The Big Sudoku Book has received another review, and in an unexpected venue: The Wall Street Journal! The review is by Keith Devlin, a mathematician at Stanford University and the author of a small library of books of his own. Devlin writes:
The authors show vividly that mathematics is really about the power of abstraction, the push to explain as much as possible in the most compact form possible. Numbers and arithmetic are a part of that enterprise, but there is a lot more besides. “Taking Sudoku Seriously” is an excellent vehicle whereby devotees of the puzzle can come to understand the nature of mathematics.
Score!
More like this
Via Mark Chu-Carroll, I just finished reading this article by mathematician Keith Devlin. He writes:
Inc. magazine is Rating the Governors, and only four governors got 4 stars, among them our own:
Kathleen Sebelius
Researchers from New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research have discovered hundreds of potentially new species.
I've been getting peppered with requests to comment on a recent argument that's
been going on about math education, particularly with respect to multiplication.
We've got a fairly prominent guy named Keith Devlin ranting that
Actually, that was about the only positive comment in the review. Devlin was generally dismissive. "Real mathematicians don't find puzzles interesting" was my takeaway. He was really quite snooty about it.