TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………. 1
TITLE………………………………………………………………………………………………………..2
CONTENTS………………………………………………………………………………………………3
A. Introduction text………………………………………………………..4
B. Chapter 1………………………………………………………………………………….. 6
C. Chapter 2…………………………………………………………………………………..7
D. Chapter 3……………………………………………………………………………………8
E. Chapter 4…………………………………………………………………………………….9
F. Chapter 5…………………………………………………………………………………10
G. Chapter 6 …………………………………………………………………………………11
H. Chapter 7…………………………………………………………………………………12
I. Chapter 8………………………………………………………………………………….13
J. Chapter 9…………………………………………………………………………………14
CONCLUSION………………………………………………………………………………………15
 Book Review on “Nature’s Numbers” by Ian Stewart

Introduction

Ian Stewart's book "Nature's Number" explores about how mathematics has affected us
today. It tells us how mathematics is in our environment literally, without even
realizing it, how to treat specific circumstances with the aid of mathematics, the
application of mathematics in our world and the enjoyment of mathematics from its
earliest discovery to the present.

Since time has been passing, the world has started. Numbers have shaped the world in
which we now live. We are surrounded by numbers, which also gave rise to and
sustained us all. From the smallest to the greatest, the poorest to the best, are the units
of our life. Since then, numbers have accompanied us and everything around us. It is
how natural numbers first appeared. Like the stars that appear in the night sky, the six-
fold symmetry of snowflakes, the stripes of tigers and zebras, the spirals, the precise
measurements of the human body, and the patterns of numbers from flower petals, I
think that mathematics has enhanced nature to make it glamorous and special. Earth
has always been a world for people., but mathematics seen the worlds beyond Earth,
the planets.

Numbers are natural and are God's illumination; the word "number" has no fixed,
divine meaning. Similar theories and proofs in math are grouped together to form
peaks and valleys like a landscape. The only thing that is permanent in this world is
change. Newton, a constant of change, developed calculus to assist in figuring out
solutions for moving bodies. Because it has two fundamental operations—integration
and differentiation—you may calculate the other two elements—force, mass, or
acceleration—by starting with just one. In order to "undo" the effects of differentiation
and isolate the original variables, differentiation is a technique for determining rates of
change. Integration is a technique for doing the opposite. The world, nature, and the
human intellect are all compatible with mathematics. It is diversified in the same way
as positive and negative infinity numbers become overly voluminous, complex,
natural, and exact.

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Mathematics is one of those ideals that is useful enough to make our life easy and
mindless. It played a significant part in changing the world into what it is now.
However, there are certain often asked questions by the general population. "Do I
require Mathematics when doing household chores?" people usually ask. "
alternatively, "Do I need to calculate the formula before purchasing products? ".It
may sound absorbed and sarcastic, but it has meaning. They are all return to a
specific question:Does mathematics play a role in everything? we do? Is the
Mathematician's greatest knowledge into Mathematical statistics reliable to the
rest of the world? Some may agree, while others may disagree. Is it feasible,
however, that Mathematics came up with the coverage and maintenance in every
subject that is suited for all of us from the start? Can the Mathematician's eyes
truly convey learnings that we, as humans, can apply in our daily lives? And, in
addition to knowing nature, does Mathematics put all of the developed rules and
structures into action?

Mathematics is more valuable than what we previously learned about it. It's as if
we're wrapping our heads around something. Mathematics is that something. It
has shown to be difficult for some people, but it is very dependent on the
individual (Benecerraf, P. 1991).To begin, Ian Stewart's Nature's Numbers
teaches us how to appreciate andunderstand Mathematics in a more enjoyable
and engaging manner. He begins by witnessing nature on a regular basis, which
will become a helpful hand not just to students but also to the rest of humanity in
viewing the natural world mathematically. To pique the interest of children who
believe that mathematics is for the birds. The Nature's Numbers is a broad review
of the world's most profound find.

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CHAPTER 1

THE NATURAL ORDER

Patterns exist in our surroundings. As human brains have evolved over

time, they have been able to construct a mechanism of pattern
recognition, categorization, and exploitation. It's known as math. We
have solved several riddles by studying and researching.Patterns are
significant markers for regulating natural processes in our environment,
and they may be calculated using mathematics. There are two types of
patterns: fractals and chaos. Fractals are geometric formations that
duplicate their structure on increasingly thinner layers, such as trees and
flowers, whereas chaos is some seeming randomness with fully
predictable bases. A pattern is the concept that an animal or person
should be moved. Aside from number patterns, there is a collection of
dot shapes such as triangles, squares, and rectangles.

