Adventures of a Mathematician

Adventures of a Mathematician PDF Author: S. M. Ulam
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520910553
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
The true story that inspired the 2020 film. The autobiography of mathematician Stanislaw Ulam, one of the great scientific minds of the twentieth century, tells a story rich with amazingly prophetic speculations and peppered with lively anecdotes. As a member of the Los Alamos National Laboratory from 1944 on, Ulam helped to precipitate some of the most dramatic changes of the postwar world. He was among the first to use and advocate computers for scientific research, originated ideas for the nuclear propulsion of space vehicles, and made fundamental contributions to many of today's most challenging mathematical projects. With his wide-ranging interests, Ulam never emphasized the importance of his contributions to the research that resulted in the hydrogen bomb. Now Daniel Hirsch and William Mathews reveal the true story of Ulam's pivotal role in the making of the "Super," in their historical introduction to this behind-the-scenes look at the minds and ideas that ushered in the nuclear age. An epilogue by Françoise Ulam and Jan Mycielski sheds new light on Ulam's character and mathematical originality.

Adventures of a Mathematician

Adventures of a Mathematician PDF Author: S. M. Ulam
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520910553
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 400

Get Book Here

Book Description
The true story that inspired the 2020 film. The autobiography of mathematician Stanislaw Ulam, one of the great scientific minds of the twentieth century, tells a story rich with amazingly prophetic speculations and peppered with lively anecdotes. As a member of the Los Alamos National Laboratory from 1944 on, Ulam helped to precipitate some of the most dramatic changes of the postwar world. He was among the first to use and advocate computers for scientific research, originated ideas for the nuclear propulsion of space vehicles, and made fundamental contributions to many of today's most challenging mathematical projects. With his wide-ranging interests, Ulam never emphasized the importance of his contributions to the research that resulted in the hydrogen bomb. Now Daniel Hirsch and William Mathews reveal the true story of Ulam's pivotal role in the making of the "Super," in their historical introduction to this behind-the-scenes look at the minds and ideas that ushered in the nuclear age. An epilogue by Françoise Ulam and Jan Mycielski sheds new light on Ulam's character and mathematical originality.

Stanislaw Ulam 1909-1984

Stanislaw Ulam 1909-1984 PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Mathematical physics
Languages : en
Pages : 326

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Book Description


Analogies Between Analogies

Analogies Between Analogies PDF Author: S. M. Ulam
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520322924
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 588

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Book Description
During his forty-year association with the Los Alamos National Laboratory, mathematician Stanislaw Ulam wrote many Laboratory Reports, usually in collaboration with colleagues. Some of them remain classified to this day. The rest are gathered in this volume and for the first time are easily accesible to mathematicians, physical scientists, and historians. The timeliness of these papers is remarkable. They contain seminal ideas in such fields as nonlinear stochastic processes, parallel computation, cellular automata, and mathematical biology. The collection is of historical interest as well, During and after World War II, the complexity of problems at the frontiers of science surpassed any technology that had ever existed. Electronic computing machines had to be developed and new computing methods had to be invented based on the most abstract ideas from the foundations of mathematics and theoretical physics. To these problems and others in physics, astronomy, and biology, Ulam was able to bring both general insights and specific conceptual contributions. His fertile ideas were far ahead of their time, and ranged over many branches of science. In fact, his mathematical versatility fulfilled the statement of his friend and mentor, the great Polish mathematician Stefan Banach, who claimed that the very best mathematicians see "analogies between analogies." Introduced by A. R. Bednarek and Francoise Ulam, these Los Alamos reports represent a unique view of one of the twentieth century's intellectual masters and scientific pioneers. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1990.

Turing's Cathedral

Turing's Cathedral PDF Author: George Dyson
Publisher: Pantheon
ISBN: 0307907066
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 466

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Book Description
“It is possible to invent a single machine which can be used to compute any computable sequence,” twenty-four-year-old Alan Turing announced in 1936. In Turing’s Cathedral, George Dyson focuses on a small group of men and women, led by John von Neumann at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, who built one of the first computers to realize Alan Turing’s vision of a Universal Machine. Their work would break the distinction between numbers that mean things and numbers that do things—and our universe would never be the same. Using five kilobytes of memory (the amount allocated to displaying the cursor on a computer desktop of today), they achieved unprecedented success in both weather prediction and nuclear weapons design, while tackling, in their spare time, problems ranging from the evolution of viruses to the evolution of stars. Dyson’s account, both historic and prophetic, sheds important new light on how the digital universe exploded in the aftermath of World War II. The proliferation of both codes and machines was paralleled by two historic developments: the decoding of self-replicating sequences in biology and the invention of the hydrogen bomb. It’s no coincidence that the most destructive and the most constructive of human inventions appeared at exactly the same time. How did code take over the world? In retracing how Alan Turing’s one-dimensional model became John von Neumann’s two-dimensional implementation, Turing’s Cathedral offers a series of provocative suggestions as to where the digital universe, now fully three-dimensional, may be heading next.

