Download or read book Rubik s Cubic Compendium written by Ernő Rubik and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1987 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Co-written by the cube's inventor, this book serves as a comprehensive guide to the Rubik's cube. It opens up a wealth of fascinating mathematics and offers a vast number of new ideas and possibilities to those who have solved the cube as well as to those who remain puzzled.
Download or read book Adventures in Group Theory written by David Joyner and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2008-12-29 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: David Joyner uses mathematical toys such as the Rubik's Cube to make abstract algebra and group theory fun. This updated second edition uses SAGE, an open-source computer algebra system, to illustrate many of the computations.
Download or read book Handbook of Cubik Math written by Alexander H Frey Jr and published by Lutterworth Press. This book was released on 2020-09-24 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Handbook of Cubic Math unveils the theory involved in Rubik's Cube's solution, the potential applications of that theory to other similar puzzles, and how the cube provides a physical example for many concepts in mathematics where such examples are difficult to find. Nonetheless, the authors have been able to cover and explain these topics in a way which is easily understandable to the layman, suitable for a junior-high-school or high-school course in math, and appropriate for a college course in modern algebra. This manual will satisfy the experts' curiosity about the moves that lead to the solution of the cube and will offer a useful supplementary teaching aid to the beginners.
Download or read book Notes on Rubik s Magic Cube written by David Singmaster and published by . This book was released on 1981 with total page 88 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Software and Mind written by Andrei Sorin and published by Andsor Books. This book was released on 2013-01-01 with total page 934 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Addressing general readers as well as software practitioners, "Software and Mind" discusses the fallacies of the mechanistic ideology and the degradation of minds caused by these fallacies. Mechanism holds that every aspect of the world can be represented as a simple hierarchical structure of entities. But, while useful in fields like mathematics and manufacturing, this idea is generally worthless, because most aspects of the world are too complex to be reduced to simple hierarchical structures. Our software-related affairs, in particular, cannot be represented in this fashion. And yet, all programming theories and development systems, and all software applications, attempt to reduce real-world problems to neat hierarchical structures of data, operations, and features. Using Karl Popper's famous principles of demarcation between science and pseudoscience, the book shows that the mechanistic ideology has turned most of our software-related activities into pseudoscientific pursuits. Using mechanism as warrant, the software elites are promoting invalid, even fraudulent, software notions. They force us to depend on generic, inferior systems, instead of allowing us to develop software skills and to create our own systems. Software mechanism emulates the methods of manufacturing, and thereby restricts us to high levels of abstraction and simple, isolated structures. The benefits of software, however, can be attained only if we start with low-level elements and learn to create complex, interacting structures. Software, the book argues, is a non-mechanistic phenomenon. So it is akin to language, not to physical objects. Like language, it permits us to mirror the world in our minds and to communicate with it. Moreover, we increasingly depend on software in everything we do, in the same way that we depend on language. Thus, being restricted to mechanistic software is like thinking and communicating while being restricted to some ready-made sentences supplied by an elite. Ultimately, by impoverishing software, our elites are achieving what the totalitarian elite described by George Orwell in "Nineteen Eighty-Four" achieves by impoverishing language: they are degrading our minds.
Download or read book Mathematics of the Rubik s Cube Design written by Hana M. Bizek and published by . This book was released on 1997 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Problems for Metagrobologists written by David Singmaster and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2015 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a collection of over 200 problems that David Singmaster has composed since 1987. Some of the math problems have appeared in his various puzzle columns for BBC Radio and TV, Canadian Broadcasting, Focus (the UK popular science magazine), Games and Puzzles, the Los Angeles Times, Micromath, the Puzzle a Day memo pad and the Weekend Telegraph. While some of these are already classics, many of the puzzles have not been published elsewhere previously. Puzzle enthusiasts of all ages will find here arithmetic problems, properties of digits; monetary problems; alpha-metics; Diophantine problems; magic figures; sequence problems; logical problems; geometric problems; physics problems; combinatorial problems; geographic problems; calendar problems; clock problems; dissection problems and verbal problems.
