Infinite Powers: How Calculus Reveals the Secrets of the Universe

Posted on 22 November 2019 by Steven H. Strogatz

Without calculus, we wouldn t have cell phones, TV, GPS, or ultrasound We wouldn t have unraveled DNA or discovered Neptune or figured out how to put 5,000 songs in your pocket Though many of us were scared away from this essential, engrossing subject in high school and college, Steven Strogatz s brilliantly creative, down to earth history shows that calculus is not about complexity it s about simplicity It harnesses an unreal number infinity to tackle real world problems, breaking them down into easier ones and then reassembling the answers into solutions that feel miraculous Infinite Powers recounts how calculus tantalized and thrilled its inventors, starting with its first glimmers in ancient Greece and bringing us right up to the discovery of gravitational waves a phenomenon predicted by calculus Strogatz reveals how this form of math rose to the challenges of each age how to determine the area of a circle with only sand and a stick how to explain why Mars goes backwards sometimes how to make electricity with magnets how to ensure your rocket doesn t miss the moon how to turn the tide in the fight against AIDS As Strogatz proves, calculus is truly the language of the universe By unveiling the principles of that language, Infinite Powers makes us marvel at the world anew. New Read Infinite Powers: How Calculus Reveals the Secrets of the Universe by Steven H. Strogatz For Kindle ePUB or eBook – kino-fada.fr I feel bad for kids who do ordinary arithmetic in grade school For me, the math doesn t get interesting until you get above the Calculus line Calculus with its dealings with the continuum is the first real taste of the infinite If you stick around for Calculus I bet you would wantStrogatz in this book shares some of the excitement we have once the math gets weird In some places, math can be hallucinogeni...Everything becomes simpler at infinity I have a habit of seeing a book, realising it s on a subject I don t know much about, and finding myself overcome with a strong desire, a need even, to read the book That was the case with Infinite Powers How Calculus Reveals the Secrets of the Universe I knew nothing about Calculus The only math I took in school was Algebra and Geometry and though I loved both of them, I can t remember diddly squat about them As for Calculus Never learned it,...Calculus is one of those subjects that is so complicated that most people not only don t understand it, they don t even know what it is that they don t understand But that s unfortunate, because calculus is one of humanity s most impressive achievements, an accomplishment that unlocks the secrets of the universe and delivers our most profound and useful technology, from radio and television to GPS navigation and MRI imaging Calculus is the main protagonist in the story of science, and is a Calculus is one of those subjects that is so complicated that most people not only don t understand it, they don t even know what it is that they don t understand But that s unfortunate, because calculus is one of humanity s most impressive achievements, an accomplishment that unlocks the secrets of the universe and delivers our most profound and useful technology, from radio and television to GPS navigation and MRI imaging Calculus is the main protagonist in the story of science, and is a subject every educated person should understand at least conceptually Fortunately, you don t have to trudge through a thousand page textbook to appreciate the story and power of calculus Steven Strogatz, in his latest book Infinite Powers, has provided a clear, concise, and fascinating tour of the subject In fact, if you don t underst...TL DR In Infinite Powers,Dr Steven H Strogatz teaches us how to use our microwaves to calculate the speed of light I m not kidding That s all the recommendation this book needs Highly Recommended.Review cross posted at Primmlife.com Review When I tell people that I m an engineer, my wife likes to follow up that comment with, He does math all day long A common response is, Oh, you must really like math I didn t enjoy it in insert level of schooling here To keep the conversation TL DR In Infinite Powers,Dr Steven H Strogatz teaches us how to use our microwaves to calculate the speed of light I m not kidding That s all the recommendation this book needs Highly Recommended.Review cross posted at Primmlife.com Review When I tell people that I m an engineer, my wife likes to follow up that comment with, He does math all day long A common response is, Oh, you must really like math I didn t enjoy it in insert level of schooling here To keep the conversation moving I agree, and while I do like math, I didn t always Until I started studying calculu...I certainly wish I had read this book while in high school or college We grilled all the basic technical parts of calculus and yet unsure what was the point Well certainly you don t need to know it if you do not work in science and research Life can go on just as well But being able to appreciate the beauty of it is an added bonus And then who knows, seeing that beauty could change the path you take in life.Strogatz takes the same approach with his earlier pop science book, The Joy of x, I certainly wish I had read this book while in high school or college We grilled all the basic technical