I finished reading The Language of Mathematics by Keith Devlin. It was mostly stuff that I knew and not many surprises. In the Postscript, he mentions that there is so much more subject matter and he has to make tough decisions.
I will read Edna Kramer and see if the stories are generally the same. If so, maybe it would be wise to read a text on the Islamic Golden Age so that I can work on the "about 500 AD to about 1500 AD" where society was dominated by the Catholic Church. Braudel will definitely bring me back there. The Middle Ages tends to get skipped by Western authors, even though they wouldn't have got the Greeks back without the Muslim occupation of (parts of) Europe. At any rate, I think The Nature and Growth of Modern Mathematics will be an interesting read. I read it in my first or second year of university entirely (though GMAC was a community college back then). I remember I found it incredible, but maybe that's because it was all new to me at that time. Once you get through a math degree, you've covered all the bases. Still, gotta fill in the history in order to be able to recognize how amazing the achievements were rather than just treating it as rote memorization and exercises.
Had another good(?) idea today. Let's call it "Ake Co" for now. Probably crazy like the other ones. ;)
Didn't know there was a video.
What book to go to next? I remember I have that one about Chomsky, but I'll save that for English. Let's finally read this Henry George book...
Comments