Posts in category Roots of Unity
Ken Ribet’s Favorite Theorem
This post originally appeared on scientificamerican.com.
In today’s episode of our podcast My Favorite Theorem, Kevin Knudson and I were happy to welcome Ken Ribet on the show. Dr. Ribet is a math professor at the University of California Berkeley and president of the American Mathematical Society. You can listen to the episode at kpknudson. [...]
Stepping into a Three-Torus
Earlier this month, my travels took me and my spouse to Copenhagen. While trying to get the most out of an 8-zone transit pass, we took the train to the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, which has a beautiful setting, an affectionate resident kitty, and gorgeous views across Øresund to Sweden. Unbeknownst to us, it also has an art installation [...]
Emily Riehl’s Favorite Theorem
This post first appeared at scientificamerican.com.
In today’s episode of our podcast My Favorite Theorem, my cohost Kevin Knudson and I were happy to welcome Emily Riehl to the show. She’s a mathematician at Johns Hopkins University, and like our previous guest John Urschel, she’s also a football player. (She plays Australian rules football, [...]
How to Confuse a Traveling Mathematic...
This post first appeared at scientificamerican.com.
“How many days will you be staying?” The immigration officer’s question made my blood run cold. I could easily tell him my origin city, nationality, flight number, and eventual destination, but this question was different. It was a fencepost question.
Fencepost questions, dealing as they do [...]
Make Mathemusic with Me at Bridges
Click to get the Bridges workshop worksheet!
Here’s what I wrote about the workshop for my Scientific American blog Roots of Unity:
Later this week, I’ll be heading to Baltimore for the annual Bridges Math+Art conference. I’ve written about Bridges before, but this is my first time attending. The conference has presentations on everythi [...]
The Shocking Failure of British Rail ...
A British train approaches a station. Image: Ingy the Wingy, via flickr.
I spent about a month in the UK earlier this summer, and that meant I took a lot of train trips. I love riding trains: the feeling of endless possibility I get when I look at the departure boards, the countryside rolling by, the fantastic people-watching, the two-hour de [...]
British Objects of Constant Width
Several British objects of constant width. Image: Evelyn Lamb.
Almost immediately after getting off the plane at Heathrow, I got some breakfast and some change in the form of metal shapes of constant width. That’s right, all British coins are shapes of constant width. This isn’t remarkable because circles have constant width, and [...]
Really Big Numbers (Book Review)
Really Big Numbers by Richard Schwartz will be published by the American Mathematical Society on July 3, 2014.
“Now and then we pluck numbers from the blur…numbers which have no names except the ones we might now give them…souvenirs from alien, unknowable worlds.”
-Really Big Numbers by Richard Evan Schwartz
Read my review of Really Big Numb [...]
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