CRC: Suggested Reading - "The Music of the Primes" Marcus du Sautoy

[james...@austin.rr.com]

The Music of the Primes
Marcus du Sautoy
ISBN 1-84115-579-9 Hdbk

Being a Goldbach slut I tend to pick up 'history' books dealing with primes, Zeta Functions, and similar related number theory all chasing after Reimann's Hypothesis. I ran across this particular book at Half Price and thought I'd share my impression. First, you don't really need to know any number theory other than what a prime number is and what cartesian coordinates are. duSautoy does an excellent job of bypassing all the technical minutiae and getting into the personalities and how the various interactions and dependencies operated. One aspect I hadn't really delved into was the difference between the French and German approach to mathematics and how this held back cooperation. The procession of great mathematicians through Gottingen and some of the idiosyncrasies these great explorers adds a personal side to the story as well. du Sautoy has an Erdos Number of 2 and now holds the Sumonyi chair that Richard Dawkins inaugurated.

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