The Best Writing on Mathematics 2017

The year's finest mathematics writing from around the world

This annual anthology brings together the year’s finest mathematics writing from around the world. Featuring promising new voices alongside some of the foremost names in the field, The Best Writing on Mathematics 2017 makes available to a wide audience many articles not easily found anywhere else—and you don’t need to be a mathematician to enjoy them. These writings offer surprising insights into the nature, meaning, and practice of mathematics today. They delve into the history, philosophy, teaching, and everyday occurrences of math, and take readers behind the scenes of today’s hottest mathematical debates.

Here Evelyn Lamb describes the excitement of searching for incomprehensibly large prime numbers, Jeremy Gray speculates about who would have won math’s highest prize—the Fields Medal—in the nineteenth century, and Philip Davis looks at mathematical results and artifacts from a business and marketing viewpoint. In other essays, Noson Yanofsky explores the inherent limits of knowledge in mathematical thinking, Jo Boaler and Lang Chen reveal why finger-counting enhances children’s receptivity to mathematical ideas, and Carlo Séquin and Raymond Shiau attempt to discover how the Renaissance painter Fra Luca Pacioli managed to convincingly depict his famous rhombicuboctahedron, a twenty-six-sided Archimedean solid. And there’s much, much more.

In addition to presenting the year’s most memorable writings on mathematics, this must-have anthology includes a bibliography of other notable writings and an introduction by the editor, Mircea Pitici. This book belongs on the shelf of anyone interested in where math has taken us—and where it is headed.

"Praise for previous editions: "Wonderful…. [C]annot be recommended highly enough!""---Robert Schaefer, New York Journal of Books

"Praise for previous editions: "Entertaining and informative.""---Ian D. Gordon, Library Journal

"Do not hesitate and read it with great pleasure; you do not need to be a mathematician to enjoy it!"---Alexander M. Nikolić, MathSciNet

"As ever, there is a substantial variety of style and content, and personally I found plenty to enjoy in this selection."---Gerry Leversha, Mathematical Gazette

"Praise for previous editions: "A volume of unexpectedly fascinating mathematical research, musings, and studies that explore subjects from art to medicine. . . . [R]eaders from many disciplines will find much to pique their interest.""

"The most striking thing about this collection is how beautiful the writing is. The articles cover a wide variety of topics, with some biographical sketches, some math education, some philosophy, and a moderate amount of actual mathematics. . . . There’s something here for everyone."---Allen Stenger, MAA Reviews

"With a shrewd eye for topics both obscure and practical, Pitici chooses a variety of thoroughly accessible works that tie abstract math to the real world in this eighth installment of the annual series. . . . Pitici gives readers an entertaining look at the odd, the amusing, and the utilitarian without requiring any more than a readerly curiosity."