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Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons™
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Articles 1 - 12 of 12
Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Mathematics Versus Statistics, Mindy B. Capaldi
Mathematics Versus Statistics, Mindy B. Capaldi
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
Mathematics and statistics are both important and useful subjects, but the former has maintained prominence in the American education system. On the other hand, statistics is more prevalent in daily life and is an increasingly marketable subject to know. This article gives a personal history of one mathematician’s bumpy road to learning and teaching statistics. Additionally, arguments for how and why to include statistics in the K-12 and college curricula are provided.
Don't Ask The Baby To Do Calculus: Thoughts From An Early-Career Math Mama, Caitlin Krul
Don't Ask The Baby To Do Calculus: Thoughts From An Early-Career Math Mama, Caitlin Krul
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
I very recently became a math mama. In my desperate search for patterns and structure in those first few weeks, my husband told me, "She's only three weeks old; we can't expect her to be doing calculus homework." I suppose he was right. I am working towards tenure and finding a new balance between teaching and family, all while trying to not lose sight of who I am. My personal challenges range from the logistics of being a nursing mother in a shared office to feelings of being seen as less adequate in my job if I present myself as …
Disciple, Jessica K. Sklar
Disciple, Jessica K. Sklar
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
This is a love poem for mathematics.
Emergence And Complexity In Music, Zoe Tucker
Emergence And Complexity In Music, Zoe Tucker
HMC Senior Theses
How can we apply mathematical notions of complexity and emergence to music, and how can these mathematical ideas then inspire new musical works? Using Steve Reich's Clapping Music as a starting point, we look for emergent patterns in music by considering cases where a piece's complexity is significantly different from the total complexity of each of the individual parts. Definitions of complexity inspired by information theory, data compression, and musical practice are considered. We also consider the number of distinct musical pieces that could be composed in the same manner as Clapping Music. Finally, we present a new musical …
My Finite Field, Matthew Schroeder
My Finite Field, Matthew Schroeder
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
A love poem written in the language of mathematics.
Joanne Growney's Poetry-With-Mathematics Blog -- An Appreciation, Gregory E. Coxson
Joanne Growney's Poetry-With-Mathematics Blog -- An Appreciation, Gregory E. Coxson
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
Now is a good time to work on the boundaries of practice and theory, of art and science. We are seeing a rising tide of interest in these boundaries. Witness the growing Bridges movement, which has been exploring the connections between mathematics and the arts. Similarly, JoAnne Growney's blog, Intersections -- Poetry with Mathematics, explores the connections between mathematics and poetry. Through this review, I aim to give readers a taste of what can be found in Intersections as a way of encouraging others, be they mathematicians, poets, or neither, to visit the blog.
Squaring, Cubing, And Cube Rooting, Arthur T. Benjamin
Squaring, Cubing, And Cube Rooting, Arthur T. Benjamin
All HMC Faculty Publications and Research
We present mentally efficient algorithms for mentally squaring and cubing 2-digit and 3-digit numbers and for finding cube roots of numbers with 2-digit or 3-digit answers.
Women In Mathematics: An Historical Account Of Women's Experiences And Achievement, Kendra D. Huff
Women In Mathematics: An Historical Account Of Women's Experiences And Achievement, Kendra D. Huff
CMC Senior Theses
For a long time, women have struggled to gain complete acceptance in the mathematics field. The purpose of this paper is to explore the history of women in the field of mathematics, the impact and experiences of current female mathematicians, and the common trends for women in the mathematics field, through literature review and personal interviews. This paper looks at the lives of four famous female mathematicians, as well as female mathematicians in the Claremont Colleges who were interviewed for this paper. Specifically this paper examines the discrimination they faced and how they overcame this discrimination, as well as the …
Mathematical Magic, Arthur T. Benjamin
Mathematical Magic, Arthur T. Benjamin
All HMC Faculty Publications and Research
In this paper, we present simple strategies for performing mathematical calculations that appear magical to most audiences. Specifically, we explain how to square large numbers, memorize pi to 100 places and determine the day of the week of any given date.
The Best Way To Knock 'M Down, Arthur T. Benjamin, Matthew T. Fluet '99
The Best Way To Knock 'M Down, Arthur T. Benjamin, Matthew T. Fluet '99
All HMC Faculty Publications and Research
"Knock 'm Down" is a game of dice that is so easy to learn that it is being played in classrooms around the world. Although this game has been effective at developing students' intuition about probability [Fendel et al. 1997; Hunt 1998], we will show that lurking underneath this deceptively simple game are many surprising and highly unintuitive results.
Bounds On A Bug, Arthur T. Benjamin, Matthew T. Fluet '99
Bounds On A Bug, Arthur T. Benjamin, Matthew T. Fluet '99
All HMC Faculty Publications and Research
In the game of Cootie, players race to construct a "cootie bug" by rolling a die to collect component parts. Each cootie bug is composed of a body, a head, two eyes, one nose, two antennae, and six legs. Players must first acquire the body of the bug by rolling a 1. Next, they must roll a 2 to add the head to the body. Once the body and head are both in place, the remaining body parts can be obtained in any order by rolling two 3s for the eyes, one 4 for the nose, two 5s for the …
Optimal Klappenspiel, Arthur T. Benjamin, Derek Stanford '93
Optimal Klappenspiel, Arthur T. Benjamin, Derek Stanford '93
All HMC Faculty Publications and Research
The game Klappenspiel ("flipping game") is a traditional German game of flipping tiles according to dice rolls. In this paper, we derive the optimal strategy for this game by using dynamic programming. We show that the probability of winning using the optimal strategy is 0.30%.