What's the Use?: The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics

by Ian Stewart

'Stewart is Britain's most brilliant and prolific populariser of maths' Alex Bellos'The instructive equivalent of a Michelin-starred tasting menu' Tim RadfordMany people think mathematics is useless. They're wrong. In the UK, the 2.8 million people employed in mathematical science occupations contributed £208 billion to the economy in a single year - that's 10 per cent of the workforce contributing 16 per cent of the economy. What's the Use? asks why there is such a vast gulf between public perceptions of mathematics and reality. It shows how mathematics is vital, often in surprising ways, behind the scenes of daily life. How politicians pick their voters. How an absurd little puzzle solved 300 years ago leads to efficient methods for kidney transplants. And how a bizarre, infinitely wiggly curve helps to optimise deliveries to your door.

Genres: Nonfiction, Mathematics

315 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 19, 2021

About the author

Ian Nicholas Stewart is an Emeritus Professor and Digital Media Fellow in the Mathematics Department at Warwick University, with special responsibility for public awareness of mathematics and science. He is best known for his popular science writing on mathematical themes.
--from the author's website

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Reviews

[jules · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 sterne? - Das Buch hat Potential, aber ist wirklich trocken und etwas unverständlich, wenn man jetzt nicht unbedingt Mathe studiert…

[Cassidy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the book is interesting and teaches you a lot but some is too literal mathematic focused. Teaches you a lot about theories and scientists and maths problems but a bit advanced for someone who doesn’t study mathematics themselves.

[Dominick Mogomotsi · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thoroughly enjoyable book. For just about anybody (if you have had a negative history with maths, learning its history may shed a new light on it.). After seeing the stories of how many concepts came to be and their applications, I grew to appreciate the grandeur of mathematics. Humanity's sustained effort to create

The author tries to explain enough of the concepts for the reader to understand how spot on/off the original discoverers were, and how incredible the discovery was. There were sections that I only read once despite not understanding because they seemed too complicated(Topology, although the author acknowledges that fact).

Again, this was a page turner. There is so little I know of this subject and a lot less I've wondered, so seeing the two spin together in the stories and their miraculous applications in things I love( CGI, Cameras) was great.
Would recommend

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Brilliant idea for a book but not quite what I was hoping for. Many of the chapters were beyond me but I enjoyed those I could follow. I think I was hoping for some digging into the 'why' of maths being so unreasonably effective which is why I originally filed it under 'cosmology' - but this is more of an argument that it IS effective - with lots of interesting examples.

[SWC · Rating 5 out of 5]

Leonhard Euler approached the Konigsberg Bridge Problem and developed graph theory. That in turn led to an application with kidney transplants. Just one example of mathematics being involved in a topic which is not at first immediately obvious.

[Ivan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this. But I couldn’t work out who it was for. The maths presented were very complex and indecipherable for anyone who hasn’t studied advanced maths. But for those people these applications wouldn’t have been much of a surprise.

[Egor Ermakov · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit uneven book. Starts well, but does not keep up the mark. For example, the chapter about topology is very hand wavy when explaining practical applications.

You can skip reading this book

[Agnieszka Kotowicz-Pogoda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Imho, uneven book. Sometimes, it was very intriguing and understandable. And then there were paragrapghs that were too difficult to follow without bigger knowledge of maths.

[Egg Eater 2000 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very informative and funny, I really enjoyed the format. It got a little hard to understand at times, but it was to be expected!

[Luis Ilabaca · Rating 3 out of 5]

se profundiza matematicamente en los usos de la matematica en la vida cotidiana.