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Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt
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Resolutions Eligible for refund or replacement
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Eugene P. Northrop
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Riddles in Mathematics: A Book of Paradoxes (Dover Math Games & Puzzles) Paperback – August 20, 2014

by Eugene P Northrop (Author), Prof. Daniel S. Silver (Introduction)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 21 ratings
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Two fathers and two sons leave town. This reduces the population of the town by three. True? Yes, if the trio consists of a father, son, and grandson. This entertaining collection consists of more than 200 such riddles, drawn from every branch of mathematics. Math enthusiasts of all ages will enjoy sharpening their wits with riddles rooted in areas from arithmetic to calculus, covering a wide range of subjects that includes geometry, trigonometry, algebra, concepts of the infinite, probability, and logic. But only an elementary knowledge of mathematics is needed to find amusement in this imaginative collection, which features complete solutions and more than 100 black-and-white illustrations.
"Mr. Northrop writes well and simply. Every so often he will illuminate his discussion with an amusing example. While reading a discussion of topology, the reviewer learned how to remove his vest from beneath his jacket. It works every time." — The New York Times
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  1. Part of series
    Dover Recreational Math
  2. Print length
    288 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Publisher
    Dover Publications
  5. Publication date
    August 20, 2014
  6. Grade level
    9 and up
  7. Reading age
    14 - 16 years
  8. Dimensions
    5.4 x 0.8 x 8.4 inches
  9. ISBN-10
    0486780163
  10. ISBN-13
    978-0486780160
  11. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Eugene P. Northrop (1908–69) was the William Rainey Harper Professor of Mathematics at the University of Chicago, where he taught for 17 years and served as Associate Dean.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Dover Publications (August 20, 2014)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0486780163
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0486780160
  • Reading age ‏ : ‎ 14 - 16 years
  • Grade level ‏ : ‎ 9 and up
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.1 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.4 x 0.8 x 8.4 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 21 ratings

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Eugene P. Northrop

Eugene P. Northrop

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
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21 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

NAVMAN
5.0 out of 5 stars It takes you from mathematical word riddles to equations.
Reviewed in the United States on August 3, 2022
Verified Purchase
It’s a great refresher for mathematics and all levels
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JUAN A BARRAGAN ROMO
5.0 out of 5 stars Great to read again.
Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2015
Verified Purchase
I first read this book 40 years ago when I was 12 and I enjoyed it again this time. A great book to enjoy the beauty of mathematcs.
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Aaron C. Brown
4.0 out of 5 stars A pathbreaking work that did not age well
Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2014
I read the original edition of this book as a child and found it educational but lacking the spark of similar works by  Martin Gardner , Yakov Perelman  and  Raymond Smullyan , among others. It is by no means dull, it suffers only in comparison to the great mathematical popularizers. It's like a class from a really good mathematics teacher who finds clever and interesting ways to teach the subject, but he's still teaching a subject. The best books of this type engage the reader in an adventure. The literary style is clear and natural, not pedantic, but it has little trace of the style of the more exuberant authors.

Rereading this as an adult, I was somewhat less impressed. There is an excellent introduction that brings the material up to date, but some of the sections are musty nonetheless. The mathematics are timeless, of course, but many applications and illustrations have old-fashioned feels to them. How many people today will follow the discussion of a person removing his vest without taking off his coat? Or have the familiarity with a WWII-era locomotive necessary to enjoy paradoxical parts of its design? Part of it is due to the success of the book, the best treatments have been incorporated into other works and are now familiar. But some of it is that the author was writing to everyday experience of his imagined readers, not to their imaginations.

Despite these issues, this is still an excellent book for developing both mathematical thinking and mathematical knowledge, and having fun along the way. I recommend this book in addition to others.
7 people found this helpful
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oli@andelain.demon.co.uk
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent introduction to mathematical problems
Reviewed in the United States on February 3, 1999
This is an excellent introduction to problems ranging from simple logic to complex mathematical.
I grew up on it & found it fascinating.
3 people found this helpful
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Mark314159
3.0 out of 5 stars Good, but with one major error
Reviewed in the United States on March 1, 2020
I enjoyed this book as a child when I first read it.

But in my copy, revised in1961, there is one fundamental error: extraordinary, for a chair in math at a major university: under Paradoxes of the Infinite, he assumes that the length of a limit curve is the limit of the lengths of the curves in the sequence that converges to it. He also believed in “infinitely small circles”, which are apparently not just points.
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