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A review by brijackandcheddar
How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking by Jordan Ellenberg
5.0
The thing that stood out the most to me was how much this book made me laugh while I read it. People have this concept that math is boring numbers. Always their response is “But when will I use this in my real life” and this book really exposes how every day things are affected by good and bad math. As well, how math is much more about understanding “why” than dealing with cold hearted numbers, which made my philosophy majored sister excited to read the book herself. Really well written as well.
One thing I have to bring up is his connection to formalist politics to baseball, namely how the judge and jury are the same as the umpire in baseball, and it’s the only area that I disagreed with. A jury in a court case makes the decision on if a person is guilty which is comprised of 13 people. The reason for 13 people is the reduce the likelihood of jumping to the “wrong” conclusion (although human beings as agreed upon are imperfectly irrational and can be swayed by emotion). Then the judge hands the sentencing. Take that and compare it to the 1 umpire who decides if the play was a Home run or not and you’ll see why introduction of video recall is not only helpful, but I argue necessary. But of course that’s a personal opinion and it doesn’t matter what we think. It is what it is!
One thing I have to bring up is his connection to formalist politics to baseball, namely how the judge and jury are the same as the umpire in baseball, and it’s the only area that I disagreed with. A jury in a court case makes the decision on if a person is guilty which is comprised of 13 people. The reason for 13 people is the reduce the likelihood of jumping to the “wrong” conclusion (although human beings as agreed upon are imperfectly irrational and can be swayed by emotion). Then the judge hands the sentencing. Take that and compare it to the 1 umpire who decides if the play was a Home run or not and you’ll see why introduction of video recall is not only helpful, but I argue necessary. But of course that’s a personal opinion and it doesn’t matter what we think. It is what it is!