Why Do We Pay Pure Mathematicians?

So if "applied" means "useful," doesn't it follow that "pure" must mean... "useless"?

And Equality for All

Like Roald Dahl and Catherine-Zeta Jones, the equals sign was born in Wales.

The Sixth Sense for Multiplication

You've been multiplying from behind a blindfold. Tear that cloth from your eyes, and begin to see!

How Science and Math See Each Other

Math is like a parasite-eating bird, perched on the rhino of scientific reality.

Playing to Lose (or, What Mucking Around with Sports Rulebooks Has to Do with Math)

What if all athletes everywhere suddenly caught losing fever, and began pursuing their own defeat? How would games change if we all played to lose?

Descartes’ PB&J (or, the Clever Idea at the Heart of High School Math)

Virtually our entire high school math curriculum now consists of playing out the consequences of Descartes’ innovation.

Why should we use proofs in the first place?

It’s helpful here to contrast math with science. That’s because they’re completely unalike.

The Psychic Card Trick

I was eight, maybe nine, at the kitchen table with my dad. He was describing a professor who claimed his grad student is psychic.

Sorting the Tools from the Toys

Mathematical tools shine floodlights into dark corners. Mathematical toys are more like flashlights dangling off of a keychain: fun, cute, and basically powerless.

The Real Bracketology

I’m here to offer a hymn of praise to the poor, misunderstood public servants that make income taxes work. No, not IRS agents. I’m talking about tax brackets.