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10 Things You Should Know
Numbers: 10 Things You Should Know
Uncover the language of our universe - numbers - in this wide-ranging whistle-stop tour of the history and majesty of mathematics.
Our world simply wouldn't function if we didn't have numbers. But where do they come from? Why do we cut cake the wrong way? How can there be different sizes of infinity?
All these questions and more are answered in this engaging romp through the history of numbers by acclaimed science writer, Colin Stuart. From the mathematicians who have (and haven't) shouted 'Eureka!' to the theories that affect and inform our everyday lives; Numbers shows us that maths was never boring - we were just being taught it in the wrong way.
Consisting of ten bite-sized essays, there's no better guide to this fundamental science.
Our world simply wouldn't function if we didn't have numbers. But where do they come from? Why do we cut cake the wrong way? How can there be different sizes of infinity?
All these questions and more are answered in this engaging romp through the history of numbers by acclaimed science writer, Colin Stuart. From the mathematicians who have (and haven't) shouted 'Eureka!' to the theories that affect and inform our everyday lives; Numbers shows us that maths was never boring - we were just being taught it in the wrong way.
Consisting of ten bite-sized essays, there's no better guide to this fundamental science.
- GenresNonfictionMathematics
120 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 1, 2022
About the author
Colin Stuart
58 books22 followersColin Stuart is a renowned astronomy speaker and best-selling author. He was a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society and a 2014 runner-up for the European Astronomy Journalism Prize. He lives in London.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
December 11, 2024
Leuk boekje, geschreven in een vlotte stijl. Een charmante combinatie van wiskundige weetjes en historische anekdotes.
January 16, 2023
Charming little book about some mathematical concepts explained through history and anecdotes.
April 2, 2023
You know me: I love finding and sharing fun facts. Because this is a book about numbers, I decided to share one fact for each of the ten chapters. Here they are…
Our calendar used to have ten “moonths”. September, October, November and December were named because they were months seven through ten. When two months (January and February) were added because there are usually twelve full moons in a year, no one bothered to change their names. Also, July and August used to be known as Quintilis and Sextilis.
Cicadas are distant cousins of shrimp and lobsters. Apparently, they taste like asparagus. (Not all of the fun facts in this book are specifically about numbers, even though the reason we learn about cicadas is number related.)
🥧 We know pi to 62.8 trillion digits
🥧 “8 is the most common digit in the first trillion digits”
🥧 There are six nines in a row at position 768
🥧 “It takes until the 17,387,594,880th digit to find the sequence 0123456789.”
🥧 You can search for combinations, like your date of birth, at angio.net/pi.
In the early nineteenth century, Reverend Jeremiah Trist built circular homes for each of his five daughters in the Cornish village of Veryan. He reasoned that there’d be no corners for the devil to hide in. If only he’d read this book first, he’d know that circles actually have an infinite number of corners. Oops!
Your maths teacher lied to you: the sum of the angles of a triangle don’t always equal 180 degrees. That only works for flat surfaces. Triangles drawn on spheres can add up to 540 degrees! If you draw a circle on a hyperbolic paraboloid (think Pringles), they’ll add up to less than 180 degrees.
Companies use graph theory to decide the route their delivery drivers take. “Such a dilemma is called a Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP) or vehicle routing problem.”
To say Francis Galton had some problematic ideas is well and truly understating it. He also came up with a way of cutting cakes to make them stay fresh longer. Although, to be fair, who expects there to be leftover cake on day three anyway?
In a group of 30 people, there is a 71% chance that two of them will share a birthday. In a group of 70 people, there is a 99.9% chance that two of them will share a birthday.
Exponential growth means that if you invested $1 in the US stock market in 1900, it would now be worth almost $70,000.
The Infinity Hotel, also called Hilbert’s Hotel, will mess with your mind. It gets to the point where an infinite number of coaches carrying an infinite number of people results in there being an infinite number of occupied rooms as well as an infinite number of unoccupied rooms.
Doesn’t add up to ten, does it? Okay, so maybe I failed at the one fact per chapter thing but only because there were too many fun facts I wanted to be able to refer to later.
This was a quick read. I mostly found it easy to follow, although infinity twisted my brain in knots and I’m not sure I could explain graph theory to you (I expect to forget everything I learned about it by this time tomorrow).
Before I found this book at my library, I’d never heard of the 10 Things You Should Know series. Now I want to know about all of the things.
Because I love pi so much now, I’m tempted to give this book pi out of five stars but that would be underselling the fun I had reading it. Instead, I’m rounding up from 4.5 stars.
Blog - https://schizanthusnerd.com/
Our calendar used to have ten “moonths”. September, October, November and December were named because they were months seven through ten. When two months (January and February) were added because there are usually twelve full moons in a year, no one bothered to change their names. Also, July and August used to be known as Quintilis and Sextilis.
The year numbering system widely used today was invented by a monk called Dionysius Exiguus in the sixth century (his name may sound grand, but it translates as ‘Dennis the Short’).The Mayans used a picture of an upside down turtle shell to represent zero.
Cicadas are distant cousins of shrimp and lobsters. Apparently, they taste like asparagus. (Not all of the fun facts in this book are specifically about numbers, even though the reason we learn about cicadas is number related.)
Every non-prime number can be deconstructed into prime numbers multiplied together (called ‘prime factors’).Pi fun facts:
🥧 We know pi to 62.8 trillion digits
🥧 “8 is the most common digit in the first trillion digits”
🥧 There are six nines in a row at position 768
🥧 “It takes until the 17,387,594,880th digit to find the sequence 0123456789.”
