Symbol for Partial Differentiation

Abstract

I AM glad to think that a pure mathematician sees the difficulty met with by users of mathematics. I wish that men who write to me privately would publish their remarks. One correspondent says: “I think the mathematicians made a rather stupid blunder when they introduced for partial differentiation. This way: nearly all differential coefficients are partial; even a complete one (assumed complete) may become partial by extension of the field of operation. So an old investigation of Kelvin's, for example, using d throughout, is, by the mathematicians, replaced by the same using throughout, except one or two here and there! What is the use? It gives a lot of trouble, and as printers haven't always 's, or proper sized 's, it makes bad work. It should have been itself that was introduced for the exceptional use, thus making next to no alteration in the classical investigations.” These are, indeed, my own views, but as my pupils go forward to University examinations I advise them to adopt the fashion which is likely to please the examiners.