Cover of British edition
“Leonard Mlodinow has had, to speak informally, a pretty random career….
A far more sober instance of randomness, however, underpins his new book, The Drunkard’s Walk. And it’s not hard to see it as a sort of Rosebud, explaining why the author finds unpredictability so compelling.”
Another sort of Rosebud–
C. P. Snow on G. H. Hardy:
“… A Mathematician’s Apology is, if read with the textual attention it deserves, a book of haunting sadness. Yes, it is witty and sharp with intellectual high spirits: yes, the crystalline clarity and candour are still there: yes, it is the testament of a creative artist. But it is also, in an understated stoical fashion, a passionate lament for creative powers that used to be and that will never come again.”
Perhaps in the afterlife Hardy, an expert on the theory of numbers, does again enjoy such powers. If so, his comments on the following would be of interest:
Mid-day 006
(the first perfect number)
Evening 568
(an apparently random number)
2 + 3 + 5 + 7 + 11 +
13 + 17 + 19 + 23 +
29 + 31 + 37 + 41 +
43 + 47 + 53 + 59 +
61 + 67 = 568
See The On-Line Encyclopedia
of Integer Sequences,
A046731, Sum of primes < 10^n, as well as
A006880, Number of primes < 10^n.
According to an amateur* mathematician named Cino Hilliard, “a very important relationship exists” between the sum of primes less than x and the prime counting function Pi(x) which is the number of primes less than x—
Whether this apparent relationship is, in fact, “very important,” or merely a straightforward consequence of other number-theoretical facts, is not obvious (to those of us not expert in number theory) from Google searches. Perhaps Hardy can clear this question up for those who will, by luck or grace, meet him in the next world.
* For some background, see a profile and user group messages here and here and here.
