The one and only Persi Diaconis is going to give a lecture on Martin Gardner at Queen Mary University of London next April. Exciting!

As part of the 2014 British Mathematical Colloquium, join Professor Persi Diaconis, mathematician and former professional magician to celebrate the centenary of the birth of Martin Gardner, with a lecture on the life, work and magic of this famous populariser of mathematics and science.

Martin Gardner brought mathematics to life for millions of people from homemakers to professional mathematicians. Professor Diaconis will try to explain what he did and how he did it. From Alice in Wonderland, Psychic exposures, bad poetry, the Game of Life, public key cryptography and a thousand other things, his clarity and curiosity are contagious. But, beware–as someone once wrote:

WARNING: Martin Gardner has turned dozens of innocent youngsters into math professors and thousands of math professors into innocent youngsters.

The hour-long lecture will take place at 18:30 on the 7th of April, 2014, in the Great Hall of QMUL’s People’s Palace.

More information

The Magic of Martin Gardner event page at QMUL.

via Ivan Tomasic on Twitter