Download or read book Encyclopedia of Play in Today s Society written by Rodney P. Carlisle and published by SAGE Publications. This book was released on 2009-04-02 with total page 1033 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title for 2009 "This ground-breaking resource is strongly recommended for all libraries and health and welfare institutional depots; essential for university collections, especially those catering to social studies programs." —Library Journal, STARRED Review Children and adults spend a great deal of time in activities we think of as "play," including games, sports, and hobbies. Without thinking about it very deeply, almost everyone would agree that such activities are fun, relaxing, and entertaining. However, play has many purposes that run much deeper than simple entertainment. For children, play has various functions such as competition, following rules, accepting defeat, choosing leaders, exercising leadership, practicing adult roles, and taking risks in order to reap rewards. For adults, many games and sports serve as harmless releases of feelings of aggression, competition, and intergroup hostility. The Encyclopedia of Play in Today′s Society explores the concept of play in history and modern society in the United States and internationally. Its scope encompasses leisure and recreational activities of children and adults throughout the ages, from dice games in the Roman Empire to video games today. With more than 450 entries, these two volumes do not include coverage of professional sports and sport teams but, instead, cover the hundreds of games played not to earn a living but as informal activity. All aspects of play—from learning to competition, mastery of nature, socialization, and cooperation—are included. Simply enough, this Encyclopedia explores play played for the fun of it! Key Features Available in both print and electronic formats Provides access to the fascinating literature that has explored questions of psychology, learning theory, game theory, and history in depth Considers the affects of play on child and adult development, particularly on health, creativity, and imagination Contains entries that describe both adult and childhood play and games in dozens of cultures around the world and throughout history Explores the sophisticated analyses of social thinkers such as Huizinga, Vygotsky, and Sutton-Smith, as well as the wide variety of games, toys, sports, and entertainments found around the world Presents cultures as diverse as the ancient Middle East, modern Russia, and China and in nations as far flung as India, Argentina, and France Key Themes Adult Games Board and Card Games Children′s Games History of Play Outdoor Games and Amateur Sports Play and Education Play Around the World Psychology of Play Sociology of Play Toys and Business Video and Online Games For a subject we mostly consider light-hearted, play as a research topic has generated an extensive and sophisticated literature, exploring a range of penetrating questions. This two-volume set serves as a general, nontechnical resource for academics, researchers, and students alike. It is an essential addition to any academic library.
Download or read book The Double Dangerous Book for Boys written by Conn Iggulden and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2019-10-08 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Dangerous Book for Boys comes the long-awaited sequel – another action-packed adventure guide featuring full-color illustrations, perfect for dads, grads, and boys of all ages. The Double Dangerous Book for Boys is a treasure trove of the essential activities and skills that have defined generations of boyhoods, from building a treehouse to fishing to finding true north. Designed with the same nostalgic look and feel as the first book, this companion volume includes more than 70 new chapters and important skills, fascinating historical information, and captivating stories, including: How to pick a padlock Making a Flying Machine Tying a Windsor Knot Advice from Fighting Men Questions About the Law Chess Openings Making Perfume Maps of Historic Empires: British, Ottoman, Genghis, Persian, Medes, Babylonian, Alexander Great Speeches Forgotten Explorers How to Wire a Plug and Make a lamp Writing a Thank You Letter Polishing Shoes Parents looking to reduce screen time and rediscover the great outdoors can use this book to fill weekend afternoons and summer days with wonder, excitement, adventure, and fun—learn to build go-carts and electromagnets, identify insects and spiders, and fly the world’s best paper airplanes. This charming and practical guide, packed with hundreds of full-color charts, maps, diagrams, and illustrations, will ignite the imagination and stimulate curiosity, and provide grandfathers, fathers, sons, and brothers the opportunity to deepen their bonds. Conn Iggulden has at last put together a second wonderful collection that is the essence of boyhood.
