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Alex's Adventures in Numberland

Alex Bellos (Goodreads Author)

4.11 · Rating details · 4,883 ratings · 513 reviews

The world of maths can seem mind-boggling, irrelevant and, let's face it, boring. This groundbreaking book reclaims maths from the geeks.

Mathematical ideas underpin just about everything in our lives: from the surprising geometry of the 50p piece to how probability can help you win in any casino. In search of weird and wonderful mathematical phenomena, Alex Bellos travels ...more

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Kindle Edition, 448 pages

Published April 5th 2010 by Bloomsbury

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Aug 21, 2016 Jan-Maat added it

While I was reading this book , I noticed it was published by Bloomsbury and I remembered that a few years ago they were doing rather poorly until J.K.Rowling came along with a seven volume Christian parable for children and magically transformed their financial performance.
I might be the ideal audience for this book - turned off Maths at school, yet still mildly interested, bed bound and unwell , with limited reading choices, however I found it largely uninteresting built up of clusters of not ...more

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Jun 12, 2017 Matt rated it liked it

Shelves: might-tell-you-the-truth, media-ebooks, tangled-up-in-maths, teachers-teach

This was a mixed bag for me. On one hand it’s an easy read, a beach read if you will, and it covers quite a lot of math’s ground in relatively little space. Most of the anecdotes and stories about former mathematicians I already knew, but it’s nice to have them all in one place. On the other hand the bock sometimes lacks a certain depth. It is noticeable that the author is trying to offer something to readers who have little or nothing to do with numbers and maths. Only those people would probab ...more

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Jun 23, 2015 Ms.pegasus rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: anyone interested in games, puzzles, and mathematical connections

Shelves: history, mathematics, nonfiction

Alex Bellos is a gifted writer who has embarked on a mission to popularize mathematics. He makes a frank observation that should give pause to any reader: “By age 16, schoolkids have learned almost no math beyond what was already known in the mid-seventeenth century, and likewise by the time they are 18, they have not gone beyond the mid-eighteenth century.” What ensues is both a historical tour and spontaneous encounters with some of the most eccentric people currently operating on the fringes ...more

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Sep 24, 2014 Aamil Syed rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 130-challenge, non-fiction

This is a fabulous chronicle of the most esoteric subject in existence!

Alex Bellos is witty, serious, engaging and if I may say so, utterly charming in his narration of the history of mathematics. He has organized the book in the way that allows him to be chronological while also taking diversions from time to time to connect with what's happening now in the field of mathematics.

He begins with a systematic exposition of the idea of numbers and the need for them and progresses steadily at a reall This is a fabulous chronicle of the most esoteric subject in existence!

Alex Bellos is witty, serious, engaging and if I may say so, utterly charming in his narration of the history of mathematics. He has organized the book in the way that allows him to be chronological while also taking diversions from time to time to connect with what's happening now in the field of mathematics.

He begins with a systematic exposition of the idea of numbers and the need for them and progresses steadily at a really comfortable pace to cover everything from shepherds using a hybrid base of numbers for counting their sheep to humans understanding incredibly weird and abstract concepts in mathematics with the help of crochet!

On this journey, he makes some astonishing revelations and keeps you thoroughly entertained. I'm an engineer, so I might be slightly better positioned to understand this text, but the format and language of the book assumes nothing of the reader (without being condescending) and explains every concept in a way that even a lay person will be able to follow.

It's no mean feat to be able to explain concepts like Zeno's paradox, regression to the mean, squaring a circle and Riemann's non-Euclidean geometry without using any equations. Bellos does that and more! He's juggling hardcore mathematics, entertaining (and often humorous) anecdotes and practical applications of math at the same time!

The most endearing aspect of the book is that it doesn't take sides. It is incredibly neutral in its treatment of all the branches of math, no matter how bogus they may seem (I'm looking at you, Vedic math). All the people in this book have been treated as creative artists and their work has been explored with childlike wonder.

There are many tidbits in the book that refresh your ideas of math. Indeed, for me this was a refresher of my entire math curriculum from school. And this book is also an answer (without actually trying to be) to all those people who ask – 'Why do we learn math if it has no real application in life?' Well, as amply demonstrated by Bellos, everything that is ever done in mathematics, be it silly games or idle curiosity, everything has been put to some use and had contributed to the progress of humanity.

