Joseph C. Mazur (born in the

Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

in 1942) is Professor Emeritus of Mathematics at Marlboro College, in

Marlboro Marlboro (, ) is an American brand of cigarettes, currently owned and manufactured by Philip Morris USA (a branch of Altria) within the United States and by Philip Morris International (now separate from Altria) outside the US. The largest Mar ...

Vermont Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...

. He holds a B.S. from Pratt Institute, where he first studied

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...

. He spent his junior year in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

, studying mathematics in classes with

Claude Chevalley Claude Chevalley (; 11 February 1909 – 28 June 1984) was a French mathematician who made important contributions to number theory, algebraic geometry, class field theory, finite group theory and the theory of algebraic groups. He was a foun ...

and

Roger Godement Roger Godement (; 1 October 1921 – 21 July 2016) was a French mathematician, known for his work in functional analysis as well as his expository books. Biography Godement started as a student at the École normale supérieure in 1940, where he ...

and returned to Pratt to earn a B.S. in mathematics. From there he went directly to M.I.T to receive his

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

in mathematics ( algebraic geometry) in 1972. He has held a visiting scholar position at M.I.T and several visiting professor positions at The Mathematics Institute of the

University of Warwick , mottoeng = Mind moves matter , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £7.0 million (2021) , budget = £698.2 million (2020� ...

. In 2006 he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for work on mathematical narrative. In 2008 he was awarded a Bellagio Fellowship from the Rockefeller Foundation, and in 2009 was elected to Fellow of the Vermont Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2011, 2013, and 2019 he was awarded Bogliasco Fellowships. Since 1972 he has taught all areas of mathematics, its

history History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...

and philosophy. He has authored many educational software programs, including Explorations in

Calculus Calculus, originally called infinitesimal calculus or "the calculus of infinitesimals", is the mathematical study of continuous change, in the same way that geometry is the study of shape, and algebra is the study of generalizations of arithm ...

, the first interactive, multimedia CD package of simulations for calculus. He is the author of several acclaimed mathematics books that have been translated into more than a dozen languages. He is also interested in history of science.

Bibliography

* ''Euclid In the Rainforest: Discovering Universal Truth in Logic and Math'', Plume, 2005 (Finalist for the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction).
''The Motion Paradox: The 2,500-Year-Old Puzzle Behind All The Mysteries of Time and Space''
Dutton, 2007. * ''Number: The Language of Science'' (Ed.) Plume, 2005. * ''What's Luck Got to Do with It? The History, Mathematics and Psychology of the Gambler's Illusion'', Princeton, 2010. * ''Enlightening Symbols: A Short History of Mathematical Notation and Its Hidden Powers'', Princeton, 2014. * ''Fluke: The Maths and Myths of Coincidences'', London: Oneworld Publications. 2016. * ''The Clock Mirage: Our Myth of Measured Time'', Yale University Press, 2020.

References

External links

Homepage of Joseph MazurJoseph Mazur at Marlboro College
* American non-fiction writers 1942 births Living people 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians 20th-century American Jews Science journalists 21st-century American Jews {{US-mathematician-stub