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Status Reports
Status: Mathematics (2023 - December)
(Text as at 01/04/2024 20:08:10)
*** THIS IS NOT THE LATEST VERSION OF THIS NOTE ***
(For the live version and other versions of this Note, see the tables at the end)
Rationale for this Project
- This is rather an eccentric activity, partly an attempt to exorcise some ancient demon – the rather bruising experience of reading mathematics at King’s College Cambridge back in the mid 1970’s.
- However, any modern educated person should be reasonably up to date with the mathematical sciences, and statistical and probability theory are essential tools for evaluating evidence, and are useful in Bridge! If only advanced mathematics wasn’t such a difficult subject.
- This project is diverging from Mathematics per se to the Philosophy of Mathematics and other related subjects. For instance, Philosophy of Mathematics features in Philosophy of Religion by providing an analogy or model of the sort of necessary existence that God is supposed to have.
Summary of Progress during October - December 2023
- I spent 12.25 hours in 23Q4 on this Project, or related work (12.25 hours YTD, where for "YTD" - Year to Date - I mean the (academic) year that commenced in October 2023). That's 94% of the planned effort (94% YTD). Overall, 1.7% of my Project effort in the Quarter was directed towards this project (making 1.7% YTD) - as against 1.9% planned (1.9% YTD).
- Further details follow (for the latest Quarter: 23Q4):-
Mathematics (Total Hours = 12.25)
- Mathematics - Reading / Writing (Total Hours = 11.75)
- "Aeon - Video - Math's famous map problem: the four colour theorem" (1.75 hours)
- Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - Introduction (0.25 hours)
→ See "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part I - Introduction" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part II - The Origins of Modern Mathematics" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part III - Mathematical Concepts" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part IV - Branches of Mathematics" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part V - Theorems and Problems" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part VI - Mathematicians" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part VII - The Influence of Mathematics" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part VIII - Final Perspectives" (0.25 hours)
- "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Preface" (0.25 hours)
- Gowers (Timothy), Etc. - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part V - Theorems and Problems: V15 - Godel's Theorem (0.5 hours)
→ See "Gowers (Timothy), Barrow-Green (June) & Leader (Imre) - The Princeton Companion to Mathematics: Part V - Theorems and Problems" (0.5 hours)
- "Kaplan (Jeffrey) - Video - Russell's Paradox - a simple explanation of a profound problem" (2 hours)
- "Ore (Oystein) - The Four-Colour Problem" (2.75 hours)
- "Penrose (Roger) - The Road to Reality: A Complete Guide to the Physical Universe" (1 hour)
- "Smullyan (Raymond) - Forever Undecided - A Puzzle Guide to Godel" (1.5 hours)
- Mathematics - Admin (Total Hours = 0.5)
- I scheduled only one hour a week in 23Q4 and spent most of this time pottering around in various books on my list. I intend to continue this minimalist approach for the rest of the academic year.
- Progress (if any) in the current quarter can be obtained from the relevant section of my Summary Task List1, and YTD in the current & future “automatic” editions of this report.
Plans for the Near Future:
Mathematical Resources
In-Page Footnotes
Footnote 2:
- Trying out Math Trainer ("Admin - Math Trainer") seems a bit eccentric, but I’ve found that – as the time has passed – I’ve got lazier and lazier with mental arithmetic, and could do with perking up a bit. The App seems of some use.
Footnote 4:
- These are not left over from my Cambridge days as these few books were given away to my sister’s high-school in Gloucester by my mother during my brief sojourn with the Carthusians.
- Rather, I found them going cheap in bulk at a local second-hand bookshop.
- They are accessible via …this link.
Live Version of this Archived Note
Table of 12 Earlier Versions of this Note (of 65)
Table of the 7 Later Versions of this Note
| This version updated |
Reference for this Topic |
Parent Topic |
| 01/04/2024 20:08:10 |
517 (Status: Mathematics (2023 - December)) |
Status: Summary (2026 - June) |
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- Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2026