Episodes
Karen Saxe is an analyst who spends her days representing mathematics on Capitol Hill. She really likes the isoperimetric inequality and its many uses. Also tennis.
Published 04/03/24
Published 04/03/24
Corrine Yap loves math, graph theory in particular, and also loves to perform her one-person play about Sonya Kovalevskaya. Also, tofu.
Published 01/23/24
Allison Henrich studies knots and her favorite theorem is about how one might unknot a knot. Also, music.
Published 11/12/23
We all know the (probably apocryphal) story of Gauss adding up the first 100 positive integers as a child. Well, Tom Edgar really likes this result and will be happy to tell you about dozens of different ways to prove it. Also, Groundhog Day.
Published 10/09/23
Tatiana Toro is a geometer and therefore loves the ur-theorem of geometry, "due" to Pythagoras. She also likes to walk.
Published 09/07/23
Gresham Professor of Geometry Sarah Hart likes cycloids and we talk at length about all their fascinating properties. Also, Moby Dick (or The Whale).
Published 07/20/23
Euler's polyhedral formula continues to amaze Matthew Kahle as he finds it showing up in different places in mathematics. Also, Bach.
Published 06/02/23
Kevin visited Texas Christian University in March and recorded this episode with some math students. Excellent theorems and pairings.
Published 05/02/23
Cihan Bahran has a popular twitter feed in which he shares surprising theorems. His favorite? Matrix mortality is undecidable.
Published 02/16/23
Juliette Bruce is an algebraic geometer who loves to think about embedding curves in projective space. Also mountaineering.
Published 12/30/22
Technically this is a theorem, but it seems so obvious that it's unclear that it needs a proof. In this episode Christopher Danielson points out that polygons have same number of sides as vertices. Many shapes make an appearance.
Published 11/26/22
Kimberly Ayers likes dynamics and so obvs her fave theorem is Sharkovskii's result that "period 3 implies chaos." Also taffy.
Published 10/21/22
Philip Ording wrote a cool book (you should check it out) and he likes the Erlangen Program. Not really a theorem, but we're not purists around here.
Published 09/15/22
Daina Taimina is famous for her adventures in mathematical crocheting, but her favorite theorem comes from Desargues. She also likes to travel.
Published 08/11/22
Tien Chih loves combinatorics, which means he really loves proving things by induction. In this episode we have a good time learning about this incredibly useful technique in mathematics.
Published 07/13/22
We are joined by a group of math students at Cal State University in Los Angeles for a diverse collection of theorems and pairings.
Published 06/09/22
We can't believe it took 75 episodes to get to the Banach-Tarski paradox, but finally Dave Kung chose it as his favorite theorem. Also, Enigma Variations.
Published 03/17/22
An old favorite theorem makes its third appearance on the pod, but we always like to learn new points of view. Priyam Patel likes the Brouwer Fixed Point theorem, and this time we learn how it helps classify isometries of hyperbolic space. Also, rock climbing.
Published 02/11/22
Courtney Gibbons likes isomorphism theorems. All three of them, in fact, and she wants to remind you they are due to Emmy Noether, despite most textbooks ignoring that fact. Also, bunnies.
Published 01/13/22
Kameryn Williams is a logician and their favorite theorem is the less well-known Condensation Lemma of Gödel. Also brie.
Published 12/10/21
Composer Emily Howard uses mathematical objects and ideas as inspiration for her orchestral and chamber pieces. In this episode we talk to her about "Torus" which was inspired by work with dynamicists.
Published 11/11/21
Mathematician and philosopher Joel David Hamkins likes games (whatever those are) and his favorite theorem is that winning strategies exist. This requires defining "games", "strategies", and all kinds of other stuff. Also chess.
Published 09/22/21
Mathematician Ranthony Edmonds likes factorization in general, so it's no surprise her favorite theorem is the Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic. And some history. And mead.
Published 08/14/21
Mathematician Rekha Thomas likes things to have applications, and nothing fits that bill better than linear algebra. In this episode we learn that the singular value decomposition gives us a lot more information than you might have realized. Also, migratory birds.
Published 07/08/21