🥧 You can search for combinations, like your date of birth, at angio.net/pi.
In the early nineteenth century, Reverend Jeremiah Trist built circular homes for each of his five daughters in the Cornish village of Veryan. He reasoned that there’d be no corners for the devil to hide in. If only he’d read this book first, he’d know that circles actually have an infinite number of corners. Oops!
Your maths teacher lied to you: the sum of the angles of a triangle don’t always equal 180 degrees. That only works for flat surfaces. Triangles drawn on spheres can add up to 540 degrees! If you draw a circle on a hyperbolic paraboloid (think Pringles), they’ll add up to less than 180 degrees.
Companies use graph theory to decide the route their delivery drivers take. “Such a dilemma is called a Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP) or vehicle routing problem.”
To say Francis Galton had some problematic ideas is well and truly understating it. He also came up with a way of cutting cakes to make them stay fresh longer. Although, to be fair, who expects there to be leftover cake on day three anyway?
In a group of 30 people, there is a 71% chance that two of them will share a birthday. In a group of 70 people, there is a 99.9% chance that two of them will share a birthday.
Exponential growth means that if you invested $1 in the US stock market in 1900, it would now be worth almost $70,000.
The Infinity Hotel, also called Hilbert’s Hotel, will mess with your mind. It gets to the point where an infinite number of coaches carrying an infinite number of people results in there being an infinite number of occupied rooms as well as an infinite number of unoccupied rooms.
Doesn’t add up to ten, does it? Okay, so maybe I failed at the one fact per chapter thing but only because there were too many fun facts I wanted to be able to refer to later.
This was a quick read. I mostly found it easy to follow, although infinity twisted my brain in knots and I’m not sure I could explain graph theory to you (I expect to forget everything I learned about it by this time tomorrow).
Before I found this book at my library, I’d never heard of the 10 Things You Should Know series. Now I want to know about all of the things.
Because I love pi so much now, I’m tempted to give this book pi out of five stars but that would be underselling the fun I had reading it. Instead, I’m rounding up from 4.5 stars.
Blog - https://schizanthusnerd.com/
November 26, 2023
Passie en een leuke schrijfstijl maken van dit boekje ( 120 blz) een plezierige reis door wiskundeland , of men nu een wiskundeknobbel heeft of niet , ( ik vraag me af of zoiets bestaat en hoe en of het kan groeien , … het kan waarschijnlijk ook wat stuk gaan net als taalproblemen)
Persoonlijk vind ik de filosofie van wiskunde wel leuk en de duidelijkheid die het kan geven , het is een universele taal die in de meeste gevallen wel iets duidelijk kan maken , de balletjes tellen in de soep, tot men in de oneindigheid van nul beland en dan wat hopeloos op zoek gaat naar 1. , oef er is al 1 we kunnen terug beginnen ,
5 sterren een kort boekje met weetjes, passie en een enthousiaste schrijver ,
Persoonlijk vind ik de filosofie van wiskunde wel leuk en de duidelijkheid die het kan geven , het is een universele taal die in de meeste gevallen wel iets duidelijk kan maken , de balletjes tellen in de soep, tot men in de oneindigheid van nul beland en dan wat hopeloos op zoek gaat naar 1. , oef er is al 1 we kunnen terug beginnen ,
5 sterren een kort boekje met weetjes, passie en een enthousiaste schrijver ,
November 6, 2022
Read the hardback edition instead of Kindle edition as there is no record found in Goodreads. Unknowingly picked the book and it was truly eye-opening talking about ten things you should know about numbers.
Read it in one instance as it piques your curiosity in not just mathematical but branches of knowledge you read in encyclopaedia. Read between the lines to get related wisdom in getting things done.
Read it in one instance as it piques your curiosity in not just mathematical but branches of knowledge you read in encyclopaedia. Read between the lines to get related wisdom in getting things done.
November 11, 2023
Short and sweet, I would probably have enjoyed it more if more of the content was new to me.
This book is easy to read and has interesting content, I recommend for people who have a bit of curiosity but aren't very familiar with this topic yet.
This book is easy to read and has interesting content, I recommend for people who have a bit of curiosity but aren't very familiar with this topic yet.
December 4, 2023
Good little book, easy to read. You can tell the author enjoyed what he as writing about.
10 short chapters covering how we've always used our fingers (and toes) to count, how circles can have corners, triangles don't always equal 180 degrees, and the possibility of different sizes of infinity.
10 short chapters covering how we've always used our fingers (and toes) to count, how circles can have corners, triangles don't always equal 180 degrees, and the possibility of different sizes of infinity.
January 19, 2023
Really interesting read. Got hooked quickly
March 21, 2023
4,5
Łatwy język, bardzo przyjemnie się czyta. Ciekawa książka, wszystko fajnie wytłumaczone.
Dowody na nieprzeliczalnosc zbiorów i moc zbioru🙇🏽♀️
Łatwy język, bardzo przyjemnie się czyta. Ciekawa książka, wszystko fajnie wytłumaczone.
Dowody na nieprzeliczalnosc zbiorów i moc zbioru🙇🏽♀️
July 8, 2023
Informative and entertaining.
Read
June 9, 2024(NR)
Im on a random math & space hyperfixation so I took out a bunch of random books at the library
Im on a random math & space hyperfixation so I took out a bunch of random books at the library
January 7, 2023
This was simple yet brilliant! Would recommend to anyone who gets excited about maths, and no need to be a genius to enjoy this book...
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews