Secret Life of Numbers : 50 Easy Pieces on How Mathematicians Work and Think

by Szpiro, George G.

• ISBN13: 9780309096584
• ISBN10: 0309096588
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-03-31
• Publisher: Natl Academy Pr

Summary

"Chock full of stories, anecdotes, and vignettes, The Secret Life of Numbers shows us how mathematics really does affect almost every aspect of life - from the law to geography, elections to botany - and we come to appreciate the delight and gratification that mathematics holds for all of us."--BOOK JACKET.

Table of Contents

Preface	xi
PART I HISTORICAL TIDBITS
1 Lopping Leap Years	3	(3)
2 Is the World Coming to an End Soon?	6	(2)
3 Cozy Zurich	8	(3)
4 Daniel Bernoulli and His Difficult Family	11	(6)
PART II UNSOLVED CONJECTURES
5 The Mathematicians' Million Dollar Baby	17	(3)
6 A Puzzle by Any Other Name	20	(4)
7 Twins, Cousins, and Sexy Primes	24	(3)
8 Hilbert's Elusive Problem Number 16	27	(6)
PART III SOLVED PROBLEMS
9 The Tile Layer's Efficiency Problem	33	(4)
10 The Catalanian Rabbi's Problem	37	(3)
11 Even Infinite Series End Sometimes	40	(3)
12 Proving the Proof	43	(5)
13 Has Poincaré's Conjecture Finally Been Solved?	48	(7)
PART IV PERSONALITIES
14 Late Tribute to a Tragic Hero	55	(4)
15 The Unpaid Professor	59	(2)
16 Genius from a Different Planet	61	(5)
17 The Resurrection of Geometry	66	(3)
18 God's Gift to Science?	69	(6)
19 Vice-President of Imagineering	75	(5)
20 The Demoted Pensioner	80	(5)
21 A Grand Master Becomes Permanent Visiting Professor	85	(8)
PART V CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT MATTERS
22 Knots and "Unknots"	93	(4)
23 Knots and Tangles with Real Ropes	97	(5)
24 Small Mistakes May Have Large Consequences	102	(4)
25 Ignorant Gamblers	106	(3)
26 Tetris Is Hard	109	(3)
27 Groups, Monster Groups, and Baby Monsters	112	(4)
28 Fermat's Incorrect Conjecture	116	(3)
29 The Crash of Catastrophe Theory	119	(3)
30 Deceptive Simplicity	122	(3)
31 The Beauty of Dissymmetry	125	(3)
32 Random and Not So Random	128	(4)
33 How Can One Be Sure It's Prime?	132	(5)
PART VI INTERDISCIPLINARY POTPOURRI
34 A Mathematician Judges the Judges (Law)	137	(3)
35 Elections Aren't Decided by the Voters Alone (Political Science)	140	(6)
36 A Dollar Isn't Always Worth a Dollar (Insurance)	146	(3)
37 Compressing the Divine Comedy (Linguistics)	149	(6)
38 Nature's Fundamental Formula (Botany)	155	(3)
39 Stacking Words Like Oranges and Tomatoes (Computer Science)	158	(3)
40 The Fractal Dimension of Israel's Security Barrier (Geography)	161	(3)
41 Calculated in Cold Ice (Physics)	164	(3)
42 Built on Sand (Physics)	167	(3)
43 Buzzing Around Corners (Biology)	170	(2)
44 Inexperienced Traders Make the Market Efficient (Economics)	172	(3)
45 The Waggle Dance of Internet Servers (Computer Science, Biology)	175	(3)
46 Turbulent Liquids and Stock Markets (Finance, Economics)	178	(2)
47 Encrypting Messages with Candles and Hot Plates (Cryptography)	180	(4)
48 Fighting for Survival (Evolutionary Theory, Finance)	184	(3)
49 Insults Stink (Neurosciences, Economics)	187	(3)
50 Bible Codes: The Not So Final Report (Theology)	190	(5)
References	195	(4)
Index	199