A Brief History of Mathematics

By: Marcus du Sautoy

Narrated by: Marcus du Sautoy

Publisher's summary

This ten-part history of mathematics reveals the personalities behind the calculations: the passions and rivalries of mathematicians struggling to get their ideas heard. Professor Marcus du Sautoy shows how these masters of abstraction find a role in the real world and proves that mathematics is the driving force behind modern science.

He explores the relationship between Newton and Leibniz, the men behind the calculus; looks at how the mathematics that Euler invented 200 years ago paved the way for the internet and discovers how Fourier transformed our understanding of heat, light and sound. In addition, he finds out how Galois' mathematics describes the particles that make up our universe, how Gaussian distribution underpins modern medicine, and how Riemann's maths helped Einstein with his theory of relativity. Finally, he introduces Cantor, who discovered infinite numbers; Poincaré, whose work gave rise to chaos theory; G.H. Hardy, whose work inspired the millions of codes that help to keep the internet safe, and Nicolas Bourbaki, the mathematician who never was.

The BBC Radio 4 series looking at the people who shaped modern mathematics, written and presented by Marcus du Sautoy.

©2020 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2020 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

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5 out of 5 stars

By Brother Bear on 04-18-24

Short & Sweet!

Brief summaries of past giants in mathematics, and examples of their works and its importance in the sciences.

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5 out of 5 stars

By Michael Sisson on 07-27-22

Wonderful

I loved the topic have always loved math, quite I defeating to learn of the men that created it. Wish there was another series.

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5 out of 5 stars

By G. Fivas on 02-17-23

A pleasing overview

I found this audiobook to be a pleasing overview of the historical development of mathematics.

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5 out of 5 stars

By Anonymous User on 06-26-24

Brief but informative

Recommend, light book, very enthusiastic author, interestingly tells story of complicated topics without going into details.

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5 out of 5 stars

By geckogal on 10-10-20

Sautoy is a Great Math Story Teller

I can spend hours listening to Dr. Marcus du Sautoy describe complex Math ideas, and I do. He has the knack of describe complex with everyday metaphors. Unfortunately, Sautoy is only looking at European mathematicians since Galileo. I am sure that other world cultures had important math breakthroughs during this time.

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5 out of 5 stars

By Anonymous User on 02-01-23

Just give it a listen!

If you want to fall in love without math this is the book. Personally I plan on releasing to it again. Only problem being there should be a video accompanying it but I don’t think it takes much away from just how interesting math is. The narrator did a fantastic job and definitely keeps the story intriguing and I didn’t think i could say this about a book on math but I almost listened to it in one sitting because of how it stays interesting.

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5 out of 5 stars

By Dr. Robert Puff on 12-19-20

Superb

Excellent. Another wonderful read on the history of mathematics. Dr. du Sautoy is an excellent communicator.

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5 out of 5 stars

By A. Toomey on 06-27-22

A History... Starting with Calculus

I'm pleased to report, given the short length, this book does not cover the entire history of mathematics, but instead starts at the concepts which became calculus and moves forward chronologically from there. It covers a wide range of concepts and includes interesting stories of the mathematicians involved. The author is very expressive and easy to listen to. The examples are well explained and clear to understand even for those not initiated into the particular theory. There are numerous real-world connections presented of how the concepts are used in our day to day lives.

My one complaint is the repeated "title card" playing throughout. This is clearly due to the fact it was originally presented in another, episodic, format. This could have been removed in editing before being presented as a single audiobook without any loss of information and the individual episodes split into "Chapters" for those who wish easier navigation.

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5 out of 5 stars

By Amazon Customer on 05-03-22

Excellent!

This was to come by and get your period I truly enjoyed listening to the entire thing. Wish there was more to listen to.

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5 out of 5 stars

By Monique on 08-03-22

Enjoyable, but….

An enjoyable introduction to the history of mathematics! Heavily focused though on European mathematicians. Mathematicians from other parts of the world: Asia, and Africa are largely ignored.

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