A Mathematical Mystery Tour PDF Download

Author: A. K. Dewdney
Publisher: Wiley
ISBN: 9780471407348
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 0

View

Book Description
Praise for A. K. Dewdney Yes, We Have No Neutrons "We need more books like this-especially if they're this much fun to read." -Wired "Dewdney manages to make this catalog of error entertaining as well as instructive; good medicine for both skeptics and true believers." -Kirkus Reviews "Written with wit and a touch of pathos-and sure to please science lovers." -Publishers Weekly 200% of Nothing "It is impossible to read this timely, important book without enjoyment and eye-opening enlightenment." -Martin Gardner "An entertaining, stinging exposé." -Publishers Weekly

Author: Ivars Peterson
Publisher: W H Freeman & Company
ISBN: 9780716721482
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 325

View

Book Description
Ivars Peterson has come up with another itinerary of Mathland - where the habitat is mysterious and the inhabitants fascinating. He explores uncharted islands, introducing strange vibrations in the shadows of chaos, new twists in knot physics, and the straight side of circles. The tour is enjoyable to experienced travellers and first-time tourists alike. Peterson, a journalist with Science News, makes the arcane intelligible by interpreting mathematics into engaging prose.

Author: Loren Graham
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674032934
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 252

View

Book Description
In 1913, Russian imperial marines stormed an Orthodox monastery at Mt. Athos, Greece, to haul off monks engaged in a dangerously heretical practice known as Name Worshipping. Exiled to remote Russian outposts, the monks and their mystical movement went underground. Ultimately, they came across Russian intellectuals who embraced Name Worshipping—and who would achieve one of the biggest mathematical breakthroughs of the twentieth century, going beyond recent French achievements. Loren Graham and Jean-Michel Kantor take us on an exciting mathematical mystery tour as they unravel a bizarre tale of political struggles, psychological crises, sexual complexities, and ethical dilemmas. At the core of this book is the contest between French and Russian mathematicians who sought new answers to one of the oldest puzzles in math: the nature of infinity. The French school chased rationalist solutions. The Russian mathematicians, notably Dmitri Egorov and Nikolai Luzin—who founded the famous Moscow School of Mathematics—were inspired by mystical insights attained during Name Worshipping. Their religious practice appears to have opened to them visions into the infinite—and led to the founding of descriptive set theory. The men and women of the leading French and Russian mathematical schools are central characters in this absorbing tale that could not be told until now. Naming Infinity is a poignant human interest story that raises provocative questions about science and religion, intuition and creativity.

Author: Ivars Peterson
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 0805071598
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 273

View

Book Description
In the first edition of The Mathematical Tourist, renowned science journalist Ivars Peterson took readers on an unforgettable tour through the sometimes bizarre, but always fascinating, landscape of modern mathematics. Now the journey continues in a new, updated edition that includes all the latest information on mathematical proofs, fractals, prime numbers, and chaos, as well as new material on * the relationship between mathematical knots and DNA * how computers based on quantum logic can significantly speed up the factoring of large composite numbers * the relationship between four-dimensional geometry and physical theories of the nature of matter * the application of cellular automata models to social questions and the peregrinations of virtual ants * a novel mathematical model of quasicrystals based on decagon-shaped tiles Blazing a trail through rows of austere symbols and dense lines of formulae, Peterson explores the central ideas behind the work of professional mathematicians-- how and where their pieces of the mathematical puzzle fit in, the sources of their ideas, their fountains of inspiration, and the images that carry them from one discovery to another.

Author: Max Tegmark
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307744256
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 434

View

Book Description
Max Tegmark leads us on an astonishing journey through past, present and future, and through the physics, astronomy and mathematics that are the foundation of his work, most particularly his hypothesis that our physical reality is a mathematical structure and his theory of the ultimate multiverse. In a dazzling combination of both popular and groundbreaking science, he not only helps us grasp his often mind-boggling theories, but he also shares with us some of the often surprising triumphs and disappointments that have shaped his life as a scientist. Fascinating from first to last—this is a book that has already prompted the attention and admiration of some of the most prominent scientists and mathematicians.

