Pi in the sky

What Hacker News says

1. dmdNov 2024
   Just a few weeks ago I got an absolutely delightful email:

   > Ні! This might seem a little out of the blue and it is but a few years ago at a library book sale I got the book "Pi in the Sky". It has your personal library stamp on it, so I guess YOU got it at a library sale and then re-donated it? I had never read anything about math before that was at all interesting and it got me reading lots of other "popular" math books and I got really interested in number theory. I am now a freshman at CMU and planning to be a math major!

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2. jostylrJan 2021
   His book Pi in the Sky was one of the two most influential math books for me in my youth; the other was Modern Mathematics by Edna Kramer.

   I had not heard of his death. Thanks for posting about it.

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3. jostylrJul 2020
   I remember Pi in the Sky by John Barrows very fondly. It has more of a focus on geometry and logic.

   A Programmer's Introduction to Mathematics by Jeremy Kun is wide ranging and appropriate if there is also interest in programming.

   Nature and Growth of Modern Mathematics by Edna Kramer is a wonderful book if history is a passion as well.

   Elements of Mathematics by John Stillwell is a broad overview of subjects. It has a crisp mathematical feel to it.

   Vector Calculus, Linear Algebra, and Differential Forms by John & Barbara Hubbard is a beautiful introduction to the multi-dimensional aspects, but it is a book that should happen after knowing one dimensional calculus. .

   If your child hasn't been exposed to Guesstimation, then a book on that is highly recommended. The book with that title by Weinstein and Adams is a nice guide to investigating that realm.

   If the child does arithmetic from right to left, as is sadly too common, the book Speed Mathematics Simplified by Edward Stoddard is a great remedy for that.

   Everyday Calculus by Oscar Fernandez could also be worth a look.

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4. contingenciesNov 2015
   Nice thread. Gotta say, listing all this makes me feel a hell of a lot less lazy! (In southwest China...)

   1. Classical Chinese, by translating old texts on Wikisource: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Translation:Manshu

   2. Just brushed up on technical drawing and woodworking to get new office furniture built.

   3. Fatherhood.

   4. Event planning. I'm trying to set up a community event to take ~40 party people down to a nearby lake to spend a day in the sun on the lakeshore and go sailing on two Weta Trimarans I transported here last year. http://wetamarine.com/ + http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuxian_Lake ... brushed up on sailing a year ago, it'd been 20 years.

   5. Winemaking. The focus is on arriving at a process and set of inputs that result in a scalable and commercially viable range of non-grape based wines (cider/perry type drinks, but not limited to apples and pears), then flip it and registered IP to a large and established distributor, and use the knowledge and cash gained to do some small-batch, higher-end organic type stuff.

   6. Improving my poetry: I am part of a very international poetry group which meets once every week or two and reads and discusses poetry in English and Chinese, with occasional additional languages.

   7. Modern history. I joined a Marxist reading group and am learning a lot about the history of late 19th century/early 20th century Europe as well as various shades of communist/socialist ideology. (Previously, living in China, I have stayed consciously ignorant of such things, which I had never found particularly interesting.)

   8. Philosophy of mathematics. Currently reading Pi in the Sky which is an awesome book which I would particularly recommend as a very readable, tangent-laden ponder for programmers without a significant background in formal mathematics who like history, mathematics or philosophy.

   9. Documentary filmmaking + new software. Currently working on a social documentary of foreigners living in this corner of southwest China. Although I'd done some since analog days, this is my first major project and I'm using the new Lightworks software on Gentoo Linux: http://www.lwks.com/ .. also planning to finish by end of year.

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