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82 afleveringen, van nieuw naar oud
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Math Exploration for Kids
9 december 2021 · 18 min
Mark Hendrickson, of Beast Academy Playground, talks about how to bring young kids into the joy, creativity and exploration that mathematicians experience. Kids enjoy art because they are free to try things and shun math for its apparent rigidness. He offers subtly mathematical games that invite even very young children to explore and question. Lees meer
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Is Mathematics an Art?
10 november 2021 · 12 min
Joshua Sack, mathematics professor at California State University, Long Beach, explores the breadth of art and mathematics and finds much commonality in patterns, emotions and more.
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Math as a way of thinking
13 oktober 2021 · 20 min
Ian Stewart, prolific author of popular books about math, discusses how math is the best way to think about the natural world. Often math developed for its own sake is later found useful for seemingly unrelated real-world problems. A silly little puzzle about islands and bridges leads eventually to a theory used for epidemics, transportation and kidney transplants. A space-filling curve, of interest to mathematicians mainly for being counterintuitive, has applications to efficient package delivery. The mathematical theories are often so bizarre that you wouldn't find them if you started with the real-world problem. Lees meer
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Symmetries in 3 and 4 Dimensions
8 september 2021 · 19 min
Joseph Bennish joins us once again to continue his discussion of symmetry, this time venturing into higher dimensions. We explore the complex symmetry groups of the Platonic solids and the sphere and their relationships. We then venture into the 4th dimension, where we see that, with a change to the distance the symmetries are maintaining, we get Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Lees meer
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Symmetry, Shapes and Groups
14 augustus 2021 · 20 min
We are all born with an intuitive attraction to symmetry, through human faces and heartbeats. Joseph Bennish, of California State University Long Beach, explores the mathematical meaning of symmetry, what it means for one shape to be more symmetric than another, how symmetries form mathematical groups and groups form symmetries, and hints at implications for Fourier analysis, astronomy and relativity. Lees meer
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Freshmen and Sophomores Confront Unsolved Problems
14 juli 2021 · 19 min
Dana Clahane, Professor of Mathematics at Fullerton College, dispels some of the misconceptions about mathematics and discusses some famous unsolved problems that he has freshmen and sophomores working on, learning what math is really about.
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Stereotypes of Mathematics and Mathematicians
16 juni 2021 · 18 min
Will Murray, chair of the math department at California State University, Long Beach, discusses popular stereotypes of mathematicians and what they do when they do mathematics. Is it all lone geniuses generating big numbers? If so many people dislike mathematical thinking, why is Sudoku so popular? Lees meer
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Prime numbers and their surprising patterns
2 juni 2021 · 17 min
Joseph Bennish talks about prime numbers, a simple concept with surprising characteristics. Are they regular or random? This takes us into unexpected realms--calculus, complex numbers, Fourier transforms and "the music of the primes."
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Creativity in Mathematics
19 mei 2021 · 18 min
Josh Hallam shares some of the ways he uses story writing and other creative endeavors in his math classes. He also discusses math in popular culture, including an original theorem in the animated show Futurama.
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The unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics
5 mei 2021 · 13 min
Saleem Watson discusses the mysterious way math predicts the natural world. Much of math is invented, and yet there are many examples of cases in which purely abstract math, developed with no reference to the natural world, later is found to make accurate and useful models and predictions of the physical world. Lees meer
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Alternative Proofs and Why We Seek Them
21 april 2021 · 17 min
Joseph Bennish discusses two famous theorems, proved long ago, and some modern alternative proofs. Why would we bother reproving something that was confirmed thousands of years ago? The answers are insight, aesthetics, and opening up surprising new areas of investigation. Lees meer
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Symmetry--It's More Than You Think
7 april 2021 · 14 min
Scott Crass, Professor of Mathematics at CSULB, expands our vague intuition about symmetry to look at transformations of various kinds and what they leave fixed. This approach finds applications in physics, biology, art and several branches of math.
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Is Math Discovered or Invented?
24 maart 2021 · 17 min
Saleem Watson, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics, CSULB, confronts an ancient mathematical argument. Is math a body of eternal truths waiting for an explorer to uncover them, or an invention or work of art created by the human mind? Or some of each?
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That's Impossible. Oh, Yeah? Prove It.