Author: Apostolos Doxiadis
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400842689
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 593

View

Book Description
Why narrative is essential to mathematics Circles Disturbed brings together important thinkers in mathematics, history, and philosophy to explore the relationship between mathematics and narrative. The book's title recalls the last words of the great Greek mathematician Archimedes before he was slain by a Roman soldier—"Don't disturb my circles"—words that seem to refer to two radically different concerns: that of the practical person living in the concrete world of reality, and that of the theoretician lost in a world of abstraction. Stories and theorems are, in a sense, the natural languages of these two worlds—stories representing the way we act and interact, and theorems giving us pure thought, distilled from the hustle and bustle of reality. Yet, though the voices of stories and theorems seem totally different, they share profound connections and similarities. A book unlike any other, Circles Disturbed delves into topics such as the way in which historical and biographical narratives shape our understanding of mathematics and mathematicians, the development of "myths of origins" in mathematics, the structure and importance of mathematical dreams, the role of storytelling in the formation of mathematical intuitions, the ways mathematics helps us organize the way we think about narrative structure, and much more. In addition to the editors, the contributors are Amir Alexander, David Corfield, Peter Galison, Timothy Gowers, Michael Harris, David Herman, Federica La Nave, G.E.R. Lloyd, Uri Margolin, Colin McLarty, Jan Christoph Meister, Arkady Plotnitsky, and Bernard Teissier.

Author: Eugenia Cheng
Publisher: Big Picture Press
ISBN: 1536217107
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 63

View

Book Description
Find the clues and lift the flaps on this mathematical mystery! Join Molly as she ventures into a curious world where nothing is quite as it seems. A trail of clues leads from scene to scene, presenting Molly with a number of challenges. But who is leaving the clues, and where will they lead? This interactive mystery shows math isn't just about numbers—it’s about imagination! An explorative and creative approach to the world of mathematics.

Author: Mark Wahl
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000943623
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 268

View

Book Description
A Mathematical Mystery Tour has been used by thousands of students and has inspired adults to greater appreciation of the secret number language of nature. It is multidisciplinary, visual, and hands-on, practicing skills while also requiring deep math thinking. The activities are reproducible and each is accompanied with informational teacher pages giving answers, historical notes, teacher suggestions, and activity extensions. Let this geographically alive Mystery Tour integrate math with art, science, philosophy, history, social studies, and language arts. The use of the calculator, geometric construction, metric measurement, problem solving, formulating results, building models and making inferences is woven throughout the book. Each book purchase includes a link to a downloadable student newspaper, the Mathematical Mystery Tour Guide, coordinated with the book content. It is capable of being broken up into various assignments and handed out as print or sent whole electronically to each student. It is filled with games, riddles, dramatic historical information, crosswords, provocative questions, and additional math thought activities.

Author: Satyan Devadoss
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262542757
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 117

View

Book Description
Sixteen of today's greatest unsolved mathematical puzzles in a story-driven, illustrated volume that invites readers to peek over the edge of the unknown. Most people think of mathematics as a set of useful tools designed to answer analytical questions, beginning with simple arithmetic and ending with advanced calculus. But, as Mage Merlin's Unsolved Mathematical Mysteries shows, mathematics is filled with intriguing mysteries that take us to the edge of the unknown. This richly illustrated, story-driven volume presents sixteen of today's greatest unsolved mathematical puzzles, all understandable by anyone with elementary math skills. These intriguing mysteries are presented to readers as puzzles that have time-traveled from Camelot, preserved in the notebook of Merlin, the wise magician in King Arthur's court. Our guide is Mage Maryam (named in honor of the brilliant young mathematician, the late Maryam Mirzakhani), a distant descendant of Merlin. Maryam introduces the mysteries--each of which is presented across two beautifully illustrated pages--and provides mathematical and historical context afterward. We find Merlin confronting mathematical puzzles involving tinker toys (a present for Camelot's princesses from the sorceress Morgana), cake-slicing at a festival, Lancelot's labyrinth, a vault for the Holy Grail, and more. Each mystery is a sword awaiting removal from its stone, capturing the beauty and power of mathematics.

Author: A. K. Dewdney
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0471652423
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 234

View

Book Description
A mind-bending excursion to the limits of science and mathematics Are some scientific problems insoluble? In Beyond Reason, internationally acclaimed math and science author A. K. Dewdney answers this question by examining eight insurmountable mathematical and scientific roadblocks that have stumped thinkers across the centuries, from ancient mathematical conundrums such as "squaring the circle," first attempted by the Pythagoreans, to G?del's vexing theorem, from perpetual motion to the upredictable behavior of chaotic systems such as the weather. A. K. Dewdney, PhD (Ontario, Canada), was the author of Scientific American's "Computer Recreations" column for eight years. He has written several critically acclaimed popular math and science books, including A Mathematical Mystery Tour (0-471-40734-8); Yes, We Have No Neutrons (0-471-29586-8); and 200% of Nothing (0-471-14574-2).