Fluke, Joseph Mazur
Fluke, Joseph Mazur
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Fluke
The Math and Myth of Coincidence

Author: Joseph Mazur

Narrator: Tim Andres Pabon

Unabridged: 7 hr 17 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Ascent Audio

Published: 06/01/2016


Synopsis

What are the chances? This is the question we ask ourselves when we encounter the strangest and most seemingly impossible coincidences, like the woman who won the lottery four times or the fact that Lincoln’s dreams foreshadowed his own assassination. But, when we look at coincidences mathematically, the odds are a lot better than any of us would have thought.

In Fluke, mathematician Joseph Mazur takes a second look at the seemingly improbable, sharing with us an entertaining guide to the most surprising moments in our lives. He takes us on a tour of the mathematical concepts of probability, such as the law of large numbers and the birthday paradox, and combines these concepts with lively anecdotes of flukes from around the world. How do you explain finding your college copy of Moby Dick in a used bookstore on the Seine on your first visit to Paris? How can a jury be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that DNA found at the scene of a heinous crime did not get there by some fluke? Should we be surprised if strangers named Maria and Francisco, seeking each other in a hotel lobby, accidentally meet the wrong Francisco and the wrong Maria, another pair of strangers also looking for each other? As Mazur reveals, if there is any likelihood that something could happen, no matter how small, it is bound to happen to someone at some time.

In Fluke, Mazur offers us proof of the inevitability of the sublime and the unexpected. He has written a book that will appeal to anyone who has ever wondered how all of the tiny decisions that happen in our lives add up to improbable wholes. A must-read for math enthusiasts and storytellers alike, Fluke helps us to understand the true nature of chance.

About Joseph Mazur

Joseph Mazur is professor emeritus of mathematics at Marlboro College. His previous books include Euclid in the Rainforest: Discovering Universal Truth in Logic and Math and Fluke: The Math and Myth of Coincidence. He lives with his wife Jennifer in Vermont.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Brucie

more math and less coincidence than I was looking for.......more

Goodreads review by Henry

About two-thirds of the way through the book, Mazur seems to run out of things to say about flukes and coincidences. I get the feeling that he rounded up a few previously written essays about marginally related topics, made a half-hearted effort to tie them to his subject, and tacked them on to the......more

Goodreads review by Mary

Math professor tries to use probability to illustrate how some unlikely coincidences are not as unlikely as you may think (e.g., there is a 50% chance that 2 people out any random group of 23 people will share the same birthday). While some of the examples are interesting, I think he stretches it a......more

This was a neither-here-nor-there book for me: a great deal of math, much of which I didn't understand, and moments that tried to be poetic but didn't really work for me. The subject is an interesting one--most people experience strange coincidences in life--and it was instructive to see how likely......more

Goodreads review by Trike

This is pretty thin and Mazur sometimes does that aggravating thing so many people do when they can’t answer a question directly, they move the goalposts and answer something else instead. That said, some of the coincidences and explanations are interesting, so it’s not a total loss, and the stories......more