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Humble Pi: A Comedy of Maths Errors
by
An international bestseller
The book-length answer to anyone who ever put their hand up in math class and asked, "When am I ever going to use this in the real world?"
"Fun, informative, and relentlessly entertaining, Humble Pi is a charming and very readable guide to some of humanity's all-time greatest miscalculations--that also gives you permission to feel a little better ...more
The book-length answer to anyone who ever put their hand up in math class and asked, "When am I ever going to use this in the real world?"
"Fun, informative, and relentlessly entertaining, Humble Pi is a charming and very readable guide to some of humanity's all-time greatest miscalculations--that also gives you permission to feel a little better ...more
Paperback, 314 pages
Published
March 7th 2019
by Allen Lane
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Start your review of Humble Pi: A Comedy of Maths Errors
Humble Pi takes us on a tour of the times when math, engineering, and programming have gone wrong, leading to disastrous or sometimes just funny results. The book covers a range of mistakes, including bridge failures, space exploration disasters, game show cheats, financial algorithms gone rogue, and so much more.
I pretty much loved this book from start to finish. I found it thoroughly fascinating and often hilarious. Parker has a great way with explaining technical subjects, distilling it down ...more
I pretty much loved this book from start to finish. I found it thoroughly fascinating and often hilarious. Parker has a great way with explaining technical subjects, distilling it down ...more
Turns out that pi's not as humble as one could imagine. That many people actually did die as a result of many of the errors is tragic and definitely takes most of fun from the comedy. The unfortunate book name aside, it's a magnificent read into how maths go bump in everywhere.
Q:
‘Plaintiff’s insistence that the commercial appears to be a serious offer requires the Court to explain why the commercial is funny. Explaining why a joke is funny is a daunting task.’ (c)
Q:
I went with my favourite metho ...more
Q:
‘Plaintiff’s insistence that the commercial appears to be a serious offer requires the Court to explain why the commercial is funny. Explaining why a joke is funny is a daunting task.’ (c)
Q:
I went with my favourite metho ...more
There is an Australian word that is used to describe people that is affectionate, but when you learn its etymology, you wonder how it possibly ever could have come to common use. It is to be called a dag, or more likely, a bit of a dag. It isn’t exactly a compliment, but it almost always implies a fondness for the person being spoken about. You know, if in context you call someone ‘a bit of a dag’ you would not be likely to get into a fight – whereas, if you called them a shit-head or a total-tu
...more
A delightful, funny, and low stakes way to enjoy the world of “maths.” Chock full of errors—ranging from program bugs to engineering mishaps to faulty Excel formulas to weird rounding mistakes—in Humble Pi, Matt Parker introduces the kind of math mistakes that can afflict the hoi polloi and rankle the experts too!
Matt Parker’s narration of the audiobook made this one even more fun to listen to. I found plenty of humor in his very drawn out rendition of “0.00000000000000000000000000167.” There ar ...more
Matt Parker’s narration of the audiobook made this one even more fun to listen to. I found plenty of humor in his very drawn out rendition of “0.00000000000000000000000000167.” There ar ...more
Summary: not very interesting, and it's not about maths errors.
This book is a collection of anecdotes that you can read anywhere: most of them I had read before, and you can find them on the internet, too. They're bundled by theme here, which is convenient, but the writer tries too hard to make them appear connected, and more often than not that results in uninspired paragraphs. Here's an example from a random page:
"But what happens when computers try to divide by zero? Unless they've been expli ...more
This book is a collection of anecdotes that you can read anywhere: most of them I had read before, and you can find them on the internet, too. They're bundled by theme here, which is convenient, but the writer tries too hard to make them appear connected, and more often than not that results in uninspired paragraphs. Here's an example from a random page:
"But what happens when computers try to divide by zero? Unless they've been expli ...more
This is billed as a book about when theory bumps up against the real world. I found it more about when the wrong mathematics is chosen rather than when mathematics is done wrongly.
There are plenty of examples to amuse, shock and confound. There is one section called “If the Data Fits” that I will note specifically. Parker is making an important point about how the advent of the computer would make data-processing so much easier. He uses as an example how the U.S. Air Force tried in the 1950s to ...more
There are plenty of examples to amuse, shock and confound. There is one section called “If the Data Fits” that I will note specifically. Parker is making an important point about how the advent of the computer would make data-processing so much easier. He uses as an example how the U.S. Air Force tried in the 1950s to ...more
I really enjoyed this book!
I'm one of those people who got labelled "bad at math" at a young age because I struggled with arithmetic (and still do). That resulted in my getting handed a lot of books of "math is fun!" type puzzles when I was a kid, which were definitely much more fun than math class. I learned to differentiate "math" from "arithmetic" and stubbornly took math classes up through calculus, which was fascinating, but which I've sadly never had any occasion to put to use. To make th ...more
I'm one of those people who got labelled "bad at math" at a young age because I struggled with arithmetic (and still do). That resulted in my getting handed a lot of books of "math is fun!" type puzzles when I was a kid, which were definitely much more fun than math class. I learned to differentiate "math" from "arithmetic" and stubbornly took math classes up through calculus, which was fascinating, but which I've sadly never had any occasion to put to use. To make th ...more
This is a marvelous book about all the ways that math errors can infiltrate our day-to-day living. Some of the math errors are just fun (as in older arcade games), while others have life-or-death consequences (like airplanes running out of fuel mid-flight).
