Weekly Potpourri

1)  Some discussion over at Quora re: specialization in mathematics:

https://www.quora.com/Is-it-still-possible-for-a-mathematician-to-be-competent-in-most-of-the-areas-or-fields-of-mathematics

2)  Nice list of 6 easy-to-state, very-difficult-to-solve math problems:

http://www.sciencealert.com/6-of-the-simplest-maths-problem-that-no-one-can-solve

3)  Evelyn Lamb introduces "metallic means" beyond the golden mean, in this fun, tidbit-full post:

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/meet-the-metallic-means/

...also from Dr. Lamb, this moving review of the book, "Hidden Figures":

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/review-hidden-figures/

4)  Gender, math, collaboration etc. (longread; h/t Jim Propp):

https://ilaba.wordpress.com/2016/10/23/a-seminar-room-of-our-own/

5)  Jo Boaler's overview of American math education:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-math-education-in-the-u-s-doesn-t-add-up/

6)  Peter Woit has placed a free pdf copy of the final draft of his latest book (on quantum theory and mathematics) on the Web here (due out next year):

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/QM/qmbook.pdf

7)  Especially for teachers, new from Fawn Nguyen, wise and thoughtful as always:
http://fawnnguyen.com/good-enough-for-now-curriculum/

8)  And if you need still more math potpourri:

a) the new (139th) "Carnival of Mathematics" now posted:

http://gonitsora.com/carnival-of-mathematics-139/

b) and the new 101st "Math Teachers At Play" carnival as well:

http://www.arithmophobianomore.com/math-teachers-play-blog-carnival-101/

Potpourri BONUS! (extra NON-mathematical links of interest):

1)  Of bongos and physics...  Futility Closet tweeted out one of its older posts this week, putting some classic Richard Feynman on display:

https://www.futilitycloset.com/2013/08/28/higher-things-2/

2)  In the last couple years I've replaced a tennis habit with a pickleball addiction. If you happen to be similarly addicted I've added a few items (t-shirts & bumperstickers) to my Zazzle store:

http://tinyurl.com/zd6p7mx

http://tinyurl.com/zsttl5p

http://tinyurl.com/z49atnu

http://tinyurl.com/glpvdf2

Some Miscellany From the Week

1)  This week The Aperiodical tweeted out that, "A little birdy tells us that Mochizuki's abc conjecture proof will be accepted into a journal "in the next few months". Hope it's not in The Journal of Irreproducible Results ;-)

Seriously, how does a journal even have room for such a proof, or do I assume they print summary and commentary, and give a digital link to the actual paper proof?

2)  Short Thomas Lumley piece on brute force in 'linguistics' computation (with interesting quote from Geoffrey Pullum):

http://www.statschat.org.nz/2016/10/20/brute-force-and-ignorance-2/

3)   "Why Science Needs the Humanities" from John McGowan here:

http://experimentalmath.org/2016/10/why-science-needs-the-humanities/

4)  Fantastic followup on negative numbers from James Propp:

https://mathenchant.wordpress.com/2016/10/16/going-negative-part-2/

(and next month he'll be writing about self-referential sentences, one of my favorite topics)

5)  Andrew Gelman complains (I think rightfully) about Dan Gilbert's prior "inane" or "ridiculous" defense of social psychology's replication rate:

http://andrewgelman.com/2016/10/20/we-have-a-ways-to-go-in-communicating-the-replication-crisis/

6)  I'm not one of them... BUT, if you're a fan of philosopher Alain Badiou, worth noting he has a new volume out, "In Praise of Mathematics":

http://amzn.to/2eyDkUg

7)  Wendy Menard encourages teachers to blog, and links to a lot of her own favorite math education resources/blogs here:
http://www.mathforamerica.org/news/enrich-and-enhance-your-professionalism-through-blogging

8)  Two of my loves in life are math and birds, so, hey, how could I resist citing a blog-post that combines the two:

http://www.statschat.org.nz/2016/10/17/vote-takahe-for-bird-of-the-year/

9)  And there's always more weekly math-and-learning fare at Mike's Math Page:

https://mikesmathpage.wordpress.com

Potpourri BONUS! (extra NON-mathematical links of interest):

1)  From last week's TED Radio Hour this (re-run) segment of Margaret Heffernan talking about the nature of work:

http://www.npr.org/2015/10/02/443412777/is-the-professional-pecking-order-doing-more-harm-than-good

