Ebook: Do Androids Dream of Symmetric Sheaves?: And Other Mathematically Bent Stories

Why is the Devil thrilled when Hell gets its first mathematician? How do 6 and 27 solve the diabolical murder of 9? What are the advantages a vampire has in the math world? What happens when we run out of new math to discover? How does Dr. Frankenstein create the ideal mathematical creature? What transpires when a grad student digging for theorems strikes a rich vein on the ridge overlooking Deadwood? What happens when math students band together to foment rebellion? What will a mathematician do beyond the grave to finish that elusive proof?

This is just a small subset of the questions plumbed in this collection of 45 mathematically bent stories from the fertile imagination of Colin Adams. Originally appearing in The Mathematical Intelligencer, an expository mathematics magazine, these tales give a decidedly unconventional look at the world of mathematics and mathematicians. A section of notes is provided at the end of the book that explain references that may not be familiar to all and that include additional commentary by the author.


Table of Contents (45 chapters)

1. Immortality


2. Gold Rush


3. Prime Suspect


4. The Cabinet of Dr. Möbius


5. On Another Plane


6. The Modern Prometheus


7. Aftermath


8. Looking Backward


9. A Denial


10. Algebrexit


11. Fields Candidacy


12. Leonhard Euler and the Seven Bridges of Königsberg


13. The Great Storm


14. All Tied Up


15. The Adventures of Robin Caruso


16. Hardy and Ramanujan


17. Introduction to the Collected Works


18. Mathematicus


19. Happiness Is a Warm Theorem


20. Motivational Seminar


21. Cylindra Ella


22. Referee’s Report


23. Silence of the Lemmas


24. The Seven Labors of Hercules


25. Presidential Address


26. A Pi Day Carol


27. GUI


28. Math Is Everywhere


29. Job Solicitation


30. CSI: MSRI


31. Do Androids Dream of Symmetric Sheaves?


32. A Ghost Story


33. Equinox


34. Secrets of Math Destruction


35. The Book


36. A Grader’s Dream


37. The End of Mathematics


38. Definitions that Sizzle


39. Edutainment


40. A Prisoner’s Dilemma


41. The Intergalactic Congress of Mathematicians


42. The Gulag


43. Where Do Theorems Come From?


44. The Lord of the Rings I: The NSF Fellowship of the Rings


45. Piracy