num_pages: 176
description: Mathematics is, Ian Stewart admits, totally unreal - an entirely mental construct. Furthermore, the complicated equations and lengthy proofs we usually identify as math are no more the essence of math than a musical score is a Beethoven symphony. Yet math is the best tool we have for understanding the world around us. By looking at the universe through mathematical eyes, we have discovered a great nature's patterns are clues to the deep regularities that govern the way the world works.Mathematics is to nature as Sherlock Holmes is to evidence. It can look at a single snowflake and deduce the atomic structure of ice crystals; it can start with a violin string and uncover the existence of radio waves. And mathematics still has the power to open our eyes to new and unsuspected the secret structure of a cloud or the hidden rhythms of the weather.Nature's Numbers will equip you with a mathematician's eyes. It will take you sight-seeing in a mathematical universe. And it will change the way you view your own world.
language: English
title: Nature's Numbers: The Unreal Reality of Mathematics
titlecomplete: Nature's Numbers: The Unreal Reality of Mathematics (Science Masters Series)
genres: Physics, Mathematics, Nature, Science Nature, Popular Science, Philosophy, Biology, Science, Nonfiction
ratings_count: 1022
publisher: BasicBooks