Humble Pi: When Math Goes Wrong in the Real World, by Matt Parker (2019)
I am not a mathematician, but my husband is. His knowledge of math, however, has not rubbed off on me. I picked up this book, though, because I was amused by the cover ~ It’s of a bicycle with square wheels.
The author, Matt Parker, a comedian and former math teacher, managed to make the math we use in our daily lives (even unwittingly), come to life through examples. He uses may examples of when humans fail to take math into consideration, and projects fail, sometimes with tragic results. He also explained how days, months and years are calculated. Prior to the Julian calendar, named in honor of Julius Caesar, the lengths of months was somewhat arbitrary and political. He explained the math behind the Y2K scare. A similar problem may result in 2038!
I can’t say I understood everything in this book, but I can say it was a fun read and I did learn a lot. It was also laugh-out-loud funny!
Read: June 18, 2021
4 Stars
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