parts of calculus and yet unsure what was the point Well certainly you don t need to know it if you do not work in science and research Life can go on just as well But being able to appreciate the beauty of it is an added bonus And then who knows, seeing that beauty could change the path you take in life.Strogatz takes the same approach with his earlier pop science book, The Joy of x, i.e trying his best to explain calculus via intuition, allegories, and graphs It works up to some extent Some concepts require a lot , but as the author tries to avoid discussing the technicals, the discussion becomes a bit shallow That is still fine, this is not a textbook.What I m a bit uneasy about is Strogatz s reverence for calculus to the point of being religious Maybe I have taken it wrong, taken his comparison allegory too much at face value when he cites...For an ordinary layperson, this is perhaps the most accessible history of the development of Calculus one could hope for In easily readable language Strogatz has provided a fascinating narrative covering the ideas behind Calculus, its history from the earliest Greek mathematicians, its dismissal from the formal geometric mathematical canon for some two thousand years, until its resurgence in the 17th c with the work of Newton and Leibnitz, and on to its amazingly extensive application to just For an ordinary layperson, this is perhaps the most accessible history of the development of Calculus one could hope for In easily readable language Strogatz has provided a fascinating narrative covering the ideas behind Calculus, its history from the earliest Greek mathematicians, its dismissal from the formal geometric mathematical canon for some two thousand years, until its resurgence in the 17th c with the work of Newton and Leibnitz, and on to its amazingly extensive application to just about every sphere of activity in modern civilisation.Some knowledge of basic mathematics is required, but not muchthan that Strogatz isconcerned with explaining what Calculus is all about, and pointing out that certain precise questions about specific physical problems can only be best answered by its application...I need to psyche myself up to do some math for work And I have a math sherpa and I arranged to meet him so he can take me through the paper I must tackle But I m old and only really remember my high school math well, so there is a genuine task at hand here.So I duck and dive between the paper and my notes from my MSc thesis from at least fifteen years ago and I work out the answer to lesser problems and I write out my questions for my sherpa and I also need to be thinking math the whole time I need to psyche myself up to do some math for work And I have a math sherpa and I arranged to meet him so he can take me through the paper I must tackle But I m old and only really remember my high school math well, so there is a genuine task at hand here.So I duck and dive between the paper and my notes from my MSc thesis from at least fifteen years ago and I work out the answer to lesser problems and I write out my questions for my sherpa and I also need to be thinking math the whole time I need to be in a mood, basically.That s the task.So I did the sensible thing and went on a bit of a binge and bought a whole bunch of popular math books in one go to read in the tube Infinite Powers I read first, because it looked like it would not challenge me at all and it gets good writeups.It s bloody aw...This book does not make calculus interesting Calculus is widely perceived as important part of science in understanding basic laws of physics But it also has important applications in advanced physics relativity and quantum mechanics, cosmology, astronomy, biology, chemistry, medicine, geology, ecology and in everyday life In this book, the author discusses calculus as catch as catch can story in an historical context without giving some ideas of how calculus helped physics to evolve This is This book does not make calculus interesting Calculus is widely perceived as important part of science in understanding basic laws of physics But it also has important applications in advanced physics relativity and quantum mechanics, cosmology, astronomy, biology, chemistry, medicine, geology, ecology and in everyday life In this book, the author discusses calculus as catch as catch can story in an historical context without giving some ideas of how calculus helped physics to evol...Infinite Powers won t teach you calculus but it ll gently familiarise you with the subject without oversimplifying it You ll finish the book wanting to dive into the actual maths.A few centuries ago some clever people noticed that nature is in an ever changing state, notably Galileo 1564 1642 studying objects in free fall and Kepler 1571 1630 studying the motion of planets around our sun Then Newton 1643 1727 and Leibniz 1646 1716 invented a mathematical tool to get closer and closer to the changing system at hand Steven did a great job explaining how Calculus uses divide and conquer to the extreme taming infinity to describe the universe It changed A few centuries ago some clever people noticed that nature is in an ever changing state, notably Galileo 1564 1642 studying objects in free fall and Kepler 1571 1630 studying the motion of planets around...

Infinite Powers: How Calculus Reveals the Secrets of the Universe

22 November 2019

Steven H. Strogatz