Math
- Math
Rise of Big Data underscores need for theory
Big Data can help scientists cope with complex systems, but only with an appreciation of its limits and recognition of the need for theoretical modeling.
- Math
Why Big Data is bad for science
Big Data is supposed to be a scientific bonanza, but it challenges the capabilities of computer science, statistical tests and perhaps calls for revamping the scientific method itself.
- Math
Scientists who claim ‘hot hand’ is a myth have never had one
The “hot hand” in basketball is more than a lucky streak or defiance of statistical chance.
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- Math
Twin primes
Mathematicians have conjectured since Euclid’s time that there are infinite pairs of prime numbers.
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- Math
Egypt wasn’t built in a day, but it did rise quickly
New timeline of ancient civilization’s earliest days finds little time between earliest villages and dominant centralized state.
- Math
Flatland and its sequel bring the math of higher dimensions to the silver screen
In 1884, Edwin Abbott wrote a strange and enchanting novella called Flatland, in which a square who lives in a two-dimensional world comes to comprehend the existence of a third dimension but is unable to persuade his compatriots of his discovery. Through the book, Abbott skewered hierarchical Victorian values while simultaneously giving a glimpse of […]
- Math
Systems biology tunes in to cancer networks
If cable TV systems had a channel called The Cancer Network, doctors would be wise to tune in. But there’s no such channel. So for now, they’ll just have to read articles in scientific journals that publish papers on the science of networks. Scientists in the new field of systems biology have made a lot […]
- Math
A field where breakthroughs are hard to come by produces two big advances on a single day
Problems in number theory often have a certain exasperating charm: They are extraordinarily simple to state, but so difficult to prove that centuries of effort haven’t sufficed to crack them. So it’s pretty remarkable that on one day this May, mathematicians announced results on two of these mathematical conundrums. Both proofs address one of the […]
- Math
Math on Trial
How Numbers Get Used and Abused in the Courtroom by Leila Schneps and Coralie Colmez.
