4 ms·

These sorts of books can be interesting as a sort of 'history of science', but I find they are very misleading, and can't help but end up as exaggerated dramati

These sorts of books can be interesting as a sort of 'history of science', but I find they are very misleading, and can't help but end up as exaggerated dramatizations of a handful of the personalities involved with virtually no scientific or mathematical content. I understand that this is probably the best the authors can do, since actual content would require years of academic preparation and near full time study on the audience's part to be able to start to approach most of these topics, but that should be a huge clue that the essence can't really be boiled down. If any of the core ideas of these subjects were accessible in any significant way via just reading a book with no real prerequisites or preparation, people wouldn't have to spend 4 years of full time study just to get to the point that some of them are considered to be prepared to start to study them in a serious way. There may be some value to science in that these popularizations increase support for science funding by creating 'fans of science', the people that read them are no better off or more educated than if they had just read a romance novel or a western. TLDR; you aren't learning anything when you read these books, other than a exaggerated biography (with largely invented stories of conflict and drama) of some of the scientists.

g9yuayon 8y ago
Did you read the book What Is Mathematics? It is certainly not "an exaggerated biography for some of the scientists". And the mentioned books, at least some of them, serve different purposes: they aim to inspire, to motivate, and to offer historical context and intuition. The last is especially important, as they show people how abstract concepts emerged from historically concrete endeavors. When it comes to learning math, you can't take an elite's view. Not everyone is born Bourbaki dudes or Galois or people like them. Ordinary people like me don't just fall in love with maths. I was certainly not interested in number theory as I thought it was too fundamental for me to spend serious time on. And I'm still not. I was certainly puzzled on why my professors introduced the concept of functional in linear algebra or quotient groups in algebra or lattice equations in program analysis or category theory in model checking or probability space in probability. After all, all I wanted was to learn how to model the world to be a better programmer. And I was not able to grasp the abstractions without serious effort. I needed historical context and motivations to plow through those topics and to enjoy math. Yes, the elites will love and excel at math for no particular reason. Yet it is the middle majority like me who will greatly benefit from the mentioned books and biographies and what not.
- ltbarcly3 8y ago
  I did a rough calculation, and far less than 1% of high school graduates in the US will be introduced to quotient groups at any point. While you might be in the middle majority of the people you interact with every day, you are quite elite compared to the general population, and in no way in any 'middle majority', and if anything you are doing what I was suggesting is necessary to appreciate these topics. If you enjoy reading popularizations on top of that, that's great!
  - g9yuayon 8y ago
    Middle majority among those who pursue STEM in college. Not everyone is or should be in STEM, after all.
- romwell 8y ago
  > I needed historical context and motivations to plow through those topics and to enjoy math. Everyone really does! It's a travesty that most books just throw dry definition - theorem - proof at you, when in real world, the concepts were developed in the opposite order, and for a good reason.
romwell 8y ago
> involved with virtually no scientific or mathematical content You can't say that about this list, on the account of "What is Mathematics" alone. That's the book that really got me into math (ended up with a PhD in it), and it covers a very wide range of topics from number theory to geometry and topology (and has the best exposition of Calculus I've ever seen). Also, a lot of branches of math do not require a very long preparation to get into. To get deeply into - yes. So, perhaps you should narrow your statement to specific books.
mymythisisthis 8y ago
I've wonder if we've reached the limits of human knowledge. One has to become extremely specialized, very early on, to get to know anything of significance. Knowing more than one field is almost unheard of, more people probably win the lottery, twice, than can master two fields.

g9yuayon 8y ago

Did you read the book What Is Mathematics? It is certainly not "an exaggerated biography for some of the scientists". And the mentioned books, at least some of them, serve different purposes: they aim to inspire, to motivate, and to offer historical context and intuition. The last is especially important, as they show people how abstract concepts emerged from historically concrete endeavors. When it comes to learning math, you can't take an elite's view. Not everyone is born Bourbaki dudes or Galois or people like them. Ordinary people like me don't just fall in love with maths. I was certainly not interested in number theory as I thought it was too fundamental for me to spend serious time on. And I'm still not. I was certainly puzzled on why my professors introduced the concept of functional in linear algebra or quotient groups in algebra or lattice equations in program analysis or category theory in model checking or probability space in probability. After all, all I wanted was to learn how to model the world to be a better programmer. And I was not able to grasp the abstractions without serious effort. I needed historical context and motivations to plow through those topics and to enjoy math. Yes, the elites will love and excel at math for no particular reason. Yet it is the middle majority like me who will greatly benefit from the mentioned books and biographies and what not.

ltbarcly3 8y ago
I did a rough calculation, and far less than 1% of high school graduates in the US will be introduced to quotient groups at any point. While you might be in the middle majority of the people you interact with every day, you are quite elite compared to the general population, and in no way in any 'middle majority', and if anything you are doing what I was suggesting is necessary to appreciate these topics. If you enjoy reading popularizations on top of that, that's great!
- g9yuayon 8y ago
  Middle majority among those who pursue STEM in college. Not everyone is or should be in STEM, after all.
romwell 8y ago
> I needed historical context and motivations to plow through those topics and to enjoy math. Everyone really does! It's a travesty that most books just throw dry definition - theorem - proof at you, when in real world, the concepts were developed in the opposite order, and for a good reason.

romwell 8y ago

> involved with virtually no scientific or mathematical content You can't say that about this list, on the account of "What is Mathematics" alone. That's the book that really got me into math (ended up with a PhD in it), and it covers a very wide range of topics from number theory to geometry and topology (and has the best exposition of Calculus I've ever seen). Also, a lot of branches of math do not require a very long preparation to get into. To get deeply into - yes. So, perhaps you should narrow your statement to specific books.

mymythisisthis 8y ago

I've wonder if we've reached the limits of human knowledge. One has to become extremely specialized, very early on, to get to know anything of significance. Knowing more than one field is almost unheard of, more people probably win the lottery, twice, than can master two fields.