Download or read book Bach s Testament written by Zoltán Göncz and published by Scarecrow Press. This book was released on 2012-12-19 with total page 195 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written late in his life, J. S. Bach’s The Art of Fugue has long been admired—in some quarters revered—as one of his masterworks. Its last movement, Contrapunctus 14, went unfinished, and the enigma of its incompleteness still preoccupies scholars and musical conductors alike. In 1881, Gustav Nottebohm discovered that the three subjects of the movement could be supplemented by a fourth. In 1993, Zoltán Göncz revealed that Bach had planned the passage that would join the four subjects in an entirely unique way. This section has not survived, but, as Göncz notes, it must have been ready in the earliest phase of composition since Bach had created the expositions of the first three subjects from its “disjointed” parts. Göncz then boldly took on the task of reconstructing the original “template” by putting together the once separate pieces. In Bach’s Testament: On the Philosophical and Theological Background of The Art of Fugue, Göncz probes the philosophic-theological background of The Art of Fugue, revealing the special structures that supported the 1993 reconstruction. Bach’s Testament investigates the reconstruction’s metaphysical dimensions, focusing on the quadruple fugue. As a summary of Zoltán Göncz’s extensive research over many years, which resulted in the completion of the fugue, this work explores the complex combinatorial, philosophical and theological considerations that inform its structure. Bach’s Testament is ideally suited not only to Bach scholars and musicologists but also intellectual historians with particular interests in 18th-century religious and philosophical ideas.
Download or read book Mathematics and Computation written by Avi Wigderson and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2019-10-29 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An introduction to computational complexity theory, its connections and interactions with mathematics, and its central role in the natural and social sciences, technology, and philosophy Mathematics and Computation provides a broad, conceptual overview of computational complexity theory—the mathematical study of efficient computation. With important practical applications to computer science and industry, computational complexity theory has evolved into a highly interdisciplinary field, with strong links to most mathematical areas and to a growing number of scientific endeavors. Avi Wigderson takes a sweeping survey of complexity theory, emphasizing the field’s insights and challenges. He explains the ideas and motivations leading to key models, notions, and results. In particular, he looks at algorithms and complexity, computations and proofs, randomness and interaction, quantum and arithmetic computation, and cryptography and learning, all as parts of a cohesive whole with numerous cross-influences. Wigderson illustrates the immense breadth of the field, its beauty and richness, and its diverse and growing interactions with other areas of mathematics. He ends with a comprehensive look at the theory of computation, its methodology and aspirations, and the unique and fundamental ways in which it has shaped and will further shape science, technology, and society. For further reading, an extensive bibliography is provided for all topics covered. Mathematics and Computation is useful for undergraduate and graduate students in mathematics, computer science, and related fields, as well as researchers and teachers in these fields. Many parts require little background, and serve as an invitation to newcomers seeking an introduction to the theory of computation. Comprehensive coverage of computational complexity theory, and beyond High-level, intuitive exposition, which brings conceptual clarity to this central and dynamic scientific discipline Historical accounts of the evolution and motivations of central concepts and models A broad view of the theory of computation's influence on science, technology, and society Extensive bibliography
Download or read book Butter My Butt and Call Me a Biscuit written by Allan Zullo and published by Andrews McMeel Publishing. This book was released on 2009-10 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A collection of hundreds of endearing, truthful, and amusing homespun adages and turns of phrases, and dozens of countrified jokes that will appeal to anyone who wants a change of pace in our pop culture--infused life. These down-home truths and insights lighten the mood, dispense some great advice, and make more than a few clever observations about the world"--Cover p. 4.
