You're reading: Travels in a Mathematical World

I have a paper published online-first by BSHM Bulletin: Journal of the British Society for the History of Mathematics. This means it is online and will be in an upcoming issue.

My title is: ‘The unplanned impact of mathematics’ and its implications for research funding: a discussion-led educational activity.

Abstract:

I recently gave a public talk about George Green’s mathematical education and influences, the audio for which is now available online.

I saw the video below, which is Rachel Riley being asked questions about her maths education at a Your Life event, in a tweet by Rob Loe, who quoted a section of one answer around 4:50 where Rachel says: “stop saying proudly that ‘I’m really bad at maths’ because you wouldn’t say ‘I can’t read’, you wouldn’t say ‘I can’t write’ as a proud thing.”

What particularly caught my ear was this section (around 5:30):

You probably remember Relatively Prime. This is a series of audio podcasts from my sometime collaborator Samuel Hansen, including stories about checkers, survival housing, swine flu, juggling, a Spanish basilica, and an alien civilization in England. They’re good. Go and listen to them.

Cory Doctorow described himself on boingboing as “a great fan of Relatively Prime” and the Chinook episode as “one of the best technical documentaries I’ve heard“. Tim Harford described it on Twitter as “a great podcast of storytelling about mathematics“.

I know many thousands of you have been writing in to Aperiodical HQ asking “when, oh when will we get to read Peter’s PhD thesis?” Well, the moment you’ve all been waiting for is finally here. The university have now put it online as a PDF available via the institutional repository. As a reminder, here’s the abstract:

We don’t regard him as a miller, I’m afraid, we regard him as a very eminent mathematician whose work today is still being used in major industries and concerns.

– George Saunders, descendant of George Green, on being asked a question about bags of flour on the Alan Clifford show on BBC Radio Nottingham of 11th September 2014 (starts approx. 1:16).

The above quote is from a short interview with George Saunders and Kathryn Summerwill on BBC local radio about George Green. Green, of whom you may have heard, was a mill-owner in Nottingham and a genius mathematical physicist. The interview marks the opening of an exhibition, curated by Kathryn, ‘George Green: Nottingham’s Magnificent Mathematician‘ in the Weston Gallery at the Lakeside Arts Centre, University of Nottingham.

I am interested in puzzles and games and how they relate to mathematical thinking, not least through my involvement with the Maths Arcade initiative. I was pleased to read what is said on this topic in the 1982 Cockcroft report. This is the report of an inquiry started in 1978 “to consider the teaching of mathematics in primary and secondary schools in England and Wales, with particular regard to its effectiveness and intelligibility and to the match between the mathematical curriculum and the skills required in further education, employment and adult life generally”.