Will he or won’t he hit the bullseye? Using Bayes’ Theorem, your prediction will be based on how the current match is going - and how he’s played in the past.
Flickr/Marjan Lazarevski
Sea otters had been absent from this Alaskan national park for at least 250 years. By marrying math and statistics, scientists map this animal’s successful comeback.
A tumor under the microscope.
Cropped from cnicholsonpath/flickr
Some American voters hope that instant runoff can make our elections better. But a mathematician has an idea for another solution.
Mathematical visualization techniques led the author to create this virtual scene, showing shapes from the realm of mathematics bursting into the physical world.
Frank Farris
It’s a golden age for visualization in mathematics. How tools like 3-D printing, animation and even knitting machines are reimagining the way mathematicians study and share their work.
Statistics and probability can sometimes yield mind bending results.
Shutterstock
Sometimes statistics and probability can produce unexpected or counter-intuitive results. If we’re hoping to use numbers to make good decisions, we should be wary of the traps.
When a player’s on fire, is it hot hands?
Basketball image via www.shutterstock.com.
For 30 years, sports fans have been told to forget about streaks because the ‘hot hand’ is a fallacy. But a reanalysis says not so fast: Statistics show players really are in the zone sometimes.
The 2016 election made clear that the Electoral College does not weigh votes from all states equally. A new analysis suggests the power of your vote is closely linked to voter turnout in your state.
It’s March 14, the day we irrationally celebrate the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. Here’s a roundup from our archive of what we know about pi.
The mathematician Kurt Gödel is said to have found a way that the US constitution would allow for a dictator to take control, or so the story goes. He certainly had the mind for it.
Good quality education fuels an economy. South Africa needs to increase its supply of science and technology university graduates. But instead it’s lowering the bar, especially when it comes to maths.
Old sky map depicting boreal and austral hemispheres with constellations and zodiac signs.
Marzolino/Shutterstock
Up until the seventeenth century, astrology was seen as a scholarly tradition, and it is credited as influencing the development of many modern day subjects.
Learning the fundamentals of maths can equip children with critical thinking and reasoning skills.
Reuters/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah
Maths occupies an eminent place in global schooling assessment criteria not just because of its content, but for the skills that are taught and developed alongside it.