Why A4? – The Mathematical Beauty of Paper Size Unless you have skipped a lot of school, or work, or both – or you live in the USA – you have probably used an A4 sheet of paper before now. Have you ever wondered … 24. Aug 2022 | By Ben Sparks | 29 comments
Beyond Chess and Go: Why AI Mastering Games Could Be Good News For Everyone Lee Sedol, one of the best Go players of of all time, wasn’t expecting much of a challenge when he faced the AI AlphaGo in 2016. But despite playing excellently, he was handed a serious … 17. Aug 2022 | By Andrei Mihai | 11 comments
The Fields Medal in Statistics One of the prizes whose laureates are regulars at the HLF is the Fields Medal – awarded by the International Mathematical Union (IMU) every four years since 1950, and celebrating the very pinnacle of mathematical … 10. Aug 2022 | By Katie Steckles | 1 comment
Can we use Asimov’s three laws of robotics in the real world? In the past few weeks, the news was abuzz with talk of a Google engineer who claimed that one of the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) systems had gained sentience. Google was quick to contradict the … 20. Jul 2022 | By Andrei Mihai | 15 comments
With great powers comes great responsibility hose with an interest in the history of mathematical notation may have noted that in last month’s post I mentioned the symbol for equality, =, is often credited to Welsh physician and mathematician Robert Recorde, … 13. Jul 2022 | By Katie Steckles | 39 comments
Mathematik im Deutschen Museum „In diesem Haus darf jeder machen, was ich will.“ Mit diesem klassischen Spruch brachte Oskar von Miller, der Gründer und einflussreiche Gestalter des „Deutschen Museums von Meisterwerken der Naturwissenschaft und Technik“ in München bereits vor … 08. Jul 2022 | By Christoph Pöppe | 5 comments
The Logic of Space and Number: Dennis Sullivan’s quest for simplicity You’re always a bit nervous when talking to a laureate, but as I was running with Dennis Sullivan in the hallway of a hotel in Oslo, my worries quickly vanished. In about two hours’ time, … 06. Jul 2022 | By Andrei Mihai | 1 comment
Die Mathematik der Demokratie Eigentlich ist die Aufgabe klar. Die Zusammensetzung des Bundestages soll das Wahlergebnis getreu widerspiegeln. Die Anzahl der Abgeordneten jeder Partei soll proportional der Anzahl der für diese Partei abgegebenen Stimmen sein, eine Forderung, die in … 22. Jun 2022 | By Christoph Pöppe | 31 comments
Everything Looks The Same The symbol for equality, =, has been in use for hundreds of years. Its invention is often credited to Welsh physician and mathematician Robert Recorde, who used the notation as early as 1557 – although … 15. Jun 2022 | By Katie Steckles | 12 comments
Die widerspenstige Navier-Stokes-Gleichung Sie ist eines der Standard-Arbeitstiere der mathematischen Physik, sie beschreibt ein Allerweltsphänomen – die Bewegung der Flüssigkeiten und Gase –, sie ist seit fast 200 Jahren bekannt, und dennoch sind grundsätzliche Fragen zu ihrer Lösbarkeit … 01. Jun 2022 | By Christoph Pöppe | 17 comments