Some of the math errors are simply a confusion about units; feet/meters, pounds/kilograms, and so on. One such error was when a jet liner was loaded up with fuel in pounds, instead of kilograms. Luckily, there was a mid-flight landing and refu ...more
Some of the math errors are simply a confusion about units; feet/meters, pounds/kilograms, and so on. One such error was when a jet liner was loaded up with fuel in pounds, instead of kilograms. Luckily, there was a mid-flight landing and refu ...more
I love maths. I enjoy finding out about mathematical and statistical errors. I was thinking some of my maths teacher friends might enjoy it and find it useful for illustrations in class. Thats where the plot breaks down a little.
I enjoyed the book but was a little disappointed that so much was taken from fields of computing and engineering, where the issue wasn't strictly a mathematical failure, but a failure, for example, to understand the limits of binary, or load-bearing, or resonant frequenc ...more
I enjoyed the book but was a little disappointed that so much was taken from fields of computing and engineering, where the issue wasn't strictly a mathematical failure, but a failure, for example, to understand the limits of binary, or load-bearing, or resonant frequenc ...more
Knew I was going to love this book when I opened it and immediately saw the page numbers going the wrong way.
It is a lot of fun the whole way through. Parker takes us through some of his favourite, or some of the more noteworthy, cases of maths going wrong across a variety of applications. We're talking engineering and computing, from bridges to spacecraft to calendars to ancient sumerian tablets. His enthusiam shines brightly through, and it's hard to not be infected by it. His writing is infus ...more
It is a lot of fun the whole way through. Parker takes us through some of his favourite, or some of the more noteworthy, cases of maths going wrong across a variety of applications. We're talking engineering and computing, from bridges to spacecraft to calendars to ancient sumerian tablets. His enthusiam shines brightly through, and it's hard to not be infected by it. His writing is infus ...more
Matt Parker had me thoroughly enjoying this collection of situations where maths and numbers go wrong in everyday life. I think the book's title is a little weak - 'Humble Pi' doesn't really convey what it's about, but that subtitle 'a comedy of maths errors' is far more informative.
With his delightful conversational style, honed in his stand-up maths shows, it feels as if Parker is a friend down the pub, relating the story of some technical disaster driven by maths and computing, or regaling us ...more
With his delightful conversational style, honed in his stand-up maths shows, it feels as if Parker is a friend down the pub, relating the story of some technical disaster driven by maths and computing, or regaling us ...more
A Christmas present book from a relative in recognition of my past technical career.
Each chapter a nugget of information about some ‘maths’ error that has caused us problems in everyday life. I put ‘maths’ in inverted commas as many of the issues may be a poor engineering implementation of some analysis. As each chapter is independent of others it’s easy to dip in and out of the book when one fancies light relief from the more serious business of reading fiction!
Not normally a book I’d review on ...more
Each chapter a nugget of information about some ‘maths’ error that has caused us problems in everyday life. I put ‘maths’ in inverted commas as many of the issues may be a poor engineering implementation of some analysis. As each chapter is independent of others it’s easy to dip in and out of the book when one fancies light relief from the more serious business of reading fiction!
Not normally a book I’d review on ...more
This is a book for nerds: math, science, and engineering nerds. I loved it. I was mesmerized.



Mr. Parker examines the relationship humans have with math and what happens when we mess up. The mistakes he describes are fascinating in how they came about. He doesn’t seek to shame anyone. He has an attitude that we all make mistakes and we’re all in this together. A lot of the mistakes are in programming code. He covers calendars and timekeeping, probability, randomness, the effects of rounding, and ...more



Mr. Parker examines the relationship humans have with math and what happens when we mess up. The mistakes he describes are fascinating in how they came about. He doesn’t seek to shame anyone. He has an attitude that we all make mistakes and we’re all in this together. A lot of the mistakes are in programming code. He covers calendars and timekeeping, probability, randomness, the effects of rounding, and ...more
I was getting ready to give this book 3 stars at the beginning but as I went on I realized that some of these math mental hurdles are driving the covid spread. For starters, many Governors, even 11 months in seem fundamentally unaware of how exponential growth works which is the underlying prediction threat of covid growth. Additionally, most people have very little familiarity with even the basics of how statistics work, useful in understanding all types of science research, for example in vacc
...more
This is not a typical book or genre that I usually go for but I thoroughly enjoyed it throughout. For some like me who enjoys maths (and it's pitfalls), this is a great book explained to a level where you only need a basic knowledge of mathematics to understand all the information presented.
