ABSTRACT
Raphael Rosen, who has worked at San Francisco’s hands-on Exploratorium science museum and writes about science for various outlets, has produced an unusual math book. Math is expressed in a special, highly symbolic language that must be learned, starting with algebra. That may be one reason why “math anxiety” often gets between people and their engagement with math. Still, mathematicians and science writers have done their best to popularize math. Looking at their efforts provides lessons in how to get math across and shows how writing about scientific ideas has evolved in the digital age, as exemplified by Math Geek. Consistent with his strategy of short pieces, Rosen has mostly picked topics in the theory of numbers, geometry, and so on that do not need long exposition. Packaging mathematical ideas into short essays means that they cannot be covered in depth, and the connections among them do not jump out.
