Book picks similar to
Algebra I for Dummies by Mary Jane Sterling
mathematics
math
for-dummies
non-fiction
The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets
Simon Singh - 2013
That they exist, Simon Singh reveals, underscores the brilliance of the shows' writers, many of whom have advanced degrees in mathematics in addition to their unparalleled sense of humor. While recounting memorable episodes such as “Bart the Genius” and “Homer3,” Singh weaves in mathematical stories that explore everything from p to Mersenne primes, Euler's equation to the unsolved riddle of P v. NP; from perfect numbers to narcissistic numbers, infinity to even bigger infinities, and much more. Along the way, Singh meets members of The Simpsons' brilliant writing team-among them David X. Cohen, Al Jean, Jeff Westbrook, and Mike Reiss-whose love of arcane mathematics becomes clear as they reveal the stories behind the episodes. With wit and clarity, displaying a true fan's zeal, and replete with images from the shows, photographs of the writers, and diagrams and proofs, The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets offers an entirely new insight into the most successful show in television history.
Dataclysm: Who We Are (When We Think No One's Looking)
Christian Rudder - 2014
In Dataclysm, Christian Rudder uses it to show us who we truly are. For centuries, we’ve relied on polling or small-scale lab experiments to study human behavior. Today, a new approach is possible. As we live more of our lives online, researchers can finally observe us directly, in vast numbers, and without filters. Data scientists have become the new demographers. In this daring and original book, Rudder explains how Facebook "likes" can predict, with surprising accuracy, a person’s sexual orientation and even intelligence; how attractive women receive exponentially more interview requests; and why you must have haters to be hot. He charts the rise and fall of America’s most reviled word through Google Search and examines the new dynamics of collaborative rage on Twitter. He shows how people express themselves, both privately and publicly. What is the least Asian thing you can say? Do people bathe more in Vermont or New Jersey? What do black women think about Simon & Garfunkel? (Hint: they don’t think about Simon & Garfunkel.) Rudder also traces human migration over time, showing how groups of people move from certain small towns to the same big cities across the globe. And he grapples with the challenge of maintaining privacy in a world where these explorations are possible. Visually arresting and full of wit and insight, Dataclysm is a new way of seeing ourselves—a brilliant alchemy, in which math is made human and numbers become the narrative of our time.
Hands-On Machine Learning with Scikit-Learn and TensorFlow
Aurélien Géron - 2017
Now that machine learning is thriving, even programmers who know close to nothing about this technology can use simple, efficient tools to implement programs capable of learning from data. This practical book shows you how.By using concrete examples, minimal theory, and two production-ready Python frameworks—Scikit-Learn and TensorFlow—author Aurélien Géron helps you gain an intuitive understanding of the concepts and tools for building intelligent systems. You’ll learn how to use a range of techniques, starting with simple Linear Regression and progressing to Deep Neural Networks. If you have some programming experience and you’re ready to code a machine learning project, this guide is for you.This hands-on book shows you how to use:Scikit-Learn, an accessible framework that implements many algorithms efficiently and serves as a great machine learning entry pointTensorFlow, a more complex library for distributed numerical computation, ideal for training and running very large neural networksPractical code examples that you can apply without learning excessive machine learning theory or algorithm details
A First Course in Probability
Sheldon M. Ross - 1976
A software diskette provides an easy-to-use tool for students to derive probabilities for binomial.
Elementary Number Theory
David M. Burton - 1976
It reveals the attraction that has drawn leading mathematicians and amateurs alike to number theory over the course of history.
10 Steps to Earning Awesome Grades (While Studying Less)
Thomas Frank - 2015
Thomas Frank, founder of the College Info Geek blog, YouTube channel, and podcast, breaks these ways down into ten steps in this short book.You'll learn how to learn more effectively in your classes, take better notes, remember more from textbook readings, cut down on procrastination, build an optimal study environment, and more.Along the way, you'll find techniques for increasing your study and work efficiency, giving you more free time in college as well.
Speed Reading For Dummies
Richard Sutz - 2009
Learn to:
Increase your reading speed and comprehension Use speed techniques for any type of reading material Improve your silent reading skills Recall more of what you read The fun and easy way(R) to become a more efficient, effective reader!Want to read faster -- and recall more of what you read? This practical, hands-on guide gives you the techniques you need to increase your reading speed and retention, whether you're reading books, e-mails, magazines, or even technical journals! You'll find reading aids and plenty of exercises to help you read faster and better comprehend the text.Yes, you can speed read -- discover the skills you need to read quickly and effectively, break your bad reading habits, and take in more text at a glanceFocus on the fundamentals -- widen your vision span and see how to increase your comprehension, retention, and recallAdvance your speed-reading skills -- read blocks of text, heighten your concentration, and follow an author's thought patternsZero in on key points -- skim, scan, and preread to quickly locate the information you wantExpand your vocabulary -- recognize the most common words and phrases to help you move through the text more quickly Open the book and find: Tried-and-true techniques from The Reader's Edge(R) program How to assess your current reading level Tools and exercises to improve your reading skills Speed-reading fundamentals you must know Helpful lists of prefixes, suffixes, roots, and prime words A speed-reading progress worksheet Exercises for eye health and expanded reading vision Tips for making your speed-reading skills permanent
Bounce: Mozart, Federer, Picasso, Beckham, and the Science of Success
Matthew Syed - 2010
Fans of Predictably Irrational and Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point will find many interesting and helpful insights in Bounce.
