How Life Reflects Numbers and Numbers Reflect Life It is depressingly common to hear people say they dont understand maths, or dont get it, or it never made any sense to them, or some variation. Its also worryingly normal (such is the low regard for numerical skills in the modern world) for these declarations to be a source of pride, as if understanding maths were something only losers or deviants would do. One of the main contributions to this lack of general understanding for and appreciation of mathematics seems to be its apparently intangible nature. While maths proves endlessly fascinating to those of us with an interest and appreciation for how important it clearly is, its abstract quality seems like a hurdle for many. Who cares what patterns these random figures on a screen form? Whats the point of it? If these attitudes are ever going to change, it will likely be in part due to the efforts of writers such as Alex Bellos. In his latest book Alex Through the Looking Glass, a follow-up to 2011s successful Alexs Adventures in Numberland (the US titles are, respectively, The Grapes of Math and Heres Looking at Euclid), Bellos endeavours to answer the Whats the point? question by investigating the many ways that mathematical laws and properties become manifest in the real world, and how they are used. Without giving away too many spoilers, a particular highlight is his explanation of how people charged with investigating fraud make use of a certain mathematical rule that causes distinct patterns in large data sets. Basically, in large data sets, numbers that begin with 1 are the most common, followed by those that begin with 2, and so on. Theres not an even spread of numbers beginning with all the digits between 1 and 9 as you (or potential fraudsters) might reasonably assume. After reading this, I found it disturbingly easy to imagine a spin-off TV series called CSI: Accountancy, although the prospect that any fraudsters who read this book might become more effective at covering their tracks is perhaps a little disconcerting. This, however, is the sort of thing that Bellos excels at: taking seemingly abstract maths formulae and rules and showing how they actually underpin much of what goes on in the real world. Making maths tangible and relatable is an achievement in itself, and its worth reading the book for Belloss elegant style of doing so. Quite often, this is not so much a book about maths but a book about how maths affects us. The opening chapters, for example, play around a lot with the psychology of numbers and how people perceive and process them – an interesting approach given that psychology is arguably the disciplinary opposite of mathematics, in that its findings are easy to relate to, but very difficult to pin down as constant and rigid patterns. And I say that as someone who has spent about five years trying to get enough neuroscientific data to fill a PhD thesis! I call this material psychology for want of a better term, as Bellos hasnt conducted what many would recognize as proper psychological studies and doesnt quote peer-reviewed data. Instead, he simply relates his own curiosity about how people feel and think about numbers, and considers the historical and cultural reasons behind their sentiments. He does refer to a few basic surveys he did to investigate peoples perceptions of numbers and the interesting results they provided, but all the research he conducted was purely for this book and related writings, not for publication in some prestigious journal. Some readers may find this a drawback, but on the other hand, Bellos doesnt make any grandiose claims about what hes saying, and he also doesnt get bogged down in minutiae and rigorous analysis (although there are some surprisingly detailed findings). As a result, his book remains easily readable. Alex Through the Looking Glass is not without its flaws, though. Bellos is clearly an engaging writer and a keen mathematician, but his own mathematical expertise sometimes gets the better of him, and as such its often a bit difficult to tell exactly who this book is aimed at. For example, he sometimes presents concepts and rules as simple equations, seemingly assuming they are self-explanatory, when they really are not for anyone who doesnt use maths or equations on at least a semi-regular basis. Its likely that anyone with even a casual interest in or grasp of mathematics will be able to follow most of what he is saying, but given that the book is clearly intended to get laypeople interested in maths, it seems like a somewhat self-limiting approach. And its not like you can just skip over the tricky bits, either. Several times, grasping the equation is integral to comprehending whats going on in the following paragraphs, so if you dont understand the supposedly simple formulae or equations presented at the start of the piece (which I, for my sins, often didnt) then youre going to miss pretty much all of what the remainder of the section is saying. Also, as you might expect from a book that tries to cover so many different aspects of such a wide-ranging field, some sections prove more engaging than others. The previously mentioned forensic investigations are particularly intriguing, whereas the discussions about triangles and their use in measuring the Earths diameter are somewhat less so. Perhaps its because the latter was so long ago or is such a familiar subject for those (like me) who read a lot of science books. Or maybe its because, however talented the writer, its just very hard to make triangles interesting. But all in all, Alex Through the Looking Glass is definitely a worthwhile read, especially for anyone whod like to know more about maths but doesnt think they have the capacity. And thats where Bellos has made his priorities clear: this book is about sharing and explaining the world of mathematics not as some abstract, aloof area inhabited only by the most analytical and socially awkward sorts, but as something that overlaps with and influences our lives in numerous subtle but surprising ways. At this, he succeeds quite comfortably. Granted, you may have to plough through a few more challenging sections, but theres invariably something cool and interesting on the page.
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 11:56:32 +0000
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