10 maart 2021 · 17 min
Paul Eklof, Professor Emeritus UCI, discusses the famous impossible straightedge-and-compass constructions of antiquity that have fascinated mathematicians and attracted cranks for centuries. There are infinitely many possible constructions. How can you prove not one of them will work? Lees meer
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The Joy of Mathematical Discovery
24 februari 2021 · 17 min
Joseph Bennish, math professor at California State University, Long Beach, discusses how math is an exploration involving imagination and excitement. Kids get this. Adults can recapture this by generalizing and questioning. For example, a simple barnyard riddle leads to questions about optics. Lees meer
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The Monty Hall Problem
10 februari 2021 · 14 min
You are a contestant on Let's Make a Deal, hosted by Monty Hall. There are 3 identical doors. Behind only one is the prize car. You make your choice, then Monty Hall opens one of the other doors to reveal a goat and asks whether you want to change your choice. Should you, or does it matter? Paula Sloan talks about the counterintuitive answer, and how she got the Duke MBA students in her math class to believe the answer. Lees meer
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What Is Mathematics? Some Surprising Answers
27 januari 2021 · 21 min
Brian Katz, a professor at California State University, Long Beach, approaches math as a philosopher, a linguist and an artist. It is not a science, but a byproduct of consciousness, an expression of humanity and a way to make connections.
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Being a Mathematician
13 januari 2021 · 16 min
We talk with Kathryn McCormick, Assistant Professor at California State University, Long Beach, about why she got into this obscure field, what a mathematician really does, and where we can learn more about being a mathematician.
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Math Jokes and What They Say about Mathematicians
30 december 2020 · 16 min
There are a lot of jokes that poke fun at mathematicians, how they think and how they fumble around in the real world. Many of them start, "A mathematician, an engineer and a physicist ..." We'll look at what these jokes say about us. The most telling is a little joke that only a mathematician would enjoy, since it gives surprising insight into how mathematicians think through all this abstraction. Lees meer
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The Most Famous (Formerly) Unsolved Problem
16 december 2020 · 16 min
Fermat’s Last Theorem is easy to state but has taken over 300 years to prove. Fermat’s supposed “marvelous proof” has been a magnet for crackpots and obsessed mathematicians, leading through a treasure hunt across almost all branches of mathematics.
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The Mathematics of Art
2 december 2020 · 14 min
A surprising amount of art is inspired by mathematics. The book Fragments of Infinity describes many works of art and the mathematics behind them. Meet mathematicians who have become artists and artists who have become mathematicians, and some who have always straddled both worlds. Lees meer
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The Real World Is a Special Case
18 november 2020 · 16 min
Abstract math is at once about nothing and about everything. The structures it builds may represent numbers, real world objects, music, or things we can barely imagine. Here we look at group theory for numbers, music, Rubik’s cubes and beyond.
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How to Find Something You’ve Never Seen
4 november 2020 · 14 min
Another seemingly easy problem that’s hard to solve. In fact, it's unsolved. Find an odd perfect number or prove one doesn’t exist. The search involves “spoof” answers, trying to find the right answer (or prove it doesn't exist) by looking at wrong answers. Hey, nothing else has worked. Lees meer
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Beyond the Third Dimension
21 oktober 2020 · 14 min
The fourth dimension is a staple of science fiction and the key to relativity. What exactly is it and how can we visualize it? What about higher dimensions?
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One Theorem, 99 Proofs
7 oktober 2020 · 9 min
Can you really approach one mathematical statement 99 different ways? We review the wonderful book 99 Variations on a Proof. The answer is yes.
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A Beautiful Theorem with an Ugly Proof
30 september 2020 · 13 min
The Four Color Theorem is a pretty little conjecture that has been intriguing mathematicians for more than a century. Too bad the proof stands as an example of really ugly mathematics.
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To Infinity...and Beyond
23 september 2020 · 17 min
What is infinity, why does it seem so weird, and can you really go beyond it?
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The Unsolved Is Solved...and Another
16 september 2020 · 11 min
We consider two problems, one in tiling and one in knots. They had each had been unsolved for over 50 years and their solutions hit the popular press in the same week. What kind of skills help people make surprising connections and new discoveries?
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This Podcast is Lying
9 september 2020 · 16 min
We explore the mind-blowing Liar and related paradoxes and how they changed mathematics
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An Impossible Easy Question
2 september 2020 · 15 min
Goldbach’s Conjecture and how a statement that is easy to understand is difficult or impossible to resolve
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Everything You Know About Math is Wrong
26 augustus 2020 · 15 min
We explore some of the common misconceptions about mathematics and mathematicians.
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The Art of Mathematics trailer
26 juli 2020 · 1 min