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April 3-4, 2009Bowling Green State University
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April 3-4, 2009Bowling Green State University
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One of the main speakers for the 2009 MAA-Ohio section spring meeting may be best introduced to Ohio section members as a commentator on National Public Radio's Weekend Edition Saturday where he is known as "the Math Guy" and his prolific writing in the column entitled "Devlin's Corner" that appears on MAA Online. His web site at http://www.stanford.edu/~kdevlin/ is also a wealth of information. As a brief overview: Dr. Keith Devlin is a co-founder and Executive Director of the university's H-STAR institute, a Consulting Professor in the Department of Mathematics, a co-founder of the Stanford Media X research network, and a Senior Researcher at CSLI. He is a World Economic Forum Fellow and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His current research is focused on the use of different media to teach and communicate mathematics to diverse audiences. He also works on the design of information/reasoning systems for intelligence analysis. Other research interests include: theory of information, models of reasoning, applications of mathematical techniques in the study of communication, and mathematical cognition. He has written 28 books and over 80 published research articles. Recipient of the Pythagoras Prize, the Peano Prize, the Carl Sagan Award, and the Joint Policy Board for Mathematics Communications Award. He is "the Math Guy" on National Public Radio. |
Many studies have found that when ordinary people need basic mathematics in a real-world context, they pick it up easily and become skilled at its use. They do not in general use the methods they were taught in school, nor does their real-world use of math show any signs of influencing their performance in the math class. What is going on here, and what could we learn from it when it comes to teaching math?
At three distinct stages in the development of modern society, a mathematical development changed - in a fundamental, dramatic, and revolutionary way - how people understand the world and live their lives. (A fourth such change may be taking place during our lifetime, but only history will say if this is really the case.) Those advances occurred around 5,000 B.C., in the 16th century, and in the 17th century. Devlin will look at how human life and cognition changed on each of those three occasions, with the main focus being risk management and the view of the future that effective risk-management techniques enable.
Based on Devlin's latest book The Unfinished Game: Pascal, Fermat and the Seventeenth Century Letter that Made the World Modern, Basic Books 2008
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Address comments and suggestions to meel@bgsu.edu.