As new mathematical theories were discovered, increasingly complex

natural patterns emerged to reveal their secrets as time went. However,
after determining that nature is abundant in"What do we want to do with
them?" everyone has different preferences due of this problem for
many years. However, mathematics aids in problem solving; it is a tool
systematic strategy to uncovering structures behind patterns in order to
explain what is going on.

CHAPTER 2
WHAT MATHEMATICS IS FOR
Isaac Newton, a very notable scientist, found that the object's motion was defined
by the mathematical connection between force on the body and its acceleration.
They could create a new area of mathematics, the Calculus, along with German
mathematician, Gottfried Liebniz. But mankind was extremely interested about
calculus for almost 200 years, physicists got it right, mathematicians concerned
about what it meant and how it could be defined as a mathematical theory and
philosophers argued that it is nonsensical. The calculus story illustrates two of
the major things that mathematics offers as instruments for scientists to compute
what nature is going on and questions the pleasure of mathematicians. But what
does the pattern that we see mean to teach us? We want to comprehend how
mathematics works; to understand why it takes place; to arrange patterns in the
most satisfactory manner; to anticipate how nature acts; to manage our nature for
our own goals; and to make practical use of our knowledge of the universe.
Gregor Mendel was able to discover genetics because of mathematical hints. He
observed significant numerical connections as plants with various characteristics,
such as the color of the seed, altered as they crossed the plants.

This led to the fundamental concept of genetics with his finding that every
organism is a crypticcombination of variables determining many of the
characteristics that are part of its body plan, and these components get mixed up
and recombined somehow when passed from parents to children. It begins with a
mathematical model of a flat cell area and allows for different "mutation" kinds.
There is also another function called prediction in mathematics. By knowing the
movement of the celestial bodies, astronomers could forecast the return of comets
and lunar and solar eclipses.

CHAPTER 3

WHAT MATHEMATICS IS ABOUT

These examples teach us the many aspects of mathematics: how

mathematics gains success in real applications. Our universe is built on
mathematical underpinnings, and mathematics is inevitably integrated
into our global society. The first thing we hear the term "mathematics"
is the number. Numbers as common knowledge is the core of
mathematics, which forges large amounts of mathematics. But numbers
in their own form are only a small portion of mathematics.

For instance, we couldn't purchase food without the capacity to count

eggs and deduct changes. We teach arithmetic, thus. Its absence is a
significant impediment for everyone. Actually, the count started long
before symbols like 1, 2, 3 had existed, since you could count them
without using any number, such as counting on your fingers, using clay
disks with pictures of an animal and scratches on wood or bone.
Although they have these ways to count, it has been possible for them to
identify or value things differently and to improve our current ways of
using mathematical methods, for example by adding 0 in the number
system, using fractions, including real numbers, applying operations
like adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing to two or more
mathematical objects.

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CHAPTER 4

THE CONSTANTS OF CHANGE

In the real world, mathematical "things" do not exist they are abstractions. But
mathematical processes are abstractions too, such that processes are no less
"things" than the "things" they apply to. Human thinking about nature has swung
between two conflicting points of view for many centuries. One perspective
shows that the world obeys definite, unchanging rules, and everything existing in
a well-defined objective reality. The development of science was mainly
controlled by the first point of view. In the 18th century and subsequently,
Newton became the first and greatest scientist of the modern era, a rationalist
who taught us to reflect on the cool and unfaded lines. Newton wasn't the first
reason age. He is the last of the magicians, the last of the Babylonians and
Sumerians, the last great mind to look at the visible and intellectual world with
the same eyes as those who, rather than ten thousand years ago, started to create
our intellectual inheritance.

The universe may seem to be a storm-tossed ocean of change, but Newton and
before him Galileo and Kepler, the giants upon whose shoulders he stood-
realized that change obeys laws. Not only may law and flux coexist, but law
creates flux. But at that time the apparent goal of mathematics was to uncover the
inventory of "ideal forms" used by nature. Nature, the creation of higher
creatures, is flawless, and ideal shapes are mathematical perfection, therefore of
course the two go together. And perfection was believed to be untouched by
change. Newton's rule of motion offers an essential lesson: specifically, that the
path from nature's laws to nature's behavior need not be straight and apparent.

