68 Items Tagged

Mathematics

Puzzle Monday: When Tetris Meets the Four-Color Theorem

AO Puzzles May 22, 2023

Puzzle Monday: A Number System of Their Own

Alex Bellos May 8, 2023

Redcliffe, England

The St Mary Redcliffe Chaotic Pendulum

The unpredictability of this pendulum's movements has drawn visitors to this magnificent church for decades.

Budapest, Hungary

Gömböc

The largest statue of this convex, homogeneous object with just one stable and one unstable equilibrium point.

Podcast: Harvard Bridge Smoots

Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.

The Podcast Team July 8, 2021

The Satisfaction of Mathematically Efficient Christmas Cookies

If only there were a cookie-cutter solution.

Isaac Schultz December 23, 2020

Borromini's Perspective Gallery of Palazzo Spada

This gallery commissioned by Cardinal Spada is known for its magnificent optical illusion.

Sold: 53 Letters Deciphered by a Groundbreaking English Codebreaker

Cagey about his methods, John Wallis was a bit of a cipher himself.

Matthew Taub October 7, 2020

What Candy Can Teach Us About the Origin of Mysterious Stone Forests

A stunning geological phenomenon, sweetly explained.

Luke Fater September 21, 2020

Astrologers Were the Quants of the Ancient World

Coincidence and correlation in the stars, from the founding of Baghdad to the New York Yankees to COVID-19.

Alexander Boxer August 7, 2020

Art Challenge: Readers Draw Places They've Never Seen

Some of your creations are even more extraordinary than their real-life counterparts.

Michelle Cassidy May 7, 2020

Boston, Massachusetts

Harvard Bridge Smoot Measurements

In 1958, an MIT fraternity pledge laid down on this bridge and instituted a new, unique unit of measurement.

Oxford, England

Penrose Paving at the Mathematical Institute

The beautiful non-repeating pattern honors the Oxford professor who discovered it.

Garching bei München, Germany

Abacus Clock

This unique abacus hanging in the Technical University of Munich actually tells the time.

Stockholm, Sweden

Last Home of Descartes

A plaque marks the house in Stockholm where the French philosopher René Descartes lived up until his death.

This Perpetual Calendar Hidden in an Italian Chapel Is a Mathematical Marvel

The 19th-century device accurately tracks 4,000 years with nine cylinders and a crank.

A. J. Oliveira February 22, 2019

Nottingham, England

Green's Mill

A curious urban windmill once owned by a renowned British mathematical physicist.

Saint-Cloud, France

Le Grand K

The former global standard for the exact mass of one kilogram sits under lock and key outside Paris.