Through "Euclid's Window" Leonard Mlodinow brilliantly and delightfully leads us on a journey through five revolutions in geometry, from the Greek ...
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Aug 21, 2009
Georg
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Nach dem Drunkard's Walk war das eine herbe Enttäuschung. Keine überraschenden Erkenntnisse, mehr Kurzbiographien als Erläuterungen der wissenschagtlichen Fortschritte selbst und ziemlich viel aufdringliche Beispiele, in denen Alexej und sein Bruder vorkommen. Ich hatte nicht die Illusion, dass ich diesmal Einsteins Theorien verstehen würde (das wird mir sicher nie gelingen), aber von diesem Ziel bin ich jetzt eher weiter entfernt als näher dran. Ich habe nichts dagegen, wenn Wissenschaft locker
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Jul 03, 2010
Esmeralda
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Euclid started out his hobby by lining up stones to represent numbers in order to find patterns. From there, the narrator goes through the historical developments of geometry. It combines biographical anecdotes and snippets of theory. As in art, many thinkers took pieces of a previous theoretical approach and gave new interpretation. Humanity would have more research to use if religion had not come around to kill people, torture people, and sometimes burn works of original thinkers. I love that
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Jul 16, 2009
Trevor
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I’ve done what I never do – before starting this review I’ve read some of the other reviews on this site. I’m quite surprised at the negative reviews this book has received. Someone has even complained that this is quite an ‘anti-Christian’ book. I guess this is because the author was clearly less than impressed with the ‘Dark Ages’ which he introduces by discussing Hypatia. So, yes, I can understand why that might annoy a Christian. But this would be like a Marxist complaining when people
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Jan 08, 2012
Siby
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Euclid's Window is a book tracing the evolution of Geometry over thousands of year; the story of the people, the brilliant mathematicians who developed it and the resistance that they faced, first from the church and then from within their own small mathematical community itself.
This book brings to life the names we have heard during our school days and some that we have not; Thales, Pythagoras, Euclid, Archimedes, Galileo, Descartes, Gauss, Riemann, Einstein, Feynman and many others. Thei More...
This book brings to life the names we have heard during our school days and some that we have not; Thales, Pythagoras, Euclid, Archimedes, Galileo, Descartes, Gauss, Riemann, Einstein, Feynman and many others. Thei More...
Jan 15, 2009
Jeremy
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An extremely poor approach to the historical development of mathematics. The book is replete with historical inaccuracies and a clear anti-Christian bias throughout. Try Kline's "Mathematics for the Nonmathematician" instead.
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Apr 06, 2011
Jerry
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Interesting discussion of history of geometry from the time of the ancient Greeks through geometry's role today in String Theory and M-Theory. It covers what it considers to be the major events of the history of geometry, starting with Euclid's organizing Greek knowledge of geometry into the Elements, Descartes bringing the coordinate system to geometry, Gauss and Riemann moving geometry beyond Euclidean space, Einstein with his theory of relativity, and finally Ed Witten and his contributions t
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Jun 11, 2010
Lynn
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I read Mlodinow’s The Drunkard’s Walk and thought this would be a great book on the history of mathematics. It started out good and then just fizzled out for me toward the end. His explanations were sometimes a little hokey and sometimes confusing. I think if you worked hard you could probably make sense of what he was trying to explain, but I’ve read better explanations of relativity, quantum mechanics, and string theory so I skimmed through the last half of the book pretty fast. It just di
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Jul 29, 2011
The book goes off-topic.
The premise is excellent and the book starts off well. However, the standard tendency of such books of the era to bring everything to relativity, quantum physics and superstring theory - may be because of far easier availability of topics in the space - means the book loses its interesting and unique subject quite quickly.
As a result, when it is compared with other books on either history of maths/science or that try to explain cosmology theoretically, it comes up with More...
The premise is excellent and the book starts off well. However, the standard tendency of such books of the era to bring everything to relativity, quantum physics and superstring theory - may be because of far easier availability of topics in the space - means the book loses its interesting and unique subject quite quickly.
As a result, when it is compared with other books on either history of maths/science or that try to explain cosmology theoretically, it comes up with More...
Jul 17, 2011
Caitlin
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Mlodinow is able to spin some fascinating tales out of the history of mathematics, and it's a pity that his grammar skills aren't quite up to his storytelling ones. As someone who found geometry to be incomprehensible, I enjoyed reading about the lives of some of the world's great mathematicians, but the math itself still didn't make any sense. If you're curious about geometry's place in the world and have a high tolerance for passive sentences, check this out--if nothing else, it'll make you sm
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Nov 25, 2008
Jeremiah
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I kept reading this book because the subject matter is so fascinating. The writing, however, was awful. First, it makes no sense to me to have a book about geometry with so few diagrams included. To make things worse, the author lets a jocular tone stand in for clear, concise explanations. It is apparently not self-evident that these two things are NOT the same. A joke -- usually a bad one -- every paragraph. SERIOUSLY. This is the God's honest truth: I found myself telling the book to "Shu
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Jul 25, 2011
Pablo
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I'm passionate about mathematics! But no biased review here. The last two chapters of this book were not so much fun as the first three. Maybe that's because of the poor translation, which is the case with Brazilian Portuguese translations, more often than not. Quite unfortunate!
Nevertheless the book is good. I'd give it 3.5 stars but I'm gonna read it again, the original English edition, to try and figure out chapters 4 and 5 and then set the seal on it (TBA).
If you enjoy ma More...
