Weird Math: A Teenage Genius and His Teacher Reveal the Strange Connections Between Math and Everyday Life

by David Darling, Agnijo Banerjee

Overview

A teenage genius and his teacher take readers on a wild ride to the extremes of mathematics

Everyone has stared at the crumpled page of a math assignment and wondered, where on Earth will I ever use this? It turns out, Earth is precisely the place. As teen math prodigy Agnijo Banerjee and his teacher David Darling reveal, complex math surrounds us. If we think long enough about the universe, we're left not with material stuff, but a ghostly and beautiful set of equations. Packed with puzzles and paradoxes, mind-bending concepts, and surprising solutions, Weird Math leads us from a lyrical exploration of mathematics in our universe to profound questions about God, chance, and infinity. A magical introduction to the mysteries of math, it will entrance beginners and seasoned mathematicians alike.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781541644786
Publisher:	Basic Books
Publication date:	04/17/2018
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

David Darling is a science writer and astronomer. He is the author of the acclaimed Equations of Eternity, among other books. He lives in Dundee, Scotland.

Agnijo Banerjee is a brilliant young mathematician and child genius. A student of Darling's, he lives near Dundee, Scotland.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

A Note to the Reader xiii

1 The Math Behind the World 1

2 How to See in 4-D 13

3 Chance Is a Fine Thing 35

4 Patterns at the Brink of Chaos 63

5 Turing's Fantastic Machine 85

6 Music of the Spheres 113

7 Prime Mysteries 135

8 Can Chess Be Solved? 151

9 What Is and What Should Never Be 171

10 You Can't Get There from Here 187

11 The Biggest Number of All 209

12 Bend It, Stretch It, Any Way You Want Too 233

13 God, Gödel, and the Search for Proof 255

Acknowledgements 279

Index 281

Editorial Reviews

01/15/2018
Darling (Equations of Eternity), an astronomer and science writer, teams up with a student of his, teenage math prodigy Banerjee, in this enjoyable, wide-ranging volume of essays on such diverse mathematical topics as computing, music theory, prime numbers, and paradoxes. Even math-averse readers should find something to pique their interest here. The authors begin by covering how math is used to visualize multiple dimensions in such fields as popular fiction, modern art, and physics. They move on with a brief discussion of the statistics of random chance that shows how to figure out the odds of winning a lottery as well as understand quantum mechanics. In the most fascinating chapters, student and teacher explore Turing machines and computing, how to build a great chess-playing computer, and the math of really large numbers. They keep their discussion equation-free while delivering thoughtful and accessible explanations with a fair bit of history and many stimulating real world examples. “Mathematics,” Darling and Banerjee write, “is an endless adventure into the weirdest and wildest places ever countenanced by the human intellect”—and there is plenty here to convince even the most skeptical reader that they have a good point. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

"A miscellany of fun oddities, ranging from chess-playing computers to prime-counting insects."—Spectator (UK)

"Readers seeking nifty facts to wow others won't be disappointed.... Even the number challenged will emerge with a stronger appreciation of math."—Booklist

"This frolic on the wilder shores of mathematics aims to bolt the way-out to the day-to-day. It succeeds."—Nature

"[An] enjoyable, wide-ranging volume of essays on such diverse mathematical topics as computing, music theory, prime numbers, and paradoxes. Even math-averse readers should find something to pique their interest here."—Publishers Weekly

"[Darling and Banerjee] offer some beguiling insights on what math is about and how it has evolved."—Kirkus Reviews

"Darling and Banerjee take us on a captivating ride through a vast landscape of mathematics, touching on mesmerising topics that include randomness, higher dimensions, alien music, chess, chaos, prime numbers, cicadas, infinity, and more. Read this book and soar."—Clifford A. Pickover, author of The Math Book: From Pythagoras to the 57th Dimension

"A glorious trip through some of the wilder regions of the mathematical landscape, explaining why they are important and useful, but mostly reveling in the sheer joy of the unexpected. Highly recommended!"—Ian Stewart, author of Significant Figures

"In this inspired collaboration, a young math prodigy teams up with a popular science writer to present a fresh view of the world of mathematics. Together they fearlessly tackle some of the most weird and wonderful topics in mathematics today, rightly believing that 'if you can't explain something in plain language then you don't properly understand it.' Clearly, they understand it."—John Stillwell, Professor of Mathematics, University of San Francisco, and author of Elements of Mathematics

From the Publisher

2018-01-22
A science writer and astronomer and his student, a teen math prodigy, join forces to elucidate fields of math they find weird.Darling (Mayday!: A History of Flight Through its Martyrs, Oddballs, and Daredevils, 2015, etc.) and Banerjee are struck by how some of the most abstruse findings from math turn out to have practical applications in quantum physics or computer science—or lead to concepts like orders of infinity or yield unexpected patterns of numbers or figures. One could argue that these findings are neither weird nor magical but the inexorable results of logic and the permissible rules of operation of mathematical systems by imaginative thinkers. As subjects, the authors examine selected fields of pure, as opposed to applied, math. The first chapter takes on the idea of seeing in the fourth dimension, with descriptions of the 4-D extension of the cube called a tesseract. There follows a chapter on probability emphasizing non-intuitive findings and then one on fractals, a field that deals with curves that have fractional dimensions. This idea grew out of a paper by the field's inventor, Benoit Mandelbrot, that asked, "how long is the coast of Britain?" Thereafter, the authors' choices are more self-indulgent, with chapters on chess and music, which will be lost on readers who are not game players or familiar with harmonics. Other areas concern computer science and number theory emphasizing primes. There is a particularly wearisome chapter on competitions to generate large and larger numbers, a sport favored by Banerjee. The text concludes with chapters on topology, set theory, infinity, and the foundations of mathematics. This is difficult material, and readers should be familiar with logical paradoxes, the meaning of "proof," and notions of consistency and completeness of axiomatic systems as well as the work Gödel and others in establishing the incompleteness of any mathematical system complex enough to embody arithmetic.The authors offer some beguiling insights on what math is about and how it has evolved but no royal road to easy understanding.

Kirkus Reviews