Synopses & Reviews
Number is an eloquent, accessible tour de force that reveals how the concept of number evolved from prehistoric times through the twentieth century. Tobias Dantzig shows that the development of mathand#151;from the invention of counting to the discovery of infinityand#151;is a profoundly human story that progressed by and#147;trying and erring, by groping and stumbling.and#148; He shows how commerce, war, and religion led to advances in math, and he recounts the stories of individuals whose breakthroughs expanded the concept of number and created the mathematics that we know today.
Review
Anyone interested in the history of numbers and mathematics should read this book. (Mario Livio, author of The Golden Ratio)
Review
A classic . . . it deserves a place on the bookshelf of anyone interested in the history of thought. (Charles Seife, author of Zero and Decoding the Universe)
Review
Beyond doubt the most interesting book on the evolution of mathematics which has ever fallen into my hands. (Albert Einstein)
Review
Anyone interested in the history of numbers and mathematics should read this book. (Mario Livio, author of
The Golden Ratio)
A classic . . . it deserves a place on the bookshelf of anyone interested in the history of thought. (Charles Seife, author of Zero and Decoding the Universe)
Beyond doubt the most interesting book on the evolution of mathematics which has ever fallen into my hands. (Albert Einstein)
Synopsis
Number is an eloquent, accessible tour de force that reveals how the concept of number evolved from prehistoric times through the twentieth century. Tobias Dantzig shows that the development of math (from the invention of counting to the discovery of infinity) is a profoundly human story that progressed by trying and erring, by groping and stumbling. He shows how commerce, war, and religion led to advances in math, and he recounts the stories of individuals whose breakthroughs expanded the concept of number and created the mathematics that we know today.
Synopsis
"Beyond doubt the most interesting book on the evolution of mathematics which has ever fallen into my hands." Albert Einstein
Number is an eloquent, accessible tour de force that reveals how the concept of number evolved from prehistoric times through the twentieth century. Tobias Dantzig shows that the development of math from the invention of counting to the discovery of infinity is a profoundly human story that progressed by trying and erring, by groping and stumbling. He shows how commerce, war, and religion led to advances in math, and he recounts the stories of individuals whose breakthroughs expanded the concept of number and created the mathematics that we know today."
About the Author
Tobias Dantzig was born in Latvia, studied under the great mathematician Henri Poincaré in Paris, and immigrated to the United States in 1910. He taught at Johns Hopkins University, Columbia . University, and the University of Maryland. He died in 1956.
Joseph Mazur is a professor of mathematics at Marlboro College, and is the author of Euclid in the Rainforest.
Barry Mazur is the Gerhard Gade University Professor at Harvard University, and is the author of Imagining Numbers (particularly the square root of minus fifteen) .