Information Theory: A Tutorial Introduction
James V. Stone - 2015
In this richly illustrated book, accessible examples are used to show how information theory can be understood in terms of everyday games like '20 Questions', and the simple MatLab programs provided give hands-on experience of information theory in action. Written in a tutorial style, with a comprehensive glossary, this text represents an ideal primer for novices who wish to become familiar with the basic principles of information theory.Download chapter 1 from http://jim-stone.staff.shef.ac.uk/Boo...
A Book of Abstract Algebra
Charles C. Pinter - 1982
Its easy-to-read treatment offers an intuitive approach, featuring informal discussions followed by thematically arranged exercises. Intended for undergraduate courses in abstract algebra, it is suitable for junior- and senior-level math majors and future math teachers. This second edition features additional exercises to improve student familiarity with applications. An introductory chapter traces concepts of abstract algebra from their historical roots. Succeeding chapters avoid the conventional format of definition-theorem-proof-corollary-example; instead, they take the form of a discussion with students, focusing on explanations and offering motivation. Each chapter rests upon a central theme, usually a specific application or use. The author provides elementary background as needed and discusses standard topics in their usual order. He introduces many advanced and peripheral subjects in the plentiful exercises, which are accompanied by ample instruction and commentary and offer a wide range of experiences to students at different levels of ability.
The Model Thinker: What You Need to Know to Make Data Work for You
Scott E. Page - 2018
But as anyone who has ever opened up a spreadsheet packed with seemingly infinite lines of data knows, numbers aren't enough: we need to know how to make those numbers talk. In The Model Thinker, social scientist Scott E. Page shows us the mathematical, statistical, and computational models—from linear regression to random walks and far beyond—that can turn anyone into a genius. At the core of the book is Page's "many-model paradigm," which shows the reader how to apply multiple models to organize the data, leading to wiser choices, more accurate predictions, and more robust designs. The Model Thinker provides a toolkit for business people, students, scientists, pollsters, and bloggers to make them better, clearer thinkers, able to leverage data and information to their advantage.
Grammar Girl Presents the Ultimate Writing Guide for Students
Mignon Fogarty - 2008
Mignon Fogarty, whose popular podcasts have been downloaded over twenty million times and whose first book, Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing,was a New York Times bestseller. For beginners to more advanced students, this guide covers it all: the parts of speech, sentences, and punctuation are all explained clearly and concisely with the warmth, wit, and accessibility Grammar Girl is known for. Pop quizzes are scattered throughout to reinforce the explanations, as well as Grammar Girl's trademark Quick and Dirty Tips--easy and fun memory tricks to help with those challenging rules. Complete with a writing style chapter and a guide to the different kinds of writing--everything from school papers to letter writing to e-mails--this guide is sure to become the one-stop, essential book on every student's desk.
The Fractal Geometry of Nature
Benoît B. Mandelbrot - 1977
The complexity of nature's shapes differs in kind, not merely degree, from that of the shapes of ordinary geometry, the geometry of fractal shapes.Now that the field has expanded greatly with many active researchers, Mandelbrot presents the definitive overview of the origins of his ideas and their new applications. The Fractal Geometry of Nature is based on his highly acclaimed earlier work, but has much broader and deeper coverage and more extensive illustrations.
The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail—But Some Don't
Nate Silver - 2012
He solidified his standing as the nation's foremost political forecaster with his near perfect prediction of the 2012 election. Silver is the founder and editor in chief of FiveThirtyEight.com. Drawing on his own groundbreaking work, Silver examines the world of prediction, investigating how we can distinguish a true signal from a universe of noisy data. Most predictions fail, often at great cost to society, because most of us have a poor understanding of probability and uncertainty. Both experts and laypeople mistake more confident predictions for more accurate ones. But overconfidence is often the reason for failure. If our appreciation of uncertainty improves, our predictions can get better too. This is the "prediction paradox": The more humility we have about our ability to make predictions, the more successful we can be in planning for the future.In keeping with his own aim to seek truth from data, Silver visits the most successful forecasters in a range of areas, from hurricanes to baseball, from the poker table to the stock market, from Capitol Hill to the NBA. He explains and evaluates how these forecasters think and what bonds they share. What lies behind their success? Are they good-or just lucky? What patterns have they unraveled? And are their forecasts really right? He explores unanticipated commonalities and exposes unexpected juxtapositions. And sometimes, it is not so much how good a prediction is in an absolute sense that matters but how good it is relative to the competition. In other cases, prediction is still a very rudimentary-and dangerous-science.Silver observes that the most accurate forecasters tend to have a superior command of probability, and they tend to be both humble and hardworking. They distinguish the predictable from the unpredictable, and they notice a thousand little details that lead them closer to the truth. Because of their appreciation of probability, they can distinguish the signal from the noise.
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
Douglas R. Hofstadter - 1979
However, according to Hofstadter, the formal system that underlies all mental activity transcends the system that supports it. If life can grow out of the formal chemical substrate of the cell, if consciousness can emerge out of a formal system of firing neurons, then so too will computers attain human intelligence. Gödel, Escher, Bach is a wonderful exploration of fascinating ideas at the heart of cognitive science: meaning, reduction, recursion, and much more.