Click the cover to order your copy!
Illustrated by Philip Reeve
This book was originally
published
in the UK as
Numbers: The Key to the Universe
by Scholastic Ltd 2002.
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Click the cover to order your copy! |
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This book was originally published in the UK as Numbers: The Key to the Universe by Scholastic Ltd 2002. |
Suitable for ages 10 upwards
You can't touch them, you can't eat them, you can't sit on them and on their own they mean absolutely nothing. But the more we know about numbers, the more we realise that everything in the universe depends on them!
Meet the man who changed maths history by just doing 2 sums on a blackboard, learn how to tell your fortune with numbers, and discover two ways that you could become famous for ever. Find out how Brett Shuffler tries to cheat at cards, why 13 is unlucky for Blade and the gang, how Auntie Crystal's enchanted quilt affects the whole of Fogsworth manor...
...and at last - the The Most Pathetic Fact in Maths is revealed!
Don't forget to click the EXTRA links for more details that we didn't have room for in the books!
It's the biggest rock concert in eternity - with an audience of infinity lifeforms. But with every one of the infinity seats full, how does the manager Tezza Goldbars fit in one extra person?
CHINESE NUMBERS! We knew that Numbers the Key to the Universe had been translated into several different languages but we didn't know there was a Chinese version! Many thanks to LUCKY who sent us this photo of himself holding his copy and a big HELLO to all our new Chinese visitors! |
Grab your old counters and use them to take apart the raw machinery of numbers.
You'll discover differences, differences of differences and differences of differences of
differences and you'll learn how to work out 3333333333332
immediately in your head. Find out why 91 is a special number for both
Urgum the Axeman buying cannon balls or Grizelda the Grisly buying arrows, and why
a scribble by an old French bloke drove the Pure Mathematicians MAD
for centuries! (The scribble is better known as Fermat's Last Theorem.)
EXTRA - Squared Triangle and Cube Numbers
Discover how to reveal people's innermost secrets by analysing names and birthdays
with a few simple sums. Meet the series of lucky numbers and then find out about
triskaidekaphobia which is fear of the number 13.
Is 13 really unlucky? It certainly leads Blade and the Gansters into trouble at
Luigi's diner.
EXTRA - The Friday 13th Calculator!
EXTRA - Find out what were you like when you were born!
A prime number will only divide by itself and 1, but why are primes so tough
when other numbers are weedy? Help catch the thieves who pinched Pongo McWhiffy's
pickled sprouts and then see a replay of a Murderous Maths hero utterly destroying a
Murderous Mersenne Prime! All your prime
questions are answered including what's special about 619737131179 and
how prime numbers could win you $1,000,000.
EXTRA: News of the BIGGEST prime number found so far!
Plus: tests to see if numbers divide by anything between 2-13 (and also 19) and
"A Day in the Life of a Pure Mathematician".
EXTRA - The Prime Numbers Calculator and a Trick
THE PRINTING ERROR!
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The smelly man with the plastic beard behind the counter draws you in with a series of quirky tricks including "Mr Kapraka's Amazing Experiments" and "The Persistent Number". But when you want answers - you have to break open a diabolical number chain. Har har!
Did you know that you can multiply numbers up to 10x10 using your fingers? (If not then
look at Finger Tables ). Once you've got the hang of it,
you can go on to
multiply numbers
up to 20 x 20. You can also use your fingers
to send number messages - but watch out if you're playing cards with Riverboat Lil!
But then suppose we didn't have ten fingers? See how different number bases work
including the binary and hexadecimal systems - then find out how Halloween can turn
into Christmas!
For nearly two thousand years people thought that 6, 28, 496 and 8128 were the only "perfect numbers" (i.e. equal to the sum of their factors, so 6 = 1+2+3).... but then 33550336 turned up! Thanks to Mersenne Primes lots more have been discovered, plus deficient numbers, abundant numbers and there's even the story of two "amicable" numbers bringing together two Pure Mathematicians. Awww!
Grab an audience, a volunteer, a pen, a sack and a padlock and prepare to amaze your friends with a bundle of tricks all based around the most mysterious number of all: 9.
NOTE: The Murderous Maths organisation cannot accept any responsibility for damage to property or injury to any person or persons arising from the performance of ... etc. You get the general idea.
If you think numbers can't scare you, just wait until you meet the irrational, the transcendental and strangest of all, the imaginary!
There's a pile of PI facts,
(including the amazing PI dance!), all about the growth number "e", and finally meet
the head bursting Euler formula which is generally accepted as the most beautiful thing in the
universe. Well, it is if you're that sort of person.
EXTRA - What is the square root of i?
By now we're ready to sort out the rock concert and find how to fit a double infinity lifeforms on a single infinity seats! (Plus we find an extra seat for the singer's mother.)
And finally- were you one of the thousands of visitors to this site who voted for
"The Most Pathetic Fact in Maths"? At last... the results are announced!
EXTRA - The Most Pathetic facts - you decide!
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