Ever wondered how the highway and interstate numbers came to be? What do they even mean if they mean anything at all? Behind those numbered shields displayed on the signs is a mathematical logic grid ...

At Pasadena City College, college algebra for STEM majors is labeled Math 003. At Cypress College, it’s Math 141-C and at Napa Valley, it’s Math 106. For anyone hoping to enroll in the same course at ...

The Babylonians used separate combinations of two symbols to represent every single number from 1 to 59. That sounds pretty confusing, doesn’t it? Our decimal system seems simple by comparison, with ...

For centuries, mathematicians tried to solve problems by adding new values to the usual numbers. Now they’re investigating the unintended consequences of that tinkering. In 1847, Gabriel Lamé proved ...

The Kakeya conjecture predicts how much room you need to point a line in every direction. In one number system after another — with one important exception — mathematicians have been proving it true.

In positional systems, as mentioned earlier, the number represented is multiplied by the base each time you move to the left of a position and is always divided by the base each time you move to the ...

As I told my class on Thursday, the theme of the first week of our math history course was “easy algebra is hard in base 60.” We started the semester in ancient Mesopotamia, trying to understand ...

Most of us have little trouble working out how many millilitres are in 2.4 litres of water (it’s 2,400). But the same can’t be said when we’re asked how many minutes are in 2.4 hours (it’s 144).