If nothing, you should read this book to learn about an encyclopedia of sequences (that also converts them into music), to see the unbelievable impact of the invention of the electronic calculator, to imagine a world of rivalries between human equation solvers and where human calculators would indulge in math duels! But if showmanship is not your cup of tea, then there's a really good critical examination of Pascal's wager, an exploration of the wonders of Pascal's triangle and of course, a fitting end to the book with a mind-mangling (a term I learned from this book) discussion of Cantor's various infinities.

You must, must, must read this book. See the excerpts to know why (excerpts annotated with a lot of love)

Thirty-fourth book reviewed as part of the 130 Challenge| Read on my blog ...more

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Dec 17, 2011 Alan Wightman rated it liked it · review of another edition

Alex Bellos attempts to engage the general public in mathematics by describing maths in a way that anyone can understand. He commences by describing how different cultures use counting and numbers, and in many ways this is the most interesting part of the book. Several cultures, for instance, have no name for any quantity greater than about 4.

I have a degree in mathematics, but there were many things in the book that were new to me, and some that made my jaw drop. My feeling is though, that any Alex Bellos attempts to engage the general public in mathematics by describing maths in a way that anyone can understand. He commences by describing how different cultures use counting and numbers, and in many ways this is the most interesting part of the book. Several cultures, for instance, have no name for any quantity greater than about 4.

I have a degree in mathematics, but there were many things in the book that were new to me, and some that made my jaw drop. My feeling is though, that anyone without mathematical training may start to lose interest at about Chapter 5, when algebra is introduced. Probability, Number Theory, Geometry and Statistics follow, and in the limit as the page number tends to infinity, the book tends to resemble a maths textbook. Having said, as infinity was reached and the book finished, I was quite sad. There were six appendices to console me, however.

I think that non-mathsy people will enjoy at least the first half, perhaps more. The title is enough however, to put off my non-mathsy girlfriend, who accused me of being a "geek" for reading it.

Here are some of my favourite snippets:

The current record for reciting the digital expansion of pi from memory is held by Akira Haraguchi, a 60 year old retired engineer from Japan. In 2006, he was filmed in a public hall near Tokyo reciting pi to 100,000 decimal places. The performance took him 16 hours and 28 minutes. He used a mnemonic technique, assigning syllables to each number from 0 to 9 and then translating pi's decimals into words, which in turn formed sentences. The record for pi memorisation whilst juggling is held by Mats Bergsten (Sweden) who has recited 9778 digits while juggling three balls. (p162/163).

Ramanujan, in the early twentieth centiry, developed some remarkable infinite series for pi, including the mind blowing one on page 164 (can be seen at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramanujan) without the help of computers. In the 1980s, presumably with the help of comupters, the Chudnovsky brothers developed an even more ferocious formula (p165).

In December 2009, the record for determining the digital expansion of pi was broken, and now stands at 2.7 trillion places (p 168).

The Great Internet Mesenne Prime Search (GIMPS) links about 75,000 computers across the world in the search for higher and higher prime numbers. The highest found (at the time of publication of the book) was 2^43112609-1, which is a number almost 13 million digits long (p 271).

"Regression (to the mean) is one of the least grasped but most useful mathematical concepts you need for a rational understanding of the world" (p 378). ...more

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Nov 01, 2020 John Gilbert rated it liked it

My brain is now filled with more number facts than I ever wanted it to be filled with. I cannot believe I was a Mathmatics major in Uni for over a year and was so unknowing of so much of what Alex talked about. Numbers are indeed fascinating, if overwhelming for most of us. The early chapters about societies use of numbers and how they did not recognise numbers over what they could see or count. Why do we have ten as the basis of our numerical system rather than 12. 12 makes sense in that we hav ...more

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Jul 17, 2020 Chaitanya Sethi rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, non-fiction, mathematics

'Alex's Adventures in Numberland' is a book that I would want everyone to read. Part history, part sociology, and part philosophy, it traces the origins of man's desire to introduce numbers and counting into his life and how that choice has led to the growth of Mathematics today.