2)  And this is just one of my all-time favorite This American Life episodes ("The Family That Flees Together, Trees Together"), about the Jarvis family. It goes all the way back to 2001, and I find most people either missed it, or have forgotten it:

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/177/american-limbo?act=1#play

Potpourri

From the past week:

1)  Presh Talwalkar offers up a semi-classic logic problem:

http://mindyourdecisions.com/blog/2016/10/09/the-mind-twisting-logical-list-riddle-sunday-puzzle/

2)  Tadashi returns to Numberphile with some shoelace knotology:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tY69D3PSmIk

3)  There's a new 'Gathering For Gardner' ("Celebration of Mind") rapidly approaching  ~Oct. 21, Martin Gardner's birthday:

http://www.celebrationofmind.org/wordpress_site/?page_id=113

4)  Ben Orlin touched a nerve when he argues in favor of public over private education this week:

https://mathwithbaddrawings.com/2016/10/12/why-competitive-marketplaces-are-an-awkward-fit-for-education/

5)  Great Quanta longread (from 4 great writers) on four math and science teachers:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161011-math-science-teachers/

6)  More p-value discussion:

https://aeon.co/essays/it-s-time-for-science-to-abandon-the-term-statistically-significant

...and a more technical piece:

http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2566171

7)  Another mathematician reporting that the math that turns so many off in school, is NOT real math:

http://ow.ly/dM5o3056pYT

8)  More on algorithms and big data:

https://theconversation.com/how-mathematics-can-fight-the-abuse-of-big-data-algorithms-66065

9)  The importance of mathematics, past and future, via Keith Devlin:

http://devlinsangle.blogspot.com/2016/10/it-was-twenty-years-ago-today.html

10)  New (pricey) book for serious logicians/philosophers-of-math, "Gödel's Disjunction":

http://amzn.to/2dKnY0D

Potpourri BONUS! (extra NON-mathematical links of interest):

1)  For anyone deeply-entrenched in linguistics, this long David Berlinski piece on Chomskyean fare:

http://inference-review.com/article/the-recovery-of-case

2)  It's gone viral so am sure you've already seen it, but that won't stop me from including such a great song put to great use:

[...blogging may continue to be light next several weeks, while I watch the U.S. Presidential campaign in utter disbelief!]

A Few Reads From the Week

ICYM any of these:

1)  Last week there were several tributes to Richard Guy's first 100 years with us... including this piece from Colm Mulcahy:

http://cardcolm-maa.blogspot.com/2016/09/richard-k-guy-turns-100.html

...and this one from Siobhan Roberts:

http://nautil.us/blog/an-infinitely-rich-mathematician-turns-100

2)  "Mathematics Rising" ponders infinity:

http://mathrising.com/?p=1413

3)  Another of Evelyn Lamb's favorite spaces, Borromean Rings:

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/a-few-of-my-favorite-spaces-borromean-rings/

4)  A new issue of the wonderful Chalkdust Magazine:

http://chalkdustmagazine.com/read/issue-04/

5)  Interesting piece on how blind people perceive dimensions and number:

http://nautil.us/blog/why-blind-people-are-better-at-math

6)  Randy Weiner and Keith Devlin (BrainQuake co-founders) held a Quora Q & A this week about math-learning video games:

https://www.quora.com/session/BrainQuake/1

...and, in the first of a series, Quanta Magazine reports on the new trend in math and science education:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161005-commoncore-math-ngss-science-education/

7)  I see Gary Smith, whose book "Standard Deviations" I really enjoyed from a couple years back, has a new volume out, "What the Luck." I'm guessing, sight unseen, that it's another great popular read:
http://amzn.to/2dPOAiU

8)  The latest from Erica Klarreich in Quanta Magazine:
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161006-new-algorithm-solves-cake-cutting-problem/

9)  And the latest mind-blower from Numberphile:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k1jegU4Wb4

Potpourri BONUS! (extra NON-mathematical links of interest):

1)  From a recent RadioLab show (though possibly a re-run?), another segment playing to my interest in language and psycholinguistics:

http://www.radiolab.org/story/96063-searching-clues/

2)  Krista Tippett's "On Being" show on NPR this week is a replay of an interview with physicist/author Leonard Mlodinow:
http://www.onbeing.org/program/leonard-mlodinow-randomness-and-choice/6295