...more
Apr 20, 2020
Emily
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
nonfiction,
public-library
I am not a math person, but I read a really nice write up of this and decided to give it a try from the local library. One of my quarantine changes is that I now have a dedicated reading hour each morning with my daughter. When she went to school in person, her school practiced this post lunch and suggested incorporating it into her school at home schedule. I mention this specifically, because to be honest, in a pre-COVID-19 world, I would have 100% thought about finishing this, but never done i
...more
Collection of anecdotes, some of which I knew, but the bulk of them I did not. Explanations for "uninitiated" are neither long-winded nor tedious, stories are quite interesting, and I found that the book flows really well. Can recommend
...more
What if one-third of all spreadsheets included at least one formulaic error? What if the reason the shuttle crashed was not narrowly due to brittle o-rings but because the estimates of reliability themselves were fundamentally flawed? Parker takes the reader on a fun tour of our societal reliance on robust arithmetic ("maths" in his quaintly Queen's own rendition) and the degree to which our 'maths' are riddled with error. Although his search for humor tends toward trying too hard the work reall
...more
Humble Pi is a brilliant piece of writing which will make you laugh at least once on every page. Matt is a mathematician and you can easily tell that even if you don't have much background about him, by his style of writing.
The book's 11th Chapter in particular was so breathtakingly gripping, that I finished it in one go. Even the other parts of the book read like an epic collection of short stories, each of which, combined with excellent writing skills, provide for am exhilerating experience.
Di ...more
The book's 11th Chapter in particular was so breathtakingly gripping, that I finished it in one go. Even the other parts of the book read like an epic collection of short stories, each of which, combined with excellent writing skills, provide for am exhilerating experience.
Di ...more
2.5
Contains fascinating stories but also chapters that are simply boring. Mostly disliked those which explain how computers work, what binary code is, how overflows happen. Going through these parts left me thinking I could be spending my time on better books instead.
Humorous at times (actually laughed out loud at the part where one architect designed the same flaw twice in different buildings). However, many of the jokes seem forced and don't match my taste. All throughout the book I felt more ...more
Contains fascinating stories but also chapters that are simply boring. Mostly disliked those which explain how computers work, what binary code is, how overflows happen. Going through these parts left me thinking I could be spending my time on better books instead.
Humorous at times (actually laughed out loud at the part where one architect designed the same flaw twice in different buildings). However, many of the jokes seem forced and don't match my taste. All throughout the book I felt more ...more
If you are a geek into maths and programming, you will love this book. If you are not, you will love this book. Mathematics was not my favourite subject in school, but this book is very educative and also quite funny. Through his maths errors stories, Matt Parker makes you give algorithms, formulas and binary code a second chance and appreciate their roles in all aspects of our lives.
Not so much a comedy since most errors ended up as tragedy. And yet, it is an important book to be written - what with mushrooming engineering colleges churning out supposed engineers every year!
The author doesn't dumb it down and hence some of the places are tough to comprehend. At the same time, the errors which were non-tragic and even funny (like Gandhi going all nuclear thanks to math error) were explained with so much passion that make your trivia quotient.
Some of the concepts were high sc ...more
The author doesn't dumb it down and hence some of the places are tough to comprehend. At the same time, the errors which were non-tragic and even funny (like Gandhi going all nuclear thanks to math error) were explained with so much passion that make your trivia quotient.
Some of the concepts were high sc ...more
It's always affirming to know that one's mistakes, birthed and out there in the world, are not alone. They are even dinky next to some of the larger, more conspicuous errors. Matt Parker has authored a book which ensures all the world should be aware and take note of some of these missteps.
Many, many examples which have probably escaped us, and the author is pleased to serve it to us. He can get a little pendantic, but is self-aware and backtracks, so for the most part I enjoyed this read, heart ...more
Many, many examples which have probably escaped us, and the author is pleased to serve it to us. He can get a little pendantic, but is self-aware and backtracks, so for the most part I enjoyed this read, heart ...more
Matt Parker is an Australian mathematician, author and comedian. A former maths teacher, he has made a living for himself popularising maths tours and videos in real life and online. He has previously written one book on the topic of mathematics, Things to Make and Do in the Fourth Dimension, as well as co-writing Hacking the Kinect.
The book of his I will be reviewing is non-fiction, Humble Pi, A Comedy of Maths Errors, published in 2019. The book focuses on many mistakes in real life consequen ...more
The book of his I will be reviewing is non-fiction, Humble Pi, A Comedy of Maths Errors, published in 2019. The book focuses on many mistakes in real life consequen ...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Play Book Tag: Humble Pi: When Math Goes Wrong in the Real World; 5 Stars | 2 | 12 | Jun 18, 2021 02:43PM | |
| Goodreads Librari...: please add book cover | 2 | 10 | Feb 21, 2021 07:27PM | |
| Goodreads Librari...: Please set page number | 3 | 49 | Apr 14, 2019 01:41AM | |
| Author | 1 | 13 | Mar 18, 2019 07:49AM |
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