Introduction to Mathematical Thinking [Kindle Edition] Author: Keith Devlin | Language: English | ISBN:
B009LTPSTO | Format: PDF, EPUB
Download Introduction to Mathematical Thinking
Posts about Download The Book Download Introduction to Mathematical Thinking [Kindle Edition] from mediafire, rapishare, and mirror link In the twenty-first century, everyone can benefit from being able to think mathematically. This is not the same as “doing math.” The latter usually involves the application of formulas, procedures, and symbolic manipulations; mathematical thinking is a powerful way of thinking about things in the world -- logically, analytically, quantitatively, and with precision. It is not a natural way of thinking, but it can be learned. Mathematicians, scientists, and engineers need to “do math,” and it takes many years of college-level education to learn all that is required. Mathematical thinking is valuable to everyone, and can be mastered in about six weeks by anyone who has completed high school mathematics. Mathematical thinking does not have to be about mathematics at all, but parts of mathematics provide the ideal target domain to learn how to think that way, and that is the approach taken by this short but valuable book. The book is written primarily for first and second year students of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) at colleges and universities, and for high school students intending to study a STEM subject at university. Many students encounter difficulty going from high school math to college-level mathematics. Even if they did well at math in school, most are knocked off course for a while by the shift in emphasis, from the K-12 focus on mastering procedures to the “mathematical thinking” characteristic of much university mathematics. Though the majority survive the transition, many do not. To help them make the shift, colleges and universities often have a “transition course.” This book could serve as a textbook or a supplementary source for such a course. Because of the widespread applicability of mathematical thinking, however, the book has been kept short and written in an engaging style, to make it accessible to anyone who seeks to extend and improve their analytic thinking skills. Going beyond a basic grasp of analytic thinking that everyone can benefit from, the STEM student who truly masters mathematical thinking will find that college-level mathematics goes from being confusing, frustrating, and at times seemingly impossible, to making sense and being hard but doable. Dr. Keith Devlin is a professional mathematician at Stanford University and the author of 31 previous books and over 80 research papers. His books have earned him many awards, including the Pythagoras Prize, the Carl Sagan Award, and the Joint Policy Board for Mathematics Communications Award. He is known to millions of NPR listeners as “the Math Guy” on Weekend Edition with Scott Simon. He writes a popular monthly blog “Devlin’s Angle” for the Mathematical Association of America, another blog under the name “profkeithdevlin”, and also blogs on various topics for the Huffington Post. Direct download links available for Download Introduction to Mathematical Thinking [Kindle Edition]
- File Size: 566 KB
- Print Length: 104 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0615653634
- Publisher: Keith Devlin (July 18, 2012)
- Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B009LTPSTO
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #70,389 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #7
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Education & Reference > Schools & Teaching > Education Theory > Decision Making & Problem Solving - #75
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Mathematics - #87
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Mathematics
- #7
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Education & Reference > Schools & Teaching > Education Theory > Decision Making & Problem Solving - #75
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Mathematics - #87
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Mathematics
This goes out as a "thank you" to Professor Devlin, but should prove informative to people who can relate to my situation,
All my life, I absolutely hated math. I mean the deep pains in my cortex, blood boiling derision of the concepts kind of hatred. I remember being 8 years old and absolutely loathing the thought of studying times tables. Then, variables were added - great, numbers and letters now! No one took the time to explain why we were studying such seemingly needless information. I understand now that I am quite the pragmatist, needing a defined practical application or goal for almost anything I do. Hence the reason I hated mindless calculations so much.
My disdain for the field grew to a point in my teenage years that I could no longer even look at the subject without my well-established biases taking over, driving me away. It affected my SAT score, with a perfect score in verbal comprehension being blemished by an embarrassingly subpar result in math. My educational experience was inhibited for almost two decades, simply because I saw no use for math past counting how many apples I wanted to buy at the grocery. After law school, I became interested in finance. From fairly light interactions with financial valuation methods grew a shameful realization that my hatred for math had caught up with me, finally affecting my daily life. I was a quantitative infant in the worst way, entirely handicapped in a vast and important arena.
Then I found Coursera, and through its curriculum I came across this course. Though I have not finished it, as it has just started, the book has opened my eyes. Math is a language, just like the ones we speak and master. Its algorithms are logical thought, its concepts proven by deductive and inductive reasoning.
Keith Devlin's book "Introduction to mathematical thinking." is the textbook, the unnecessary and ridiculously inexpensive ($10) textbook, for his class on Coursera.com. The class obviously designed to be an introduction to mathematical thinking, a transition from the problem solving math of secondary school to college level mathematics where simply finding an answer is not the final goal.
I wanted to take a look at the free, non-credit classes that Coursera offers and this looked like a good one to try. It has been 30 years since I last took college calculus, and I have not looked at a math book since then. I knew I could do the work, I wanted to see just how a free, non-credit class, with 50,000 students worked.
Both the class and the book are excellent. Devlin begins by showing us that imprecision is often acceptable in spoken English. "One American dies every hour from heart disease" is his favorite example. Literally it says that there is one single American who dies, and apparently recovers, from heart disease every hour. We all understand the true meaning because in English we have background knowledge which allows us to make sense from nonsense based on the context. Mathematics requires precision because with it we will be dealing with concepts with which we do not have the background to guide our understanding.
Dr. Devlin focused on developing logical thinking and managed to arrange the lessons and exercises such that the mathematical logic required quickly evolves from simple "and" "or" statements into doing formal proofs, no small feat for a class only seven weeks long.
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