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Excursions in Modern Mathematics
Excursions in Modern Mathematics introduces you to the power of math by exploring applications like social choice and management science, showing that math is more than a set of formulas. Ideal for an applied liberal arts math course, Tannenbaum’s text is known for its clear, accessible writing style and its unique exercise sets that build in complexity from basic to more challenging.
The Eighth Edition offers more real data and applications to connect with today’s readesr, expanded coverage of applications like growth, and revised exercise sets.
The Eighth Edition offers more real data and applications to connect with today’s readesr, expanded coverage of applications like growth, and revised exercise sets.
608 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 1991
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 21, 2018
A surprisingly engaging and readable overview of some concepts in contemporary mathematics!
Don’t believe me? How about proving there is no voting system which follows all the rules of fairness? How about creating CGI mountains using nothing but triangles? How about finding the best way to equally divide a pizza?
I’ll admit I didn’t bother to sit down and work through the exercises, but that’s the advantage of reading a textbook for fun. If you’re somebody who has even a passing interest in how numbers affect the everyday world, this is a good place to start.
Don’t believe me? How about proving there is no voting system which follows all the rules of fairness? How about creating CGI mountains using nothing but triangles? How about finding the best way to equally divide a pizza?
I’ll admit I didn’t bother to sit down and work through the exercises, but that’s the advantage of reading a textbook for fun. If you’re somebody who has even a passing interest in how numbers affect the everyday world, this is a good place to start.
June 8, 2025
Excellent book!
August 21, 2020
Some disclaimers:
* I borrowed this book from my institution's library
* I didn't attempt to access let alone use the on-line feature
* My main interest was the social choice theory oriented material in Part 1 of the text. Hence, I skimmed the remainder of the book.
The intention of the "Excursions ..." is expose the non-mathematical university student to some highly applicable mathematics drawn from relatively recently developed topics. Think, for the sake of better term, the "maths for poets" course that some universities offer (or compel) students from the humanities to take.
The book covers, in basic terms, social choice theory (voting, fair division, apportionment), graph theory (travelling salesman, networks, scheduling), symmetry and fractals, discrete iterative equations (logistic growth but no chaos, financial equations like compounding interest etc) and some probability and statistics.
To clarify the "modern" in the title consider that STEM students typically will take a calculus course and a linear algebra course in their first year. Calculus was born in the 17th century. While the problem of solving linear systems is an ancient one (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nin... ) it got systematic treatment (in Europe) in the 17th century as well. With the development of matrices and their inverses perhaps we can say Linear algebra proper had a 19th century birth. Much of the content in Tannenbaum's book, although often inspired by old problems, is teaching maths developed in the mid-twentieth century.
The text does a generally good job of presenting the material to its target audience. Its colourful, has plenty of pictures/graphs, lots of white space, and a chatty prose style. Many examples are drawn from everyday activities or interests - popular sports, TV programs, elections etc. Problem sets are graded as "Walk", "Jog" and "Run" to indicate difficulty which is helpful while not off putting. The choice of content is interesting and I believe much of it would be easy for the non-maths student to see as useful and relevant.
The negatives are:
* the book is expensive (close to $300 AUD at the time of writing) and its hard to justify making a student spend that much for a book in most cases let alone a course outside their specialisation .
* the book is intended for an American audience so educators outside of the USA will need to supplement the existing examples or replace them
* its long -- ~600 pages -- so you're unlikely to use all the content.
* statistics is covered in numerous other places better for the social scientist, the discrete equations section only just hints at the chaos so doesn't really get to the modern material.
Overall, its good excursion but I'm glad I didn't pay for it.
* I borrowed this book from my institution's library
* I didn't attempt to access let alone use the on-line feature
* My main interest was the social choice theory oriented material in Part 1 of the text. Hence, I skimmed the remainder of the book.
The intention of the "Excursions ..." is expose the non-mathematical university student to some highly applicable mathematics drawn from relatively recently developed topics. Think, for the sake of better term, the "maths for poets" course that some universities offer (or compel) students from the humanities to take.
The book covers, in basic terms, social choice theory (voting, fair division, apportionment), graph theory (travelling salesman, networks, scheduling), symmetry and fractals, discrete iterative equations (logistic growth but no chaos, financial equations like compounding interest etc) and some probability and statistics.
To clarify the "modern" in the title consider that STEM students typically will take a calculus course and a linear algebra course in their first year. Calculus was born in the 17th century. While the problem of solving linear systems is an ancient one (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nin... ) it got systematic treatment (in Europe) in the 17th century as well. With the development of matrices and their inverses perhaps we can say Linear algebra proper had a 19th century birth. Much of the content in Tannenbaum's book, although often inspired by old problems, is teaching maths developed in the mid-twentieth century.
The text does a generally good job of presenting the material to its target audience. Its colourful, has plenty of pictures/graphs, lots of white space, and a chatty prose style. Many examples are drawn from everyday activities or interests - popular sports, TV programs, elections etc. Problem sets are graded as "Walk", "Jog" and "Run" to indicate difficulty which is helpful while not off putting. The choice of content is interesting and I believe much of it would be easy for the non-maths student to see as useful and relevant.
The negatives are:
* the book is expensive (close to $300 AUD at the time of writing) and its hard to justify making a student spend that much for a book in most cases let alone a course outside their specialisation .
* the book is intended for an American audience so educators outside of the USA will need to supplement the existing examples or replace them
* its long -- ~600 pages -- so you're unlikely to use all the content.
* statistics is covered in numerous other places better for the social scientist, the discrete equations section only just hints at the chaos so doesn't really get to the modern material.
Overall, its good excursion but I'm glad I didn't pay for it.
January 22, 2023
The excursions were fine, but the mini excursions were not long enough.
December 20, 2016
This was a very fun math book.
March 5, 2020
A math book.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews