COLEGIO DE SAN FRANCISCO JAVIER

COLLEGE OF SOCIAL WORK AND DEVELOPMENT STUDIES

MATHEMATICS IN THE MODERN WORLD

I. THE NATURE OF MATHEMATICS

Module 3 Patterns and Numbers in Nature and the
World The Fibonacci Sequence
MATHEMATICS FOR OUR WORLD

CONTENT DISCUSSION

Mathematics for our World

We have seen in the preceding sections how evident mathematics is in the natural world, specifically in how the patterns that we observe in
nature follow logical and mathematical structures. It is, important that we learn mathematical concepts and apply them in solving societal
problems.

What mathematics is for?

We've now established the uncontroversial
idea that nature is full of patterns. But what
us good: it reminds us of what we are. Painting pictures, sculpting sculptures, and writing poems are valid and important ways to express our feelings a
do we want to do with them?

your thoughts go well beyond that. How much food will you need to store? Where will the freezer have to fit? It is not always a matter of utility; you m
The entrepreneur's instinct is to exploit the natural world. The engineer's instinct is to change it. The scientist's instinct is to
try to understand it-to work out what's really going on. The mathematician's instinct is to structure that process of understanding by
seeking generalities that cut across the obvious subdivisions.

So what do we want to get out of mathematics?

Each of nature's patterns is a puzzle, nearly always a deep one. Mathematics is brilliant at helping us to solve puzzles. It is a
more or less systematic way of digging out the rules and structures that lie behind some observed pattern or regularity, and then using
those rules and structures to explain what's going on. Indeed, mathematics has developed alongside our understanding of nature, each
reinforcing the other.

Mathematics is a useful way to think about nature. What do we want it to tell us about the patterns we observe? There are
many answers. We want to understand how they happen; to understand why they happen, which is different; to organize the
underlying patterns and regularities in the most satisfying way; to predict how nature will behave; to control nature for our own ends;
and to make practical use of what we have learned about our world. Mathematics helps us to do all these things, and often it is
indispensable.

What mathematics is about?

When we hear the word "mathematics," the first thing that springs to mind is numbers. Numbers are the heart of mathematics,
an all-pervading influence, the raw materials out of which a great deal of mathematics is forged. But numbers on their own form only
a tiny part of mathematics. Some mathematical ideas are so basic to our world that they cannot stay hidden, and numbers are an
especially prominent example. Without the ability to count eggs and subtract change, for instance, we could not even buy food. And so
we teach arithmetic. To everybody. Like reading and writing, its absence is a major handicap. And that creates the overwhelming
impression that mathematics is mostly a matter of numbers-which isn't really true. The numerical tricks we learn in arithmetic are only
the tip of an iceberg. We can run our everyday lives without much more, but our culture cannot run our society by using such limited
ingredients. Numbers are just one type of object that mathematicians think about.
A large part of the early prehistory of mathematics can be summed up as the discovery, by various civilizations, of a wider
and wider range of things that deserved to be called numbers. The simplest are the numbers we use for counting. In fact, counting
began long before there were symbols like 1, 2, 3, because it is possible to count without using numbers at all-say, by counting on
your fingers. You can work out that "I have two hands and a thumb of camels" by folding down fingers as your eye glances over the
camels. You don't actually have to have the concept of the number "eleven" to keep track of whether anybody is stealing your camels.
You just have to notice that next time you seem to have only two hands of camels-so a thumb of camels is missing.

You can also record the count as scratches on pieces of wood or bone. Or you can make tokens to use as countersclay disks
with pictures of sheep on them for counting sheep, or disks with pictures of camels on them for counting camels. As the animals
parade past you, you drop tokens into a bagone token for each animal. The use of symbols for numbers probably developed about five
thousand years ago, when such counters were wrapped in a clay envelope.

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 The next invention beyond counting numbers was fractions-the kind of number we now symbolize as 2/3 (two thirds) or 22/7
(twenty-two sevenths-or, equivalently, three and one-seventh). You can't count with fractions-although two-thirds of a camel might be
edible, it's not countable-but you can do much more interesting things instead. In particular, if three brothers inherit two camels
between them, you can think of each as owning two-thirds of a camel-a convenient legal fiction, one with which we are so
comfortable that we forget how curious it is if taken literally.

Much later, between 400 and 1200 AD, the concept of zero was invented and accepted as denoting a number. If you think
that the late acceptance of zero as a number is strange, bear in mind that for a long time "one" was not considered a number because it
was thought that a number of things ought to be several of them. Many history books say that the key idea here was the invention of a
symbol for "nothing." That may have been the key to making arithmetic practical; but for mathematics the important idea was the
concept of a new kind of number, one that represented the concrete idea "nothing." Mathematics uses symbols, but it no more is those
symbols than music is musical notation or language is strings of letters from an alphabet. Carl Friedrich Gauss, thought by many to be
the greatest mathematician ever to have lived, once said (in Latin) that what matters in mathematics is "not notations, but notions."
The pun "non notationes, sed notiones" worked in Latin, too.

