• See large image

  Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception (Hardback) By (author) Charles Seife

  

  $24.65 - Save $1.30 (5%) - RRP $25.95 Free delivery worldwide (to United States and
  all these other countries) Usually dispatched within 48 hours Add to basket | Add to wishlist |

  Short Description for ProofinessThe bestselling author of "Zero" shows how mathematical misinformation pervades and shapes daily lives. "Proofiness," as Seife explains in this eye-opening book, is the art of using pure mathematics for impure ends, and he reminds readers that bad mathematics has a dark side.
  Full description

  • Publisher: Viking Books
  • Published: 23 September 2010
  • Format: Hardback 295 pages
  • See: Full bibliographic data
  • Categories: History Of Mathematics | Philosophy Of Science
  • ISBN 13: 9780670022168 ISBN 10: 0670022160
  • Sales rank: 67,548

• Innumeracy

  

  Add to basket $11.80 - Save $2.19 (15%) - RRP $13.99

• Zero: the Biography of a Dangero...

  

  Add to basket $13.25 - Save $2.75 (17%) - RRP $16.00

• Proofiness

  

  Add to basket $15.20 - Save $0.80 (5%) - RRP $16.00

• The Music of the Primes

  

  Add to basket $15.09 - Save $0.79 (4%) - RRP $15.88

• The Universe in Zero Words

  

  Add to basket $26.55 - Save $5.17 (16%) - RRP $31.72

Full description for Proofiness

• The bestselling author of "Zero" shows how mathematical misinformation pervades-and shapes-our daily lives. According to MSNBC, having a child makes you stupid. You actually lose IQ points. "Good Morning America" has announced that natural blondes will be extinct within two hundred years. Pundits estimated that there were more than a million demonstrators at a tea party rally in Washington, D.C., even though roughly sixty thousand were there. Numbers have peculiar powers-they can disarm skeptics, befuddle journalists, and hoodwink the public into believing almost anything. "Proofiness," as Charles Seife explains in this eye-opening book, is the art of using pure mathematics for impure ends, and he reminds readers that bad mathematics has a dark side. It is used to bring down beloved government officials and to appoint undeserving ones (both Democratic and Republican), to convict the innocent and acquit the guilty, to ruin our economy, and to fix the outcomes of future elections. This penetrating look at the intersection of math and society will appeal to readers of "Freakonomics" and the books of Malcolm Gladwell.