CHAPTER 5

FROM VIOLINS TO VIDEOS

The patterns and regularities of nature have other sources, but mathematics, at least, is
a highly efficient method for people to understand these patterns. Why did humans
initially desire a formula? Because it was the only method to figure out what sort of
movements would occur in the early days of dynamics. The same information may
afterwards be derived through approximations. Today, theories that deal directly and
accurately with the major qualitative features of the motion may be produced. The
division of mathematics into two different subdisciplines, namely pure mathematics
and applied mathematics has become conventional. Even mathematics can be easily
grasped, but the classical fields of science have become so vast that no one mind can
possibly embrace them. Unfortunately, it is therefore extremely attractive for the world
to believe that the only valuable aspect of mathematics is the application of
mathematics. Anything helpful ultimately ends up being seen as applied, irrespective
of its beginnings, but provides a skewed perspective of the origins of new, practical
mathematics. Good ideas are unusual, but they originate from fantastic thoughts about
the underlying structure of mathematics as many as they can to address a particular
practical issue.

Imagine an idealized violin string, whose elastic tension rises as you draw it sideways,
producing a force that pulls its initial position back. When you let go, it starts to
accelerate in accordance with Newton's law of motion under the influence of this
force. As the knowledge of the wave equation increased, the eighteenth-century
mathematicians were able to solve the wave equation for the movement of drums of
different forms. The identical equation started to appear everywhere. It appeared in
fluid dynamics, in sound theory, and in electrical and magnetism theories and altered
human civilization forever. Electricity and magnetism have a lengthy and complex
history, much harder than the wave equation, including accidental findings, important
experiments, and mathematical and scientific ideas.

10

CHAPTER 6

BROKEN SYMMETRY
Symmetry is a mathematical notion; it enables us to categorize and
differentiate between various kinds of regular pattern. Symmetry breaking is
a more dynamic concept, which describes pattern alterations. There's a lot of
symmetry. The most significant are reflections, rotations, and translationsor
flips, tours, and slides, less technically. On every scale, from the structures
of subatomic particles to the whole cosmos, the symmetries of nature may
be discovered. The breakdown of symmetry is precisely such a premise. But
it must be there to begin with for symmetry to shatter. If something is
symmetrical, its component characteristics may be replaced or exchanged.
The symmetry-breaking mathematical concepts apply for any system with
the same symmetry-all that passes across a flat surface producing patterns.
Life is a process of symmetryreplication: The biological universe is as mass-
produced as the physical universe, and thus the organic world shows many
patterns seen in the inorganic world. The same fundamental technique for
forming patterns, the same mechanism for breaking symmetry into a
massproduced world, controls the cosmos, the atom and humanity. Nature is
nothing but rhythm, with numerous and different rhythms.

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CHAPTER 7

THE RHYTHM OF LIFE

Many of the rhythms of nature are like a heartbeat: they look for themselves, run 'in
the background.' Others are like breathing, there's a basic 'default' pattern that works
when nothing unexpected occurs, but also a more advanced control system that may
kick in when required. Controllable rhythms of this type are very frequent and
especially fascinating locomotives. In legged animals, the default motion patterns
which occur when cognitive control does not work are known as gaits.

The organizing idea underlying many of these biological cycles is the mathematical
notion of an oscillator-a unit that repeats the same behavioral cycle in its natural
dynamics. Some animals have just one rhythmic default pattern to move their
extremities. For example, the elephant can only walk whereas other animals have
various gaits.
Take, for example, the horse. Horses walk at moderate speeds, trot at higher speeds,
and then gallop at high speeds. Some people put an additional movement, a canter,
between a trot and a gallop. The dynamics of CPGs are used to change gaits (Central
Pattern Generator).

The fundamental concept behind the CPG models is that animal gaits' rhythm and
phase interaction are controlled by the natural pattern of oscillation of relatively simple
brain circuits. Symmetry also organizes potential transitions between gaits. The
quicker the animal travels, the lower its symmetry: greater speed destroys more
symmetry. The rhythms of nature are frequently associated with symmetry and that
patterns that occur may be quantitatively categorized by invoking the general rules of
breaking the symmetry. Mathematics may reveal many elements of nature that we
usually do not consider to be mathematical. Non-linear dynamics is one of the most
fascinating new fields of mathematics, often called chaos theory. It creates a revolution
in the way we think about order and unrest, law, opportunity, predictability, and
unpredictability

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CHAPTER 8

DO DICE PLAY GOD!

