TTC - Zero to Infinity A History of Numbers

This journey to infinity and beyond will be the final brush stroke on our painting of the endless frontier of the notion of number.
Numbers surround us. They mark our days, light our nights, foretell our weather, and keep us on course. They drive commerce and sustain civilization. But what are they? Whether you struggled through algebra or you majored in mathematics, you will find Professor Edward B. Burger's approach accessible and stimulating. If you think math is just problems and formulas, prepare to be amazed.
In this course, we will paint a picture of an ever-evolving notion of "number" -coming to the realization that the notion of number is a difficult if not impossible idea to define precisely. Our course will have two main points of focus: the historical evolution of the representation of numbers for communication and manipulation, "the numbers in life," and the intrinsic structure of those numbers, "the life of numbers." We will discover throughout the course that these two perspectives synergistically inform each other and allow our understanding to grow and evolve with the numbers themselves. While we will explore these two vantage points and their interconnectedness, we will also offer the recurring historical theme of number as a means to count, quantify, measure, and compare, and surprisingly, all of our intuitions about these basic notions will be challenged.
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