Download or read book Analyzing Intelligence written by Roger Z. George and published by Georgetown University Press. This book was released on 2008-04-09 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on the individual and collective experience of recognized intelligence experts and scholars in the field, Analyzing Intelligence provides the first comprehensive assessment of the state of intelligence analysis since 9/11. Its in-depth and balanced evaluation of more than fifty years of U.S. analysis includes a critique of why it has under-performed at times. It provides insights regarding the enduring obstacles as well as new challenges of analysis in the post-9/11 world, and suggests innovative ideas for improved analytical methods, training, and structured approaches. The book's six sections present a coherent plan for improving analysis. Early chapters examine how intelligence analysis has evolved since its origins in the mid-20th century, focusing on traditions, culture, successes, and failures. The middle sections examine how analysis supports the most senior national security and military policymakers and strategists, and how analysts must deal with the perennial challenges of collection, politicization, analytical bias, knowledge building and denial and deception. The final sections of the book propose new ways to address enduring issues in warning analysis, methodology (or "analytical tradecraft") and emerging analytic issues like homeland defense. The book suggests new forms of analytic collaboration in a global intelligence environment, and imperatives for the development of a new profession of intelligence analysis. Analyzing Intelligence is written for the national security expert who needs to understand the role of intelligence and its strengths and weaknesses. Practicing and future analysts will also find that its attention to the enduring challenges provides useful lessons-learned to guide their own efforts. The innovations section will provoke senior intelligence managers to consider major changes in the way analysis is currently organized and conducted, and the way that analysts are trained and perform.
Download or read book Humble Masterpieces written by Paola Antonelli and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2005-11-29 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From M & Ms to Post–It Notes, a charming and insightful collection of design marvels from everyday life, celebrated by the curator of the MoMA's department of architecture and design. Every day we use dozens of tiny objects, from Post–It notes to Band–Aids. If they work well, chances are we do not pay them much attention. But although modest in size and price, some of these objects are true masterpieces of the art of design. Paola Antonelli, curator of the Museum of Modern Art's Department of Design and Architecture, is a highly celebrated figure in the world of design (she was just ranked among the top 100 most powerful people in the world of art). Paola has long been passionate about the subject of everyday objects that are marvels of design. The response to her recent MoMA show, also called Humble Masterpieces, was electric. In addition to lively coverage in dozens of publications, the museum goers spread the word about the fun of learning about and nominating their own picks for humble masterpieces. Now, in this colorful visual feast, Antonelli chooses 100 fabulous objects, from Chupa Chup lollipops to Legos to Chopsticks and Scotch tape. Each object will be portrayed with a gorgeous close–up detail, a brisk and informative text on its origin and special design features, as well as a silhouette image of the object as we see it each day. Certain to appeal to a broad audience, and to lend itself to fun, creative promotional opportunities, Humble Masterpieces will celebrate the possibility of looking at our everyday lives in an all–new way.
Download or read book Origin of Everyday Things written by Johnny Acton and published by Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.. This book was released on 2006 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describes the origins of over 400 everyday items, arranged in alphabetical order.
Download or read book Mad Science written by Randy Alfred and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2012-11-13 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 365 days of inventions, discoveries, science, and technology, from the editors of Wired Magazine. On January 30, Rubik applied for a patent on his cube (1975). On the next day, 17 years earlier, the first U.S. Satellite passed through the Van Allen radiation belt. On March 17, the airplane "black box" made its maiden voyage (1953). And what about today? Every day of the year has a rich scientific and technological heritage just waiting to be uncovered, and Wired's top-flight science-trivia book Mad Science collects them chronologically, from New Year's Day to year's end, showing just how entertaining, wonderful, bizarre, and relevant science can be. In 2010, Wired's popular "This Day in Tech" blog peaked with more than 700,000 page views each month, and one story in 2008 drew more than a million unique viewers. This book will collect the most intriguing anecdotes from the blog's run-one for each day of the year-and publish them in a package that will instantly appeal to hardcore techies and curious laypeople alike.
Download or read book Professor Stewart s Incredible Numbers written by Ian Stewart and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2015-04-07 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Renowned mathematician Ian Stewart uses remarkable (and some unremarkable) numbers to introduce readers to the beauty of mathematics. At its heart, mathematics is about numbers, our fundamental tools for understanding the world. In Professor Stewart's Incredible Numbers, Ian Stewart offers a delightful introduction to the numbers that surround us, from the common (Pi and 2) to the uncommon but no less consequential (1.059463 and 43,252,003,274,489,856,000). Along the way, Stewart takes us through prime numbers, cubic equations, the concept of zero, the possible positions on the Rubik's Cube, the role of numbers in human history, and beyond! An unfailingly genial guide, Stewart brings his characteristic wit and erudition to bear on these incredible numbers, offering an engaging primer on the principles and power of math.
