You Failed Your Math Test, Comrade Einstein: Adventures and Misadventures of Young Mathematicians

Misha Shifman

ISBN 10: 981256358X / ISBN 13: 9789812563583

Published by World Scientific Publishing Company Mai 2005, 2005

About this Item

Neuware - - Contains captivating and challenging math problems created by Soviet mathematicians that can be solved using elementary mathematics (i.e. 'mathematics before calculus')- Unravels a bizarre page in the history of the exact sciences, i.e., the use of mathematics as a weapon of ideological control of the educational process in the USSR- Collects works by leading mathematicians including Ilan Vardi, B Kanevsky and V Senderov.

Seller Inventory # 9789812563583

Bibliographic Details

• Title: You Failed Your Math Test, Comrade Einstein: Adventures and Misadventures of Young Mathematicians
• Publisher: World Scientific Publishing Company Mai 2005
• Publication Date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 981256358X
• ISBN 13: 9789812563583
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 237W x 154H x 16D millimeters 237 millimeters width by 154 millimeters height by 16 millimeters depth
• Weight: 503 grams

About this title

Synopsis

This groundbreaking work features two essays written by the renowned mathematician Ilan Vardi. The first essay presents a thorough analysis of contrived problems suggested to "undesirable" applicants to the Department of Mathematics of Moscow University. His second essay gives an in-depth discussion of solutions to the Year 2000 International Mathematical Olympiad, with emphasis on the comparison of the olympiad problems to those given at the Moscow University entrance examinations.The second part of the book provides a historical background of a unique phenomenon in mathematics, which flourished in the 1970s-80s in the USSR. Specially designed math problems were used not to test students' ingenuity and creativity but, rather, as "killer problems," to deny access to higher education to "undesirable" applicants. The focus of this part is the 1980 essay, "Intellectual Genocide", written by B Kanevsky and V Senderov. It is being published for the first time. Also featured is a little-known page of the Soviet history, a rare example of the oppressed organizing to defend their dignity. This is the story of the so-called Jewish People's University, the inception of which is associated with Kanevsky, Senderov and Bella Subbotovskaya.