Nevertheless the book is good. I'd give it 3.5 stars but I'm gonna read it again, the original English edition, to try and figure out chapters 4 and 5 and then set the seal on it (TBA).
If you enjoy ma More...
Oct 22, 2010
Steve
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This book is perhaps a simpler version of Brian Greene's 'Elegant Universe' that takes you through Euclid to M-Theory. As such, it means the book is heavy on historical anecdote and basic explanations, but spends less time on the science itself. Like Mlodinow's 'The Drunkards Walk', this book will certainly give you plenty of interesting material for dinner-parties. I must say, it also brings geometry into the discussion in a way that is often overlooked.
Apr 20, 2011
Ben
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This was a good introduction to a very interesting topic: geometry. Although, I got a little bit annoyed with the author's style at times (and very sick of Alexei and Nikolai popping up so frequently) the intrinsic interest of the subject (at least for me!) kept me reading. And I am glad I did, for the last two sections (on relativity and string theory, respectively) were the best. I knew nothing about string theory before, so this was a gentle introduction to what is clearly a very difficult
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Apr 08, 2009
Bill
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I was very plesantly surprised when I picked this book up at a small independent shop of Drury Circle in DC about 6 years ago. I thought it would be interesting but I didn't expect it to also be so entertaining. Mlodinow does a remarkable job considering the subject matter is the history of Geometry yet he brings the story to life and he even managed to get me to chuckle a few times.
But then again, maybe I'm just a math geek?
But then again, maybe I'm just a math geek?
Apr 29, 2009
Nick
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Quite an enjoyable read. Fantastic material, and at (what seemed to me anyway) a very readable level. Someday I really should read a harder-level book about modern physics, but I think that'll have to wait.
This book was a great history (and math/physics) book. One of it's best attributes, for me, was that it was entertaining (amusing!) to read.
Highly recommended.
This book was a great history (and math/physics) book. One of it's best attributes, for me, was that it was entertaining (amusing!) to read.
Highly recommended.
Oct 07, 2010
Rich
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The author left math for Hollywood, to write Night Court episodes. (Seriously. It says so on the jacket.) Night Court was funny. This book's jokes aren't.
The substance in each chapter of this book is covered in an entire, better, book somewhere else. Possibly a good introduction to the general subject; nothing new or revealing to those who've already read quite a bit of math history.
The substance in each chapter of this book is covered in an entire, better, book somewhere else. Possibly a good introduction to the general subject; nothing new or revealing to those who've already read quite a bit of math history.
Jan 18, 2012
George
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I met Len at a dinner party, so I had to get one of his books. I always liked geometry, so I got this one and felt that I was well rewarded for my time. He also is Stephen Hawking's co-author, but I'm not that interested in cosmology. I got my father Len's book on random walks, and he really liked it.
Jul 02, 2010
Michelle
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I really liked this book, would recommend to anyone interested in history and/or math, and even those who are not mathy!! Entertaining stories about historical figures in geometry. I got lost at string theory (truthfully, even a bit earlier, with Einstein!!).
Jun 27, 2009
Susan
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I enjoyed this journey through the history of geometry. It was actually a delightful read and led to more than one discussion with Doug. I was able to understand most of the explanations he provided - it became more dicey for me once he started into string theory. I realized how insufficient my high school geometry education was, as much as I did enjoy it.
Mar 16, 2009
Peb
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this book brings a no-math-man with better perspective on geometry. it brings together history of geometry perspective on the world we are inhabiting from the simple five postulates of euclid to the development of general relativity and M-Theory.
Apr 05, 2009
Jessica
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Definitely the best book on math I've read in a long time. I didn't even get lost until the last few chapters, and even then, it was still interesting. It was actually quite funny in places, and made me grateful that I'm not a physicist.
Mar 19, 2011
Bookninja
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Phenomenal. My quest to understand mathematics persists to this day (still a quest!!) - a great review of the history of geometry.. talks about statistics and why it was devised.. I wish I had this book in school...
May 07, 2010
Chad
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Pretty good book, but tough to follow the narrator's pace through string theory and quantum physics...(I listened to the auidiobook) I enjoyed learning about the progression geometry has made through history and applied to the Egyptian pyramids, marine navigation, and ancient astronomy.
Jun 09, 2011
Gerald
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Wonderful narration of the history of development of maths. Amazing facts not likely to be stumbled upon except reading this book
Aug 02, 2010
Lauren
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I dug it... But very eurocentric and highly fetishistic about his love for a Grecian ideal... Still, a nice popular primer
Oct 28, 2009
Sacha
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I read this despite tepid reviews because I so liked Drunkard's Walk. Turns out the reviews were correct. This was not nearly as good as Drunkard's Walk. The story was more familiar to me, so not as compelling and there were several examples I had just read in DW. I expected to learn more toward the end of the book: relativity and string theory. I've seen better overviews of relativity. (Lillian Lieber for example.) The string theory part was nearly all new to me, but by then... Sigh. Th
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Dec 08, 2011
Angus
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It is incredibly fascinating to study geometry from a historical perspective, to recognize just how revolutionary some of the concepts and theories, that we consider so "common sense", actually were to those who discovered them, and how they had such an impact on the world as we know it. Apart from Mlodinow's occasional, and completely unnecessary, sex-reference, and his casual assumption that everyone who reads his book must be atheist, this is a very well written, very enjoyable boo
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Aug 13, 2011
Kyleglidewell
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Excellent book for anyone interested in the history of math (and really, history in general).
Mar 15, 2011
Jill
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I am NOT a geek! This book is so readable, even funny in places... I really enjoy it!
