Double Maths First Thing saw two shooting stars last night
Hello! My name is Colin and I am a mathematician on a mission to spread the joy of thinking mathematically, solving problems and generally doing creative things with one’s brain.
Such as, to pick a random example, taking a new instrument to rehearsal with the Pseudorandom Ensemble and finding that bass guitar makes a big difference to the sound, even if the bassist has only been a bassist for a few days. (Incidentally, there is a good chance of exciting news for PRE fans in the next couple of weeks, and if you want to be the first to hear it, you should sign up to the newsletter there.)
Eagle-eyed loyal readers will have noticed that Issue 51 represents a square number of issues – unlike the incredible Chris Smith (whose newsletter you can sign up for by emailing aap03102 [at] gmail [dot] com), I don’t have the capacity to make this issue any squarer than normal. You’ll have to square it yourself.
Links
I continually bang the drum (even as a bassist) about trying to do good in mathematics. I’m certain there are times I’ve screwed up in how I treat other mathematicians, and I’m certain there are times I will in the future; I aim to learn from the first and reduce the number and severity of the second. One useful tool in that aim is to read about other people’s experiences in mathematics and see what I might be missing; I found this reddit thread on the experiences of women in maths saddening and informative.
Much more uplifting, someone who’s certainly on the side of mathematics for good is Colin Wright, without whom MathsJam would not be a thing; one of the many other things he does is aperiodically toot about when you can see the ISS from the UK. I caught a pass through Peterborough’s light pollution on Saturday. I can also recommend Stellarium (online) or downloadable, both for free, to help you make sense of when and where to look.
On the more evil end of the spectrum, Andrew Taylor has pointed me at 100 Jumps. (Andrew isn’t evil, in case that isn’t clear. Andrew is amazing. Here’s his Gravity game, one of several excellent examples.) My attitude to this game is identical to Deborah Singmaster’s attitude to the Rubik’s cube: she correctly identified it as an enemy and refused to touch it.
I’ve mentioned Christian Lawson-Perfect’s Beach Spectres project before: here’s a thread about how it’s going. I love this sort of ephemeral public art project, and that it’s got obvious maths in it is even better. There’s still time to get involved – the event takes place on the weekend of June 6th-7th in Whitley Bay.
One of the reasons I wound up at St Andrews was that the maths department felt inclusive and welcoming. I remember the member of staff showing me around on the open day merrily pointing out the back way into a lecture hall so you could sneak in without being spotted by the professor. Before that, I’d spotted a display in the corridor celebrating the honorary degree that had just been awarded to Benoit B Mandelbrot, and talking about some of the fractal research in the group – including the proof that a fractal can be constructed to cast arbitrary shadows from arbitrary directions, meaning you can (in principle) make a digital sundial. In practice you can, too, and there are even Thingiverse recipes.
Currently
Coming up this week, you’re going to have to choose between Alison Kiddle talking about knitting at MathsWorld in London (Tuesday March 31, 6:15pm) and the Chalkdust pop maths book club (same day, 6:30pm) – they’ll be discussing Tom Briggs’s The Mathematician’s Library.
The Diversity and Decolonisation (D&D) conference takes place at the University of Warwick on Thursday May 7th and Friday May 8th. Registration is free, but you can pay £20 for the conference dinner. Register by Friday March 27th.
Next month is apparently the month of maths: there’ll be a puzzle every couple of days starting mid-April (here are last year’s). Visit the project page to learn more and sign up.
That’s all I’ve got for this week. If you have friends and/or colleagues who would enjoy Double Maths First Thing, do send them the link to sign up – they’ll be very welcome here.
If you’ve missed the previous issues of DMFT or – somehow – this one, you can find the archive courtesy of my dear friends at the Aperiodical.
Meanwhile, if there’s something I should know about, you can find me on Mathstodon as @icecolbeveridge, or at my personal website. You can also just reply to this email if there’s something you want to tell me.
Until next time,
C