September 2024 (with bad drawings).

A month ends. A month begins.

It’s the 10th such transition this year.

It is the 447th of my lifetime.

It is perhaps the 50 billionth since the moon began orbiting the Earth.

It is an auspicious event, my friends. Please, take out your auspices and join me in this small, bloggy act of celebration.

1. Math for English Majors: Events!

I remain very proud of my new purple book. I’m grateful to those who helped make it, grateful to those who have received it so warmly, and grateful to all the purple trees that gave their life that this purple child might live.

This month, I did two bookstore events with friends: one at iconic Magers & Quinn with poet Claire Wahmanholm, and another at the delightful Thinking Spot with mathematician Kristin Heysse.

2. Math for English Majors: Audio!

Thanks so much to the roughly six million people who hosted me on their podcasts this month! In rapid-fire fashion, here’s the list:

• NPR Life Kit. No introduction required!
• WNYC All Of It. I got to take live radio calls, like some kind of old-timey mayor! I loved it.
• Infinite Loops. No greater pleasure than chatting with Jim! We touched on everything important under the sun: namely, Douglas Adams and Lewis Carroll.
• Smart Family. I really enjoyed this conversation with Dr. Meeder.
• Leading Equity with Dr. Sheldon Eakins. Great to chat with an educator who’s in the thick of it, doing the work.
• Strategy Skills. Thanks to my host for this mystifying conversation.
• Talking to Teens. Another fun chat with Andy Earle.
• Cool Science Radio. A really fun visit with Lynn and Katie.
• Breaking Math. Another delightful chat with Autumn and Gabe.

3. Math for English Majors: Reviews!

Brian Clegg gave a lovely five-star review at Popular Science books:

In this light-hearted take, Orlin does a great job of taking on mathematical processes a step at a time, in part making parallels with the structure of language….

Many popular maths books shy away from the actual mathematical representations, going instead for verbal approximations. Orlin doesn’t do this, but makes use of those linguistic similes and different ways of looking at the processes involved to help understanding. He also includes self-admittedly awful (but entertaining) drawings and stories from his experience as a long-time maths teacher…

Overall, a delight.

And the fabulous Jennifer Ouellette at Ars Technica published a long interview with me, probably the best record available of my thinking about this book:

But Orlin’s main objective is to reconcile the expert’s view of math, “where the notation vanishes and you’re just focusing on the ideas that the notation conveys,” with the beginner’s experience of math, “where you can’t even access the ideas because there’s this thick wall of symbolism in the way.” Math, says Orlin, is both “a collection of beautiful ideas and a language for expressing those ideas.” His approach is the opposite of the usual popularizations of math, where ideas are translated into plain English and notation is largely avoided. Here, the notation is the primary focus.

4. Math for English Majors: My Writing!

Ars Technica was also gracious enough to publish my newest personality quiz: What’s your mathematical style? A sample question:

If you see someone write “0.33333,” how do you interpret this?

(a) They clearly meant 1/3.

(b) They clearly meant 33,333/100,000.

(c) Looks like a fifth-iteration address in a generalized Cantor set. But I can’t tell the specifics without more context.

(d) It’s a coded message to my android brain. To escape the time loop, we must follow Commander Riker’s plan and decompress the main shuttle bay. 

And earlier in the month, Lit Hub published the introduction as a standalone essay: “Humanity’s Strangest Language: On the Joys of Translating Math.” It begins:

I once asked an auditorium of undergraduates to recall their earliest memories of math. One of them shared a scene so peculiar—and yet so universal—that it burrowed deep into my unconscious, to the point where it has begun to feel like a memory of my own…

5. Fun Stuff to Read

Jim Propp’s essay this month is a masterclass. No spoilers. No notes. Though Jim chimes in below with the following caveat:

If parodic writing leaves you cold and you’re prone to hypothermia, put on warm clothing before reading my essay. If exposure to alternative time-lines causes disorientation or dizziness, check with your doctor before reading. And if you’re allergic to overblown prose, mixed metaphors, or the word “paradigm”, under no circumstances will I be responsible for any ill effects that may result should you choose to read my (I mean, Jeff Glibb’s) essay.

I’m also happy to pass along that Princeton University Press is smartly republishing two excellent books by Siobhan Roberts: biographies of mathematicians Donald Coxeter (newly retitled The Man Who Saved Geometry) and John Conway (still bearing its perfect title Genius at Play).

Both well worth owning!

6. A parting puzzle.

(wording tweaked in response to comments!)

In a foreign land whose currency has strange denominations, you are asked to pay a certain bill in cash, using exact change.

You dig bills from your rucksack, and find that you are capable of paying each of the following amounts: 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, or just one other number, this being the highest of all, and (it so happens) the amount you owe.

What is this amount?