What Eric Temple Bell calls "The Last Problem" is the problem of proving 'Fermat's Last Theorem', which Fermat wrote in the margin of a book almost 350 years ago. The original text of The Last Problem traced the problem from 2000 BC to 17th century France. Along the way we learn quite a bit about history, and just as much about mathematics. This book fits no categories. It is not a book of mathematics: it is a biography of a famous problem. Pages go by without an equation appearing. It is ...

Eric Temple Bell in 1924, published The Purple Sapphire, his first novel. Bell adopted the pseudonym of John Taine for all of his fictional work while continuing to write non-fiction under his own name. In the field of mathematics, Bell polynomials and Bell numbers of combinatorics are named in his honour and in 1924 he was awarded the Bocher Memorial Prize for his work in mathematical analysis.The Purple Sapphire, published in 1924, revolves around a mad scientistand an ex...

From one of the foremost interpreters for lay readers of the history and meaning of mathematics: a stimulating account of the origins of mathematical thought and the development of numerical theory. It probes the work of Pythagoras, Galileo, Berkeley, Einstein, and others, exploring how "number magic" has influenced religion, philosophy, science, and mathematics