The next extension of the number concept was the invention of negative numbers. Again, it makes little sense to think of
minus two camels in a literal sense; but if you owe somebody two camels, the number you own is effectively diminished by two. So a
negative number can be thought of as representing a debt. There are many different ways to interpret these more esoteric kinds of
number; for instance, a negative temperature (in degrees Celsius) is one that is colder than freezing, and an object with negative
velocity is one that is moving backward, So the same abstract mathematical object may represent more than one aspect of nature.

Fractions are all you need for most commercial transactions, but they're not enough for mathematics. For example, as the
ancient Greeks discovered to their chagrin, the square root of two is not exactly representable as a fraction. That is, if you multiply any
fraction by itself, you won't get two exactly. You can get very close-for example, the square of 17/12 is 289/144, and if only it were
288/144 you would get two. But it isn't, and you don't-and whatever fraction you try, you never will. The square root of two, usually
denoted 1.4… is therefore said to be "irrational." The simplest way to enlarge the number system to include the irrationals is to use the
so called real numbers-a breathtakingly inappropriate name, inasmuch as they are represented by decimals that go on forever, like
3.14159 … where the dots indicate an infinite number of digits. How can things be real if you can't even write them down fully? But
the name stuck, probably because real numbers formalize many of our natural visual intuitions about lengths and distances.

In current terminology, the whole numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, ... are known as the natural numbers. If negative whole numbers are included,
we have the integers. Positive and negative fractions are called rational numbers. Real numbers are more general; complex numbers
more general still. So here we have five number systems, each more inclusive than the previous: natural numbers, integers, rational,
real numbers, and complex numbers.

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 However, mathematics is not just about numbers. We've already had a passing encounter with a different kind of object of
mathematical thought, an operation; examples are addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. In general, an operation is
something you apply to two (sometimes more) mathematical objects to get a third object.

If you start with a number and form its square root, you get another number. The term for such an "object" is function. You can
think of a function as a mathematical rule that starts with a mathematical object-usually a number-and associates to it another object in
a specific manner. Functions are often defined using algebraic formulas, which are just shorthand ways to explain what the rule is,
but they can be defined by any convenient method. Another term with the same meaning as "function" is transformation: the rule
transforms the first object into the second. This term tends to be used when the rules are geometric.

Mathematics for Organization

A lot of events happen around us. In the blink of an eye, several children have already been born, liters of water have been consumed, our
thousands of tweets have been posted. For us to make sense of all available information, we need mathematical tools to help us make
sound analysis and better decisions. For instance, a particular store can gather data on the shopping habits of its customers and make
necessary adjustments to help drive sales. Scientists cn plot bird migration routes to help conserve endangered animal populations. Social
media analysts can crunch all online postings using software to gauge the netizens’ sentiments on particular issues or personalities.

Mathematics for Prediction

It is sometimes said that history repeats itself. As much as we use mathematical models using existing data to generate analysis and
interpretations, we can also use them to make predictions. Applying the concept of probability, experts can calculate the chance of an event
occurring. The weather is a prime example. Based on historical patterns, meteorologists can make forecasts to help us prepare for our day –
to – day activities. They can also warn us of weather disturbances that can affect our activities for weeks or months. Astronomers also use
patterns the occurrences of meteor showers or eclipses. In 2017, announcements were made about heavenly phenomena such as the
Draconid Meteor Shower and “The Great American Eclipse.” They were able to tell when these phenomena would occur and where would
be the best places to view them.

Mathematics for Control

We have demonstrated by means of examples around us that patterns are definitely present in the universe. There seems to be an
underlying mathematical structure in the way that natural objects and phenomenon behave. While photographers could capture a single
moment through a snap shot, videographers could record events as they unfold. Painters and sculpture could create masterpieces in
interpreting their surroundings, poets, could use beautiful words to describe an object, and musicians could capture and reproduce sounds
that they hear. These observations of nature, as well as their interactions and relationships, could be more elegantly described by means of
mathematical equations. As stated by astrophysicist Brian Greene, “With a few symbols on a page, you can describe a wealth of physical
phenomena.”
It is interesting

CHECK YOUR PROGRESS

I. Write a short response or essay about the following questions.

1. What new ideas about mathematics did you learn?

2. What is it about mathematics that might have changed your thoughts about it?
3. What is most useful about mathematics for humankind?

RUBRIC FOR ESSAY WRITING

The student is unable to elicit the ideas and concepts from the readings and that s/he has not read the prescribed
0
reading.
1 The student is able to elicit the ideas and concepts form the readings but shown erroneous
The student is able to elicit the ideas and concepts from the readings and shows correct understanding of these.
2
The students not only elicit the correct ideas from the readings but also shows evidence of internalizing these.
3
The student elicits the correct ideas from the readings, shows evidence if internalizing these and consistently
4
contributes additional thoughts to the core idea.