According to contemporary physics, nature is governed at its lowest space and
temporal scales by chance. In every physical system, the most accurate measures
are exact at about 10 or twelve decimal places. Therefore, a system that is
sensitive to starting circumstances is said to be chaotic. Chaos is not just
complex, it is less behavioral, but much subtler. Chaos is seemingly complex,
with less behavior that seems to have a straightforward, predictable explanation.
It was due to the combination of three different advancements. One was a shift in
scientific emphasis to more complicated behaviors, away from basic patterns,
such repeating cycles. The second was the computer, which allowed approximate
solutions for dynamic equations to be found simply and quickly. The third was a
fresh mathematical perspective on dynamicsrather than numerical. The first was
motivating, the second was technical and the third gave comprehension. Chaos
has an odd geometry of its own: it is linked to curious fractal forms, termed
strange attractors. The discovery of chaos has exposed a fundamental mistake in
our perception of the relationship between the rules and their behavior.

We formerly thought that deterministic causes had to create regular effects, but
today we know that they may yield very irregular results which can easilly be
wrong with randomness. It informs us that the cosmos is weirder than we believe.
A chaotic system may respond considerably faster and with far less effort to
external events. Chaos is an industry of development. New discoveries
concerning the underlying chaotic mathematics, new applications of chaos to our
knowledge of the natural world or new technology uses of chaos may be found
every week. Chaos tells us that systems that follow basic principles may be
complex unexpectedly.

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CHAPTER 9

DROPS, DYNAMICS, AND DAISIES

But the world cannot be entirely chaotic, else humans cannot
live. Indeed, one of the reasons why chaos has not been found
earlier is because our world is basic in many respects. This
simplicity seems to vanish when we delve under the surface, yet
it's still there on the surface. The phrase "foxes pursue rabbits"
only makes sense because it reflects a typical pattern of animal
interaction. Foxes pursue the rabbits in the sense that if a hungry
fox spots a rabbit, it will probably follow. Vision, pattern
recognition and movement must be understood. Recently, under
the term complexity theory, a completely new approach was
proposed. Its fundamental idea is that the intricate interactions of
many components give rise to large-scale simplicities. In its own
delicate way, nature is simple.However, these simplicities are
not immediately available to us. Rather, nature gives clues to the
mathematical detectives.

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Conclusion
Mathematics is indeed around us. We might comprehend a lot
about ourselves, from simple identifying the patterns of our
surrounds, living and non-living objects, to more complex
building of formulae and hypotheses. Due to the existence of
mathematics, this helped to develop science and to build various
types of tools to be able to know about the celestial bodies and
the size of the universe. Without these mathematical theories,
formulas, laws or even those influential scientists, we may not be
able to collect answers for unknown things or for literally things
there, and we may not be able to appreciate most or more about
the secrets, mysteries, and clues to our nature and all about
ourselves.

In this thin book, Stewart admirably captures compelling and

accessible mathematicsl ideas along with the pleasure of thinking
about them. He writes with clarity and precision.
I find the book highly readable,and believe that- overall, the
author did a fine job of providing food for thought without
getting too complicated for the general reader. This book claims
it will equip its readers with a mathematician’s eyes and hence
change the way they see the world.

15
Reflection:

Ian Stewart’s Nature’s Numbers: The UnrealReality of

Mathematics is a book that ets us see nature from a
mathematcian’s point of view, changing the way we view the
world.

I personally enjoyed reading thi book, because it is truly

interesting, informative and educationalin a way that he
presented and provided evident examples of mathematics in our
nature and he writes with clarity and precision. We don’t pay
attention to those patterns but because I’ve read the book, I
realized that it really exists and we ignore them.

I have also learned that patterns of form and motion reveal deep
regularities in the world around us specifically the sixfold
symmetry of snowflakes which led kepler to conjecturethat all
matter is composed of atoms. I’m not really fond of reading
books with no pictures in ir. But with Book is an exception, I
was mazed when I read chapter 5. I had no idea that a simple
violin string vibrating caused a chain of thinking and discoveries
that lead to the birth of television But, vibrations of a linear
object are universal- they arise all over the place in one guise or
another. It msy come from a spider struggling in the spider web
that led to the discpvery of electromagnetic waves. The point
here is; in order to have an epic discovery, it has to start with
something simple. Mathematics reveales the simplicities of
nature and allows us to generelize from simple examples to the
complexities of the real world.

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