Here's Looking At Euclid: A Surprising Excursion Through The Astonishing World Of Math (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
I dunno, its possible that I just needed this popular science romp in the middle of all the juvenile fantasy I've been reading, but, I thoroughly enjoyed it. My biggest gripe is that I wasn't ready for it to end.I particularly enjoyed the early chapters. Here the author examined how the human math language and methodology developed. I am also intrigued by some of the vedic math that was introduced; I'd like to explore it a bit more. I got this book from the Maailma Kylässä festival, as an impulse. Its cover promised more than the book delivered. It had its interesting parts, but way too many chapters were just boring and uninteresting. Also I did not really enjoy the way the book was written and/or translated. I liked the first chapter, with its anthropological point of view to mathematics. Of the others, the best part of the book was the last chapter about Cantor's theorems. His beautiful proofs still illuminate any book; the definite highlights of (also) this book. Also the parts about the Fibonacci sequence, statistics and the normal distribution were ok, if not exactly innovative.Way too many chapters, however, had, in my opinion, chosen a very weird point of view. Numerologists, religious leaders and all other sorts of quacks made their appearance. I did not not find this interesting at all. It really does have very little to do with mathematics, and certainly even less with why I find mathematics fascinating. The other thing that bugged me was the way the book was written: I did not really like the personal style. Mathematics, to me, is more of a universal thing. And while there are many very interesting characters in the history of mathematics, I still find the math itself more interesting than those characters. Thus I feel that too much time was devoted to the writers personal experiences and encounters with mathematics and mathematicians.All in all, in general a not very interesting book, even though it had a couple of interesting chapters.
What do You think about Here's Looking At Euclid: A Surprising Excursion Through The Astonishing World Of Math (2010)?
Lovely! Really enjoyed the historical perspective on developments in math(s) =P
—tugba
Made me appreciate how math and civilisation go hand in hand.
—Caitlin
Great exploration of numbers and mathematics in general.
—ShikhaBasdeo
