Upcoming events in support of the "How To Make The World Add Up" book tour. Saturday 5th September, 7,10pm BST The Data Detectives - a session with FT data visualisation wizard, John Burn-Murdoch, at the FT Weekend Festival online. Monday 7th September, 2.35pm BST -...
I wanted to like this book, found the early pages a chore.... then suddenly, I found myself hooked. Mary Pilon's book revolves around Ralph Anspach's legal case against Parker Brothers. Parker Brothers own the "Monopoly" boardgame; Anspach, an idealistic economics...
I re-read this fascinating book today to help me with a column. It's terrific stuff: packed with memorable facts yet easy to read, counter-intuitive yet persuasive. Books about technology tend to focus on the inventions, the cutting edge - a timeline of 'firsts'....
I'm excited to announce that on 17 September, my new book will be published in the UK and around the world by Bridge Street Press. How To Make The World Add Up is my effort to help you think clearly about the numbers that swirl all around us. Over the past 13...
Edward O. Thorp is a remarkable chap, and so this is a remarkable autobiography. A Depression-era child whose parents were smart but desperately poor, young Thorp took part-time jobs so that he could buy raw materials. As a boy, he made his own gunpowder, pipe-bombs,...
What is Dark Data? Consider the example of the 1986 Challenger shuttle disaster. Should the shuttle launch, despite fears that low temperatures might weaken the "o-ring" seals? A graph of seven previous occasions when the o-rings had been stressed showed no...
'"Racist" and "antiracist" are like peelable name tags that are placed and replaced based on what someone is doing or not doing, supporting or expressing in each moment. These are not permanent tattoos. No one becomes a racist or antiracist. We can only strive to be...
Sleight of Mind offers "75 ingenious paradoxes in mathematics, physics and philosophy" - and there are many classics here - the Monty Hall problem; the Hilbert hotel; Feynman's sprinkler; Achilles and the Tortoise. I was expecting a rather breezy discussion of the...
Okay, this week I'm plugging my own brand new book, The Next Fifty Things That Made The Modern Economy. At least, a little bit. But I have some other books to tell you about too. One of the joys of writing this book was to be able to pick up two or three wonderful...