modern geometry textbooks that were replacing it, advocated by the Association for the Improvement of Geometrical Teaching, satirized in the book as the "Association
Menelaus of Alexandria Menelaus of Alexandria Menelaus of Alexandria (; , "Menelaos ho Alexandreus"; c. 70 – 140 CE) was a Greek mathematician and astronomer, the first to recognize geodesics on a curved surface as natural analogs of straight lines. Although very little is known about Menelaus's life, it is supposed that he lived in Rome, where he probably moved after having spent his youth in Alexandria. He was called "Menelaus of Alexandria" by both Pappus of Alexandria and Proclus, and a conversation of his with Lucius, held in Rome, is recorded by Plutarch. Ptolemy (2nd century CE) also mentions, in his work