Mathematical Circles

by Eves, Howard Whitley

• ISBN13: 9780883855447
• ISBN10: 0883855445
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-11-01
• Publisher: Mathematical Assn of Amer

Summary

For many years, famed mathematics historian and master teacher Howard Eves collected stories and anecdotes about mathematics and mathematicians, gathering them together in six Mathematical Circles books. Thousands of teachers of mathematics have read these stories and anecdotes for their own enjoyment and used them in the classroom - to add entertainment, to introduce a human element, to inspire the student, and to forge some links of cultural history. All six of the Mathematical Circles books have been reissued as a three-volume edition. This three-volume set is a must for all who enjoy the mathematical enterprise, especially those who appreciate the human and cultural aspects of mathematics.

Author Biography

Howard Eves spent most of his teaching career at the University of Maine at Orono, and more recently at Central Florida University. For 25 years, he edited the Elementary Problems Section of the American Mathematical Monthly

Table of Contents

Quadrant I. Mathematics in early America

Pierre de Fermat and René

Descartes

Some pre-nineteenth-century mathematicians

Carl Friedrich Gauss

Schellbach and Grassmann

Seven mathematicians and a poet

Charles Hermite

Lewis Carroll

Quadrant II. A melange

Albert Einstein

L. J. Mordell

From our own times

On mathematics and mathematicians

Professors, teachers and students

Lectures

Quadrant III. Authors and books

Definitions

Logic

On mathematics and logic

Counting

Numbers

Logarithms

Arithmetic

Quadrant IV. Computers

Mnemonics

The number thirteen

Mersenne numbers

Business mathematics

Probability and statistics

Algebra

Geometry

Recreational matters

A concluding miscellany

L'Envoi: Geometrical Illusions. Areal deceptions

Linear deceptions

Deformations. Quadrant I. Concerning some men of mathematics

Albert Einstein

Einstein's theory of relativity

Einstein and children

Humor

Einstein quotes and comments

Lobachevski and Já

nos Bolyai

Quadrant II. Julian Lowell Coolidge

Some more stories about men of mathematics

Some literary snips and bits

Sherlockiana

Poetry, rhymes, and jingles

Computers and calculators

Algebra

Quadrant III. Geometry

Numbers

Probability and statistics

Flawed problems

Quadrant IV. Recreation corner

Have you heard?

Mr. Palindrome

Examples of recreational mathematics by the master

Miscellanea

Epilogue.