While it may sound strange to us, the desire to question the need for math, Alex sets the ball rolling right from the first chapter(the zeroth, in the book) where he introduces a tribal community in the Amazon who don't 'Alex's Adventures in Numberland' is a book that I would want everyone to read. Part history, part sociology, and part philosophy, it traces the origins of man's desire to introduce numbers and counting into his life and how that choice has led to the growth of Mathematics today.

While it may sound strange to us, the desire to question the need for math, Alex sets the ball rolling right from the first chapter(the zeroth, in the book) where he introduces a tribal community in the Amazon who don't have the vocabulary for numbers beyond 5 because they have no need for counting the things they own. It is at that point he makes you realize how much about the math around us we take for granted - why do we have a base 10 for counting, how did the names for the numbers come about, how did humans over the world establish math as a globally standard way of communicating, and where did the ideas for concepts like probability, statistics, and infinity come from?

He also explores what he terms 'ethnomathematics' - the approach of different cultures towards Mathematics; how Indians(Hindus) have made Vedic math as a symbol of past glory and how Japanese have made mental arithmetic and the abacus a mark of intelligence. He's also traced the link of innovations and ideas over time - how one idea led to another and it snowballed into fads and theories. There are sprinkles of neat mathematical tricks and patterns to amuse the reader - curious little observations and theorems. There are references to religion and how many people associated the exploration of math to getting closer to divinity.

Although it runs nearly 450 pages, it is a book one can breeze through. The writing is easy to follow and so are the mathematical explanations(for the most part). In any case, the point isn't to grasp the math but the philosophy behind it. If you'd like to spend some time being impressed with the ingenuity of brilliant minds who lived before us and had the ability to invent these concepts, then this book would be a field day for you. ...more

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Aug 22, 2011 Koen Crolla rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: mathematics

The world of maths can seem mind-boggling, irrelevant and, let's face it, boring. This groundbreaking book reclaims maths from the geeks.

This is how the blurb on the back cover starts. Alex's Adventures in Numberland isn't quite as awful as that suggests, but it's very apparent Bellos is a journalist, not a mathematician. He shares with most of his colleagues a subconscious but profound contempt of experts (to his credit, at least it is subconscious), an inability to distinguish substance and le ...more

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Jun 19, 2011 John Gardner rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Surprising, indeed! This book (and my puchase of it) is proof that a great title can sell a book. I'd never heard of the author. I'm not particularly interested in math, and have certainly never intentionally read over 300 pages about it. A month ago it would have been difficult for me to conceive of something so seemingly dull as a book about math.

But I loved this book!

Part of the appeal of the book is its author. I am convinced that Alex Bellos could make anything interesting. He is a gifted w Surprising, indeed! This book (and my puchase of it) is proof that a great title can sell a book. I'd never heard of the author. I'm not particularly interested in math, and have certainly never intentionally read over 300 pages about it. A month ago it would have been difficult for me to conceive of something so seemingly dull as a book about math.

But I loved this book!

Part of the appeal of the book is its author. I am convinced that Alex Bellos could make anything interesting. He is a gifted writer, who just happens also to be a gifted mathematician; the perfect left/right-brained combination to make something like this work.

The book is ordered into twelve chapters (numbered 0-11; Chapter Zero is, fittingly, about the concept of zero and how it's invention changed the world). Each chapter can be read individually, which, as Bellos says, means you can skip any chapters that you find boring... but I can pretty much guarantee that won't happen. For a book about numbers, the content is largely narrative, as opposed to being arranged in lists, tables, and other mathematical ways. The author uses his skills as a journalist to track down some remarkable people from all parts of the world, and engages readers in their fascinating stories.

The "World of Math" truly is astonishing. From ancient philosophy and counting monkeys to sudoku puzzles and how to beat the odds in the casino, my mind was consistently blown on every page (but in a good way!). If I start listing individual facts that amazed me, I wouldn't be able to stop, so you're going to just have to read this book for yourself.

You don't have to know advanced math to enjoy this book. Honestly, you probably don't need to know much at all about math, or be particularly good at it. Bellos never assumes too much about his audience. You merely need to love a good story, and be prepared to be thoroughly entertained.

