The World of Mathematics, a monumental four-volume reference 15 years in the making, was specially designed to make mathematics more accessible to the layman. It comprises nontechnical essays on every aspect of the subject, including articles by and about scores of eminent mathematicians, as well as literary figures, economists, biologists, and many other thinkers. Included are... (展开全部) The World of Mathematics, a monumental four-volume reference 15 years in the making, was specially designed to make mathematics more accessible to the layman. It comprises nontechnical essays on every aspect of the subject, including articles by and about scores of eminent mathematicians, as well as literary figures, economists, biologists, and many other thinkers. Included are selections from the works of Archimedes, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Gregor Mendel, Edmund Halley, Jonathan Swift, John Maynard Keynes, Henri Poincare, Lewis Carroll, George Boole, Bertrand Russell, Alfred North Whitehead, John von Neumann, and many others. In addition, an informative commentary by noted mathematics scholar James R. Newman precedes each essay or group of essays, explaining their relevance and context in the history and development of mathematics. Volume 3 (Parts VIII-XVII) contains essays on such topics as statistics and the design of experiments, group theory, the mathematics of infinity, the unreasonableness of mathematics, the vocabulary of mathematics, and mathematics as an art. The essays gathered here include "The Law of Large Numbers," by Jacob Bernoulli; "The Vice of Gambling and the Virtue of Insurance," by George Bernard Shaw; "Mathematics and the Metaphysicians," by Bertrand Russell; and 30 more.
