Here's Looking at Euclid

I don't get much free time to read books that I choose. In fact, I'm not even halfway through this book and I'm already in love with it. I now have Alex Bellos' math-terpiece on my wishlist and it's part of my dream classroom library.

Cover of Here's Looking at Euclid

One of the things that has always bothered me about eduction is how each subject is taught in a void. This happens less often in the humanities, but way too often in math and science. And it's more than just notion that you need the skills and knowledge from English, or math to successfully study science. It's the cultural void that surrounds our teaching. Science and math are not conducted in a void. They are accomplished by people with fascinating personal histories and influenced by the culture in which they occur.

Here's Looking at Euclid  offers readers a new perspective on math, beyond formulas and proofs. The bits of math that Bollos follows seems eclectic, taking us on a world-wide tour of Euclid's geometry to origami in Japan, to a tribe in the Amazon who only have specific words for the numbers one through five, and sometimes not even that. Rather than seem disjointed, this wide range of mathematical wonders highlights the variety and depth of what math has to offer. Each person who reads this book should come out with at least one thing that makes them realize the role that math plays in each of our lives.