Aspects Of Mathematics

The construction of mathematical models is an essential scientific activity. Mathematics is associated with developments in science and engineering, but more recently mathematical modelling has been used to investigate complex systems that arise in other fields. This book demonstrates the application of mathematics to research topics in ecology and environmental science, health and medicine, phylogenetics and neural networks, theoretical chemistry, economics and management.

If learners in the classroom are to be excited by mathematics, teachers need to be both well informed about current initiatives and able to see how what is expected of them can be translated into rich and stimulating classroom strategies. The book examines current initiatives that affect teaching mathematics and identifies pointers for action in the classroom. Divided into three major sections, it looks at: the changing mathematics classroom at primary, secondary and tertiary level major components of the secondary curriculum practical pedagogical issues of particular concern to mathematics teachers. Each issue is explores in terms of major underpinnings and research in that area, and practical ideas can be drawn from the text and implemented in the reader's classroom practice. Each chapter has been written by a well-respected writer, researcher and practitioner in their field and all share a common goal: to look thoughtfully and intelligently at some of the practical issues facing mathematics teachers and offer their perspectives on those issues.

This book demonstrates the usefulness of geometric methods in probability theory and mathematical statistics, and shows close relationships between these disciplines and convex analysis. Deep facts and statements from the theory of convex sets are discussed with their applications to various questions arising in probability theory, mathematical statistics, and the theory of stochastic processes. The book is essentially self-contained, and the presentation of material is thorough in detail. Audience: The topics considered in the book are accessible to a wide audience of mathematicians, and graduate and postgraduate students, whose interests lie in probability theory and convex geometry.

This book introduces the basic ideas to build discontinuous Galerkin methods and, at the same time, incorporates several recent mathematical developments. The presentation is to a large extent self-contained and is intended for graduate students and researchers in numerical analysis. The material covers a wide range of model problems, both steady and unsteady, elaborating from advection-reaction and diffusion problems up to the Navier-Stokes equations and Friedrichs' systems. Both finite element and finite volume viewpoints are exploited to convey the main ideas underlying the design of the approximation. The analysis is presented in a rigorous mathematical setting where discrete counterparts of the key properties of the continuous problem are identified. The framework encompasses fairly general meshes regarding element shapes and hanging nodes. Salient implementation issues are also addressed.

Semiotics as a Tool for Learning Mathematics is a collection of ten theoretical and empirical chapters, from researchers all over the world, who are interested in semiotic notions and their practical uses in mathematics classrooms. Collectively, they present a semiotic contribution to enhance pedagogical aspects both for the teaching of school mathematics and for the preparation of pre-service teachers. This enhancement involves the use of diagrams to visualize implicit or explicit mathematical relations and the use of mathematical discourse to facilitate the emergence of inferential reasoning in the process of argumentation. It will also facilitate the construction of proofs and solutions of mathematical problems as well as the progressive construction of mathematical conceptions that, eventually, will approximate the concept(s) encoded in mathematical symbols. These symbols hinge not only of mental operations but also on indexical and iconic aspects; aspects which often are not taken into account when working on the meaning of mathematical symbols. For such an enhancement to happen, it is necessary to transform basic notions of semiotic theories to make them usable for mathematics education. In addition, it is also necessary to back theoretical claims with empirical data. This anthology attempts to deal with such a conjunction. Overall, this book can be used as a theoretical basis for further semiotic considerations as well as for the design of different ways of teaching mathematical concepts.

Making up Numbers: A History of Invention in Mathematics offers a detailed but accessible account of a wide range of mathematical ideas. Starting with elementary concepts, it leads the reader towards aspects of current mathematical research. The book explains how conceptual hurdles in the development of numbers and number systems were overcome in the course of history, from Babylon to Classical Greece, from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, and so to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The narrative moves from the Pythagorean insistence on positive multiples to the gradual acceptance of negative numbers, irrationals and complex numbers as essential tools in quantitative analysis. Within this chronological framework, chapters are organised thematically, covering a variety of topics and contexts: writing and solving equations, geometric construction, coordinates and complex numbers, perceptions of ‘infinity’ and its permissible uses in mathematics, number systems, and evolving views of the role of axioms. Through this approach, the author demonstrates that changes in our understanding of numbers have often relied on the breaking of long-held conventions to make way for new inventions at once providing greater clarity and widening mathematical horizons. Viewed from this historical perspective, mathematical abstraction emerges as neither mysterious nor immutable, but as a contingent, developing human activity. Making up Numbers will be of great interest to undergraduate and A-level students of mathematics, as well as secondary school teachers of the subject. In virtue of its detailed treatment of mathematical ideas, it will be of value to anyone seeking to learn more about the development of the subject.

This book brings together ideas from experts in cognitive science, mathematics, and mathematics education to discuss these issues and to present research on how mathematics and its learning and teaching are evolving in the Information Age. Given the ever-broadening trends in Artificial Intelligence and the processing of information generally, the aim is to assess their implications for how math is evolving and how math should now be taught to a generation that has been reared in the Information Age. It will also look at the ever-spreading assumption that human intelligence may not be unique—an idea that dovetails with current philosophies of mind such as posthumanism and transhumanism. The role of technology in human evolution has become critical in the contemporary world. Therefore, a subgoal of this book is to illuminate how humans now use their sophisticated technologies to chart cognitive and social progress. Given the interdisciplinary nature of the chapters, this will be of interest to all kinds of readers, from mathematicians themselves working increasingly with computer scientists, to cognitive scientists who carry out research on mathematics cognition and teachers of mathematics in a classroom.