P.S. — This book has opened my eyes to an entire genre that I never knew existed: "Recreational Math Books". I'll definitely be returning to this well! ...more

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Oct 09, 2016 Sumit Gouthaman rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Didn't believe I'll read an entire book just about math. But this one is just weirdly engaging. ...more

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Oct 10, 2021 Roland rated it liked it

Shelves: skipped

I like the format of the book, where all the chapters start by a story that's brings you slowly into an aspect of the science of numbers.

I found the chapters on the history of numbers fascinating. I also liked the chapters on The Golden Ratio, and on Statistics and probabilities.

But, most the Maths went through me, as I am not used to represent them in my head anymore. Therefore, I am too slow to follow Alex's Math's demonstrations.

Nevertheless, I liked the book, even if I skipped the 'back of t ...more

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Jan 29, 2021 Rut Noboa rated it it was amazing

Alex’s Adventures in Numberland is a captivating read that broadens the reach of mathematics past its traditional scope. Within the conventional (or at least American-style) school system, mathematics is often contemplated as merely a stepping stone for graduation, an abstract concept that can be easily ignored if you join the humanities or liberal arts and simplified through the rise of constantly evolving computers and calculators if you go into STEM. However, Bellos manages to explore the imp ...more

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Nov 30, 2016 Blair rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: zzz-public-library, mathematics

Is this a great book, or did I read it at the right time? I am tutoring high-school math and found much inspiration in these pages. While there is little that is completely new for me, most of what is there is well explained. He provides a lot of historical background, starting with tribes using a number system of one, two, many. The author is not afraid of philosophy, as can be seen in this meditation on the number zero:

“Indian philosophy embraced the concept of nothingness just as Indian math ...more

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Jul 24, 2012 Christy rated it really liked it · review of another edition

This strays so far from my normal read, but I found it very interesting, and Bellos' writing was engaging.

I've been spending the summer feeling like one of the teachers from Pink Floyd's The Wall, forcing my 12 year old to study Algebra in preparation for next school year. It's been shear hell for both of us. Neither of us likes math, but I'm a really stubborn woman & I've been seeking sources that will make math & algebra more accessible, more understandable, maybe even interesting. Who knew? T ...more

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May 14, 2011 Brian Sison rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: math-science, non-fiction

This is a great book that delves into the fascinating history of math. Stops along the way include the advent of zero, the use of the abacus and the sliderule, the search for the trillionth decimal in pi, the Fibonacci sequence, the golden ratio, fractals, varying levels of infiniti, counting cards in blackjack, the definition of what's "normal", and straight lines that aren't straight.

Unlike some books that try to cover so many topics, Bellos goes into enough depth in each chapter to educate, e ...more

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Feb 06, 2021 Naama rated it liked it

This book was recommended by many math lovers and enthusiasts. I was expecting to explore a layout of math and it's beauty, yet the topics were math-related and not mathimatical concepts. It was quite a fun read, but not as compelling as I was expecting. ...more

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Apr 03, 2012 Dave Hill rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

If you read just one book about math this year, it should totally be this one and I am right about everything.

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Feb 18, 2013 Colin rated it liked it · review of another edition

Pretty good pop-sci but strangely unsatisfying. Possibly I just wasn't in the right mood, but I think it's something to do with his authorial voice... ...more

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May 22, 2020 Benjamin rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

What an amazing adventure through the world of math.

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Jun 18, 2022 Hiraeth rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2022

7/10
Mathematics has always been there but it requires a human understanding to become seen. Bellos focuses primarily on these subjects from an anthropological perspective which is uniquely interesting. I'm coming at this from the position of a pretty heavy maths background at this point so a lot of the theory wasn't new. I found particularly interesting the development of numeral systems, the sometimes hilarious professional feuds, probability relating to gambling and the finale which delves int ...more

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Jan 22, 2022 Annette rated it liked it

2.5
Good book however Alex lost me / my interest many times while explaining theories and going on about details of history of maths. I really hoped this book would have explained the world around me better but instead there were waaay too many distracting details. I won't lie that some chapters really dragged. Still, I learnt quite a bit from it :)

Definitely not a maths noob book but a book for someone who already has a clue and an existing interest in maths + its history. ...more

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Feb 25, 2019 Jitendra Singh rated it really liked it

It's an exceptional book but at the same time I must confess that I didn't fully understand some of the portions. But I highly enjoyed it. A must read for anyone who loves math ...more

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Jun 24, 2019 Aly Verbaan rated it it was amazing

Anyone with an interest in maths and history and all kinds of odd factoids about both, this is fantastic and so well presented.

