jamespropp

11 ms·

31.
by jamespropp 2y ago
What can the counterintuitive nature of some mathematical results teach us about the pursuit of virtue?
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by jamespropp 2y ago
This spoof of popular science journalism envisions a parallel world in which mathematicians make their discoveries in a radically different order yet science journalists invent the exact same cliches (and a few famous folks have suspiciousl
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by jamespropp 2y ago
This essay explores the boundary between two aspects of math: its unchanging truths on the one hand, and the ever-changing ways we try to capture those truths in symbols on the other. Modern symbolical algebra is relatively new on the scene
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by jamespropp 2y ago
This essay describes operations on finite sets that mimic the operations of adding, multiplying, and exponentiating counting numbers and uses these operations to explain why discrete mathematicians and computer scientists take 0^0 to equal
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"Jewish Mathematics"?(mathenchant.wordpress.com)
15 points by jamespropp 2y ago|23 comments
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by jamespropp 3y ago
How mathematicians learned to stop worrying and to just get on with the business of creating new universes.
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Plus and Times Set Free(mathenchant.wordpress.com)
3 points by jamespropp 3y ago|2 comments
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by jamespropp 3y ago
I don’t have classroom experience with this kind of teaching. I may write a companion to “When 1+1=0” called “When 1+1=1”, at which point I’ll have to think harder about these issues. (Are we using a different 0 and a different 1 here? Or a
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by jamespropp 3y ago
I’ll look into this. Thanks!
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Vectors from Leibniz to Einstein(mathenchant.wordpress.com)
58 points by jamespropp 3y ago|14 comments
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by jamespropp 3y ago
This essay tells the story of how the modern theory of vectors was gradually discovered, and covers the colorful yet often forgotten late-19th century quarrel between quaternionists and vectorialists.
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Numbers Far Afield(mathenchant.wordpress.com)
1 points by jamespropp 3y ago|1 comments
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by jamespropp 3y ago
This essay discusses finite fields and the role they played in the early years of the computer revolution (remember paper-tape drives?) and in the ongoing Voyager mission to explore the outer solar system.
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by jamespropp 3y ago
In this month’s Mathematical Enchantment, I wrote about finite fields and the role they played in the early years of the computer revolution (remember paper-tape drives?) and in the ongoing Voyager mission to explore the outer solar system.
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by jamespropp 3y ago
Yeah, I admit the title is a bit click-baity. But I got the word “marvelous” from the Audre Lourde poem, so it’s not completely gratuitous.
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by jamespropp 4y ago
Thanks, fwlr! Your words of appreciation made my day.