The Mathematical Pranksters behind Nicolas Bourbaki
Bourbaki was gnomic and mythical, impossible to pin down; his mathematics just the opposite: unified, unambiguous, free of human idiosyncrasy.
The Physics of Karate
A human hand has the power to split wooden planks and demolish concrete blocks. A trio of physicists investigated why this feat doesn't shatter our bones.
Florence Nightingale, Data Visualization Visionary
The woman who revolutionized nursing was also a mathematician who knew the power of a visible representation of information.
The Black Mathematician Who Resisted Nuclear War
J. Ernest Wilkins Jr. worked on the Manhattan Project and signed a petition that the bomb not be used before Japan was offered terms of surrender.
The Quantum Random Number Generator
It’s real. And it will use quantum entanglement to generate true mathematical randomness. Here’s why that matters.
The Woman Who Found the Earth’s Inner Core
Inge Lehmann was the seismologist and mathematician who figured out what the Earth's core was actually made of.
The Math Behind the Perfect Free Throw
The fate of a free throw is set the instant the ball leaves the player’s fingertips.
The Ancient Origins of Dice
Gambling is one of humankind’s oldest activities. Elaborate technologies and customs have emerged around games of chance. Dice in particular have drawn attention from scholars.
The Statistics of Coin Tosses for Theater Geeks
At the beginning of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, a coin toss lands as heads 92 times in a row, the odds of which are a mere 1 in 5 octillion.
Mathematics is Beautiful (No, Really)
For many people, memories of maths lessons at school are anything but pretty. Yet “beautiful” is a word ...