Eightface

Street-fighting Mathematics

Sanjoy Mahajan’s book, Street-fighting Mathematics, is about the art of educated guessing and opportunistic problem solving.

In problem solving, as in street fighting, rules are for fools: do whatever works—don’t just stand there! This engaging book is an antidote to the rigor mortis brought on by too much mathematical rigor, teaching us how to guess answers without needing a proof or an exact calculation.

The book is available in traditional dead-tree format and also for download under a Creative Commons license.

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Eightface is a weblog by Dave Kellam. It's largely just a collection of links to things I find interesting, with some attempts at pithy commentary interspersed.