From Cardinals to Chaos

From Cardinals to Chaos PDF Author: N. G. Cooper
Publisher: CUP Archive
ISBN: 9780521367349
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 324

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Book Description
First published 1987 as Los Alamos science, special issue. A compendium of biographical (and autobiographical) notes, essays, and scientific articles reflecting on Ulam's legacy of interdisciplinary approaches to problems in math, physics, and biology; and previously unpublished miscellanea--conversations, a satirical play. The whole serves to celebrate the personality and contributions of the dynamic mathematician. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Memory, Edited

Memory, Edited PDF Author: Abby Smith Rumsey
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262376164
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 275

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Book Description
An exploration of historical memory and networks of meaning in the context of today’s crises of extremism and polarization. As authoritarianism continues to rise around the world, the stories we tell ourselves about what has happened and what is happening become ever more relevant. In Memory, Edited, Abby Smith Rumsey examines collective memory, how it binds us, and how it can be used by bad actors to manipulate us. Bringing forward the voices of a rich cast of Eastern European artists from the past two hundred years—from Fyodor Dostoevsky to Gerhard Richter—Rumsey shows how their work and lives illustrate the devastation wrought by regimes dependent on entrenched lies to survive. This hijacking of the narrative polarizes communities even as it commandeers our future. Through an interdisciplinary lens that includes the best thinking from history, the arts, cognitive science, psychology, and political philosophy, Rumsey lays bare our narratives, showing how they are constructed and how they have changed over time. Ever-aware of resisting the false promise of utopia, Rumsey argues that only by confronting the past and reckoning with the crimes that were committed can we ever hope to heal and gain self-knowledge. Memory, Edited is an indispensable text for anyone who cares about democracy, equality, and freedom in our current age of crisis.

Graph Theory

Graph Theory PDF Author: Ralucca Gera
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319976869
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 284

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Book Description
This second volume in a two-volume series provides an extensive collection of conjectures and open problems in graph theory. It is designed for both graduate students and established researchers in discrete mathematics who are searching for research ideas and references. Each chapter provides more than a simple collection of results on a particular topic; it captures the reader’s interest with techniques that worked and failed in attempting to solve particular conjectures. The history and origins of specific conjectures and the methods of researching them are also included throughout this volume. Students and researchers can discover how the conjectures have evolved and the various approaches that have been used in an attempt to solve them. An annotated glossary of nearly 300 graph theory parameters, 70 conjectures, and over 600 references is also included in this volume. This glossary provides an understanding of parameters beyond their definitions and enables readers to discover new ideas and new definitions in graph theory. The editors were inspired to create this series of volumes by the popular and well-attended special sessions entitled “My Favorite Graph Theory Conjectures,” which they organized at past AMS meetings. These sessions were held at the winter AMS/MAA Joint Meeting in Boston, January 2012, the SIAM Conference on Discrete Mathematics in Halifax in June 2012, as well as the winter AMS/MAA Joint Meeting in Baltimore in January 2014, at which many of the best-known graph theorists spoke. In an effort to aid in the creation and dissemination of conjectures and open problems, which is crucial to the growth and development of this field, the editors invited these speakers, as well as other experts in graph theory, to contribute to this series.

Statistical Rethinking

Statistical Rethinking PDF Author: Richard McElreath
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1315362619
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 488

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Book Description
Statistical Rethinking: A Bayesian Course with Examples in R and Stan builds readers’ knowledge of and confidence in statistical modeling. Reflecting the need for even minor programming in today’s model-based statistics, the book pushes readers to perform step-by-step calculations that are usually automated. This unique computational approach ensures that readers understand enough of the details to make reasonable choices and interpretations in their own modeling work. The text presents generalized linear multilevel models from a Bayesian perspective, relying on a simple logical interpretation of Bayesian probability and maximum entropy. It covers from the basics of regression to multilevel models. The author also discusses measurement error, missing data, and Gaussian process models for spatial and network autocorrelation. By using complete R code examples throughout, this book provides a practical foundation for performing statistical inference. Designed for both PhD students and seasoned professionals in the natural and social sciences, it prepares them for more advanced or specialized statistical modeling. Web Resource The book is accompanied by an R package (rethinking) that is available on the author’s website and GitHub. The two core functions (map and map2stan) of this package allow a variety of statistical models to be constructed from standard model formulas.

The Honors Class

The Honors Class PDF Author: Ben Yandell
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1439864225
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 498

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Book Description
This eminently readable book focuses on the people of mathematics and draws the reader into their fascinating world. In a monumental address, given to the International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris in 1900, David Hilbert, perhaps the most respected mathematician of his time, developed a blueprint for mathematical research in the new century.

Mathematical Apocrypha: Stories and Anecdotes of Mathematicians and the Mathematical

Mathematical Apocrypha: Stories and Anecdotes of Mathematicians and the Mathematical PDF Author: Steven G. Krantz
Publisher: American Mathematical Soc.
ISBN: 1470457385
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description