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Farewell Martin Gardner a guest blog

By Nicolas (Paris, France) - a friend and puzzle-solver.

Martin Gardner just passed away. If anybody influenced me into science and math, that should be him.

Martin Gardner was a journalist who wrote columns in Scientific American, short witty pages on fun math topics. He is the one who introduced things like Conways game of life to the general public, raising overall interest in mathematics as a fun thing to do.

Gardner entered our family life in the 70s when my father brought back the latest issue of Scientific American. I remember folding my first hexaflexagon when I was maybe 6 or 7 and bringing it to school to wow the teacher. I did not understand the concept of Moebius stips then but I certainly got the fun part of it. My parents subscribed to the French
edition (Pour la Science) later on and we would get Gardners columns every month with great impatience. From there on we bought all of his books, did his problems, read the solutions and discovered we had sometimes invented better ones. We played the game of life with pen and paper until we got our first programmable pocket calculators and later our own kid computer (a Sinclair ZX81). His columns were always bringing something new, teaching us tricks in algebra, geometry, paradoxes and logic, you name it.

I recently discovered that Gardner has also helped MC. Escher achieving the incredible fame he has today among scientists, and probably inspired Douglas Hofstadter into writing "Goedel, Escher and Bach", another inspirational book to which I probably owe my scientific-oriented career.

30 years later, I still own a copy of Martin Gardners "Aha!" (dated 1980) and read it to my kids every now and then, enjoying the mathematical seeds he planted into my mind as a kid and propagating them one generation further.

Some of the gems found in Aha:

• The Loch Ness monsters length is 20 meters plus half of its length. What is his total length? Click to submit or read the solution.


• Try to guess my phone number. You can ask me 20 questions and I will answer by Yes or No. How can you do that? Click to submit or read the solution.


• These two miners come out from a coal mine at the end of their working day. One of them has his face covered in soot and the other one still has a perfectly clean face. They both glance at each other in the elevator bringing them back to the surface. When they get home, the one with the clean face cleanses himself thoroughly and the other one does not. Why? Click to submit or read the solution.

[This latter story is much more profound than it looks. It took me years to actually see its relevance in the way we perceive our own selves compared to other people.]

Farewell Martin. Your achievements will live on forever.


References:
Interesting video about Martin Gardner
Martin Gardners page on Wikipedia
Conways game of life
Sinclair ZX81
Goedel, Escher and Bach: an eternal golden braid
" target="_blank">Aha! Insight

You can find some of the Martin Gardners books on our Math Resources for Adults page.

Available link for download

Five Years Ago Today I Started This Blog and now a soppy post ensues

So here we are, at the five year anniversary of this little corner of the web. It is weird to think of this time five years ago where I would have been furiously tapping away at the big keys of my Dads desktop PC to create my paragraph-long thinkpiece on Let the Right One In. Okay, so thinkpiece is a loose term for this very vague review. The ironic thing is, I wrote that review in my first year of high school. Just recently, I wrote an essay on the same film for my first year of university (which got an A, so apparently Im smart). So whys this important?

Usually, Id have some post to celebrate an anniversary with all of these thank yous and lists of movies that have meant a lot during the years. And believe me, Ive thought about this five year anniversary and what Id do for it for the last couple of years. But Ive said it before, and Ill say it again: this blog has been a great way to track the way Ive grown up. Through my changing movie tastes (hello not watching Hannah Montana: The Movie for fun) to the way my writing has developed to how my life went through all of these strange milestones. It was great for those formative high school years, figuring out all those weird questions of "who am I, what am I doing, what will I choose as my career when I cant even decide to have for breakfast this morning?"

Admittedly, this year has been a strange one where everything has changed in so many ways. Gone are the days of having to go 45 minutes to get to a cinema and instead Ive been to the cinemas 37 times this year (so almost once a week). Ive gone from only ever living in three different houses in my life to living in four different places in one year. Ive learnt about the perils of referencing (cant we all just use one referencing style instead of jamming MLA, Harvard, APA and Chicago into one semester?!), how to put up with constant abuse from the engineers about the fact that my Arts degree will not get me a job, the weird feeling of being in a relationship with someone who is too good to be true. So while my blog has been the perfect thing through a whole lot of transitions, it hasnt been all that present this year as Ive been making some of the biggest transitions in my life.

And believe me, it isnt like I havent tried. Ive written so many drafts for posts and just got to the point where it no longer makes sense, so I delete it. I would love to throw my hat into the rather expansive ring of thinkpieces about Gone Girl, but a) Id just be fangirling over how perfect Rosamund Pike was and how David Finchers direction was ON POINT, b) Im still feeling guilty over dragging my boyfriend to see it twice and c) theres so much discussion on it, where do I even begin? I would love to tell yall about how my life did not turn out like Before Sunrise or The Spectacular Now (actually, it kinda did...). I would love to write another post on how much I love Shame or how much I want Interstellar to be in my life right now or how much The Equalizer rubbed me up the wrong way.

Problem is, I dont. Ill always look back to posts I wrote in 2011/2012 and most likely think "damn, I was such a good writer, what happened?" Thing is, Im not the same person I was back then. The blogging world is not the same sanctuary it was then. I used to be very clear about what I wanted this blog to be like when I wasnt so sure of what I wanted to do with my own life. Ive kinda lost that now.

This makes it sound like I will finally cut the cords on this wee high school project, but thats something I dont really wish to do. Especially considering my degree is really all about writing and Im happiest when Im writing, this is a good little haven to come back to. It just might be that Im ready to take a new direction and stop wishing that I could be at the same stage of blogging that I have been through the past five years. Yes, it is a great thing that I have an online record of how much Ive changed throughout the years. And yes, it is a great thing that I managed to (loosely) keep up with it for five whole years. So even though this seems like Im moving on, lets just see it as moving forward.

(allow for soppy story to ensue)

Through going to the cinemas so many times this year, it has easily become my absolute favourite thing to do. I admit to still looking up at the light coming from the projector like I used to do as a kid, loving the waft of buttery popcorn smell you get as you come up the escalator, and being so comfortable in the warmth of the glow from the screen. Ive seen some bad films this year, and Ive seen some great ones (behold the wonder that is Boyhood), but no matter what film it is, I always love this stuff. Especially having someone to share it with now. And something that Ive found while being at university is that passion does matter and passion is the only thing thatll get you through. So of course, Id hate to lose this little corner of the internet that allows to me to express my passion. Ive been kind of awful at it in the last few months, and I may continue to be awful at it, but Ill still be here in some small way.

So finally, Id like to thank the people who have come and gone or stayed at some stage through the past five years. It has been a great time growing up with you guys, and I look forward to sharing some more thinklings and discussions with you.

And if I dont, someone just kick me up the butt for some encouragement, huh?

Available link for download