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Title details for A Numerate Life by John Allen Paulos - Available

A Numerate Life

A Mathematician Explores the Vagaries of Life, His Own and Probably Yours

by John Allen Paulos
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Employing intuitive ideas from mathematics, this quirky "meta-memoir" raises questions about our lives that most of us don't think to ask, but arguably should: What part of memory is reliable fact, what part creative embellishment? Which favorite presuppositions are unfounded, which statistically biased? By conjoining two opposing mindsets--the suspension of disbelief required in storytelling and the skepticism inherent in the scientific method--bestselling mathematician John Allen Paulos has created an unusual hybrid, a composite of personal memories and mathematical approaches to re-evaluating them.

Entertaining vignettes from Paulos's biography abound--ranging from a bullying math teacher and a fabulous collection of baseball cards to romantic crushes, a grandmother's petty larceny, and his quite unintended role in getting George Bush elected president in 2000. These vignettes serve as springboards to many telling perspectives: simple arithmetic puts life-long habits in a dubious new light; higher dimensional geometry helps us see that we're all rather peculiar; nonlinear dynamics explains the narcissism of small differences cascading into very different siblings; logarithms and exponentials yield insight on why we tend to become bored and jaded as we age; and there are tricks and jokes, probability and coincidences, and much more.

For fans of Paulos or newcomers to his work, this witty commentary on his life--and yours--is fascinating reading.

From the Trade Paperback edition.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    November 10, 2015

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9781633881198
      • File size: 1056 KB

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781633881198
      • File size: 1056 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

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Formats

  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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