I am interested in puzzles and games and how they relate to mathematical thinking, not least through my involvement with the Maths Arcade initiative. I was pleased to read what is said on this topic in the 1982 Cockcroft report. This is the report of an inquiry started in 1978 “to consider the teaching of…
Not mentioned on The Aperiodical this month – August 2014
As usual in the summer, we’ve all been off doing our own things and consequently neglecting the news queue. Time to break out our tried-and-tested solution: a combo-post summarising everything we failed to cover in depth, before it goes completely out of date. The Royal Society has Opinions about Education The Royal Society has released a…
Puzzlebomb – August 2014
Puzzlebomb is a monthly puzzle compendium. Issue 32 of Puzzlebomb, for August 2014, can be found here: Puzzlebomb – Issue 32 – August 2014 The solutions to Issue 32 can be found here: Puzzlebomb – Issue 32 – August 2014 – Solutions Previous issues of Puzzlebomb, and their solutions, can be found here.
John Venn is 180
Today is the 180th Birthday of John Venn, inventor of the often-misused mathematical staple the Venn Diagram. In celebration, Google have made today’s Google Doodle be a playful interactive toy where you can select two categories and it’ll show you something in the intersection. Here’s some of our other favourite Venn diagrams from the internet: ‘Math’,…
Listen to the premiere of “A Man from the Future”
I could have sworn we posted about the fact the Pet Shop Boys were writing some music about Alan Turing, but I can’t find anything in the archives. Anyway, the Pet Shop Boys have written a piece of music “inspired by codebreaker Alan Turing”, titled A Man from the Future (not The Man from the Future, the 2011…
An Alan Turing expert watches the “The Imitation Game” trailer
We weren’t sure quite what to think about the recently-released trailer for The Imitation Game. We don’t know enough about either films or Alan Turing to give an authoritative opinion. James Grime, on the other hand, knows a lot about both… The trailer for the highly anticipated new film about mathematician Alan Turing was released this…
Maths movie round up
You wait and wait for a movie about a mathematical genius, and then three come at once. I’ve got Turing, I’ve got Ramanujan, I’ve got Erdős.