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Jul 01, 2012 Elizabeth McDonald rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

Excellent, approachable non-fiction writing which combines history of math with actual mathematical concepts. Bellos addresses a different mathematical concept in each chapter, telling about its discovery, explaining how it works, and making you laugh at the same time. He consulted a variety of experts, from a linguist who studies Amazon tribes that only have words for numbers up to 4, to a Hollywood numerologist, to the man with the most impressive slide rule collection in Britain. Although I h ...more

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Jul 20, 2011 Libyrinths rated it really liked it · review of another edition

What a thoroughly fun book! Yes, I got the book because of the title. I figured anyone with a good sense of humor like that might do a reasonable job on a popular math book. It exceeded expectations!

Bellos does a lively romp through various everyday (and some not so everyday) things with little resort to heavy equations or other soporific or brain-wrenching stuff. He covers sudoku, magic squares, number sequences, the probability and statistics of gambling and betting systems, pi and transcenden ...more

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Nov 07, 2011 Emily rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: nonfiction

I'm not a math person by any stretch of the imagination, but I found this book to be a lot of fun...until about halfway through when some of the math discussions started going way over my head (but that's my fault, not the author's). This is basically a book about the history of mathematical thought and Bellos does a good job of pulling it all together in an entertaining and informative way. We learn where numbers come from, how we went from counting sticks to written numbers, the invention of z ...more

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Jun 30, 2013 Jen rated it liked it · review of another edition

Ok, some parts of this book made me feel like a mental midget, some made me feel super-smart when I understood what was being discussed and the rest made me realize why I majored in English and not math. Can anyone please explain to me why it is important to know that there are sets of numbers larger than infinity? Some of the stuff made practical sense, but who cares if the numbers between zero and one is a set of numbers larger than infinity? Will it solve a bigger problem some day or is it ma ...more

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Jul 07, 2018 Raquel (Silver Valkyrie Reads) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Raquel (Silver Valkyrie Reads) by: Toby Lansberry

Shelves: nonfiction, reread-worthy

The irony of this book is that it was so good I wanted to go through it slowly enough to absorb all the information, which led to me getting distracted and reading other things instead, so it took me approximately forever to finish it.

Entertaining and informative, and occasionally mind blowing, I would recommend this book be read by anyone who is considering whether to study higher branches of mathematics. If the concepts here intrigue you, go for it! If they put you off, go for a different f ...more

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Dec 23, 2011 Nathan rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fact

When I was a kid, I remember reading and loving E.T. Bell's "Men of Mathematics". I later learned that his scholarship leaves something to be desired, but he brought out the humanity and genius of the big names and famous characters of mathematics. Bellos doesn't have a similar goal in "Alex's Adventures in Numberland", as he's just as interested in applications and the quirky patterns of maths as he is in the people behind it, but he captured my interest the way no writer since E.T. Bell has. Y ...more

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Jan 26, 2020 Erik Molnar rated it it was amazing

Shelves: soft-cover, favorites, numbers

Mind blown. Mission accomplished. Numbers are part of our everyday lives, but how much thought do you put into them other than figuring out how much to tip or how much you should budget for the month. I wanted to get a better understanding of numbers without having to learn all of the difficult math behind it all, most if which I never learned or already forgot how to do. This book is exactly what i was looking for. Easy read. Mind blowing concepts. There is no why behind it all, don’t look for ...more

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About Alex Bellos

Alex Bellos

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"I was born in Oxford and grew up in Edinburgh and Southampton. After studying mathematics and philosophy at university I joined the Evening Argus in Brighton as a trainee reporter. I joined the Guardian in 1994 as a reporter and in 1998 moved to Rio de Janeiro, where I spent five years as the paper’s South America correspondent. Since 2003 I have lived in London, as a freelance writer and broadca ...more

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