How Not to Be Wrong

Jordan Ellenberg is a professor of mathematics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with a Ph.D. in mathematics from Harvard and an MFA in creative writing from Johns Hopkins. His areas of research specialization are number theory and algebraic geometry. He has written articles on mathematical topics in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Wired, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, and the Believer, and is a regular columnist for Slate.该内容有Taobao 乐读书屋提供 # http://l-books.taobao.com #

出版者:Penguin Press

作者:Jordan Ellenberg

页数:480

出版时间:2014-5-29

价格:USD 27.95

装帧:Hardcover

isbn号码:9781594205224

图书标签:数学思维科普英文原版方法论Mathematics英文版美国

The Freakonomics of math—a math-world superstar unveils the hidden beauty and logic of the world and puts its power in our hands

The math we learn in school can seem like a dull set of rules, laid down by the ancients and not to be questioned. In How Not to Be Wrong, Jordan Ellenberg shows us how terribly limiting this view is: Math isn’t confined to abstract incidents that never occur in real life, but rather touches everything we do—the whole world is shot through with it.

Math allows us to see the hidden structures underneath the messy and chaotic surface of our world. It’s a science of not being wrong, hammered out by centuries of hard work and argument. Armed with the tools of mathematics, we can see through to the true meaning of information we take for granted: How early should you get to the airport? What does “public opinion” really represent? Why do tall parents have shorter children? Who really won Florida in 2000? And how likely are you, really, to develop cancer?

读后感

英文名叫how not to be wrong。书都是围绕这个写的，非常切题。但是中文名是什么鬼，受了魔鬼经济学的影响么，完全不知所云。 也是中了某推荐的招，kindle上买的，还好几乎没有什么数学公式，否则kindle看太累。 讲的内容比较浅，基本完全在本科高等数学的水平内，理念的话中学...  

听说这是比尔盖茨最喜欢的十本书之一，我才找来读。读了前两章，还有点鄙视盖茨，这么简单的数学概念，有啥值得推荐的？但是读到后面不得了，越来越引人入胜，有点放不下的感觉。 重点推荐第二、第三、第四部分。第一部分略浅显；而第五部分，尤其最后一章，感觉太拔高数学了，...  

用户评价

“Maybe individual people seem irrational because they aren’t really individuals. Each one of us is a little nation-state, doing our best to settle disputes and broker compromises between the squabbling voices that drive us.”

作者Ellenbery开始将数学由简单到复杂，解决问题由简单到复杂分成四象限，该书着重讲述简单数学解决复杂问题这个象限。内容从古希腊人无理数的发现，圆周率的计算，概率统计与投资，与彩票设计，几何结构与通信编码，Fisher的假设检验与Neumann的回归分析的争论，Shannon的通信原理，投票选举中的Condorcet 悖论，Condor的提出以数学定量分析的社会科学推动社会前进。整个书涉猎数学范围很广并且与当今社会的空间通信编码，经济，金融投资，社会发展紧密联系，非常好。

读了一半不想读了

多好的一本给大家科普数学的书，起这么个鸡汤名。看到有人的评论，“数学部分还是没有耐心去看，但是里面讲到的思维在生活中非常受用。” 忽然又明白为什么要起这样的名字了。proof才是最好看的部分好吗！妈的没有耐心你看什么数学书！

虽然我对书中提到的大部分概念并不陌生，但仍然学到不少东西。作者把很多看似毫不相干的概念或现象巧妙地联系到一起，展现出数学的美妙和无所不在。