Beginning with simple calculations, such as the number of sheep in a herd, the field of mathematics has developed over time according to people’s needs and interests. In the course of history, ...

While American children once learned to add by reading a poster of animals and birds, they do it now by playing games on computers. Each step in between—whether it be a box of blocks or exercises ...

Like many of the cultures it studies, the Department of History of Mathematics has had innovative leaders, a golden era and, inevitably, a fall from glory. This year could witness the end of a ...

Nobel laureate Eugene Wigner once wrote that mathematics has the uncanny ability to describe the universe around us. That’s the spirit behind the new book “The Big Bang of Numbers: How to Build the ...

March 14 — a day you’re more likely than most others to eat — or throw — a pie and get a reduced price on your pizza. It’s all in celebration of pi (Greek letter π), the mathematical constant and ...

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics releases “Currisulum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics.” The document emphasizes that students should understand the concepts underlying ...

One of the biggest mathematical achievements in human history has to do with the origin of nothing—or zero, to be more specific. Researchers at the University of Oxford's Bodleian Library recently ...

THE two volumes of this history (the first of which was noticed in NATURE of November 15, 1924) deal with the subject from two different aspects. The first volume, described as a “General Survey,” is ...