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Watching the trailer, makes me think that people who may enjoy this series will also enjoy a book called "Aha" by Martin Gardner (from probably 40 years ago)[0]

Watching the trailer, makes me think that people who may enjoy this series will also enjoy a book called "Aha" by Martin Gardner (from probably 40 years ago)[0]. It has a lot of amusingly illustrated insight problems that show you how thinking about a problem differently simplifies getting to the answer a lot. It's probably aimed at advanced teenagers, but in fact the lessons there are some that even many adults probably have not come across before. I mean, I haven't watched the Masterclass, but I imagine Terrence Tao isn't teaching multimanifold group theory or something anyway, so this is the kind of insightful more daily-math problems he's helping people to understand how to think about. [0] search your favorite, ahem, LIBrary GENeric source of books to find it.

agumonkey 5y ago
Them russian librarians have well furnished shelves.
wging 5y ago
Do you mean Aha! Insight? I don't see a book just labeled "Aha". There is another Gardner book, Aha! Gotcha, which has a different emphasis than what I think you're talking about, but is excellent. I loved it as a kid. Gotcha is more about mathematical paradoxes and intuition-breaking concepts. Hotel Infinity, "who shaves the barber who does not shave himself?", the 'unexpected tiger', Zeno's paradox is included I think..., the difference between average and median, Newcomb's problem, etc... (the unexpected tiger: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox) I'm going to have to check this out based on how good Gotcha was.
- supernova87a 5y ago
  Actually both books, but I was particularly thinking first of the "Aha Insight!" book, which has like 100 different problems where some clever thinking/turning around the problem statement helps to solve it. The other one ("Aha Gotcha"), you are right is more about paradoxes that arise when applying logic that seems to lead to contradictory outcomes. But it also has a lot of "change the way of thinking" answers.

agumonkey 5y ago

Them russian librarians have well furnished shelves.

wging 5y ago

Do you mean Aha! Insight? I don't see a book just labeled "Aha". There is another Gardner book, Aha! Gotcha, which has a different emphasis than what I think you're talking about, but is excellent. I loved it as a kid. Gotcha is more about mathematical paradoxes and intuition-breaking concepts. Hotel Infinity, "who shaves the barber who does not shave himself?", the 'unexpected tiger', Zeno's paradox is included I think..., the difference between average and median, Newcomb's problem, etc... (the unexpected tiger: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox) I'm going to have to check this out based on how good Gotcha was.

supernova87a 5y ago
Actually both books, but I was particularly thinking first of the "Aha Insight!" book, which has like 100 different problems where some clever thinking/turning around the problem statement helps to solve it. The other one ("Aha Gotcha"), you are right is more about paradoxes that arise when applying logic that seems to lead to contradictory outcomes. But it also has a lot of "change the way of thinking" answers.