The Nothing That is by Robert Kaplan
A symbol for what is not there, an emptiness that increases any number it's added to, an inexhaustible and indispensable paradox. As we welcome the new millennium, zero is once again making its presence felt. Nothing itself, it makes possible a myriad of calculations. Indeed, without zero mathematics as we know it would not exist. And without mathematics our understanding of the universe would be vastly impoverished. But where did this nothing, this hollow circle, come from? Who created it? And what, exactly, does it mean? Robert Kaplan's The Nothing That Is: A Natural History of Zero begins as a mystery story, taking us back to Sumerian times, then to Greece and India, piecing together the way the idea of a symbol for nothing evolved. For Kaplan, the history of zero is a lens for looking not only into the evolution of mathematics but into very nature of human thought. He points out how the history of mathematics is a process of recursive abstraction: how once a symbol is created to represent an idea, that symbol itself gives rise to new operations that in turn lead to new ideas. The beauty of mathematics is that even though we invent it, we seem to be discovering something that already exists. The joy of that discovery shines from Kaplan's pages, as he ranges from Archimedes to Einstein, making fascinating connections between mathematical insights from every age and culture.Robert Steven Kaplan is a Senior Associate Dean at Harvard Business School and the Martin Marshall Professor of Management Practice in Business Administration. He is also chairman and a founding partner of Indaba Capital Management, LLC, and cochairman of the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation, a global venture philanthropy firm. Kaplan was vice chairman of the Goldman Sachs Group before joining Harvard in 2005.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780195142372 |
| ISBN 10 | 0195142373 |
| Title | The Nothing That is |
| Author | Robert Kaplan |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press Inc |
| Year published | 2000-12-07 |
| Number of pages | 240 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |