A mathemagician is a

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

who is also a magician. The term "mathemagic" is believed to have been introduced by

Royal Vale Heath Royal Vale Heath (5 January 1883 – 25 July 1960) was a wealthy New York stockbroker and writer who became widely known as a magician and puzzle enthusiast.

with his 1933 book "Mathemagic"."Mathemagic" by Royal Vale Heath and Jerome Sydney Meyer, Simon and Schuster, New York (1933) The name "mathemagician" was probably first applied to

Martin Gardner Martin Gardner (October 21, 1914May 22, 2010) was an American popular mathematics and popular science writer with interests also encompassing scientific skepticism, micromagic, philosophy, religion, and literatureespecially the writings of L ...

, but has since been used to describe many mathematician/magicians, including

Arthur T. Benjamin Arthur T. Benjamin (born March 19, 1961) is an American mathematician who specializes in combinatorics. Since 1989 he has been a professor of mathematics at Harvey Mudd College, where he is the Smallwood Family Professor of Mathematics. He is ...

, Persi Diaconis, and Colm Mulcahy. Diaconis has suggested that the reason so many mathematicians are magicians is that "inventing a magic trick and inventing a theorem are very similar activities." Mathemagician is a

neologism A neologism Greek νέο- ''néo''(="new") and λόγος /''lógos'' meaning "speech, utterance"] is a relatively recent or isolated term, word, or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use, but that has not been fully accepted int ...

, specifically a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsmentalism Mentalism is a performing art in which its practitioners, known as mentalists, appear to demonstrate highly developed mental or intuitive abilities. Performances may appear to include hypnosis, telepathy, clairvoyance, divination, precognit ...

tricks rely on mathematical principles. Max Maven often utilizes this type of magic in his performance. The Mathemagician is the name of a character in the 1961 children's book ''

The Phantom Tollbooth ''The Phantom Tollbooth'' is a children's fantasy adventure novel written by Norton Juster, with illustrations by Jules Feiffer, first published in 1961. The story follows a bored young boy named Milo who unexpectedly receives a magic tollbo ...

''. He is the ruler of Digitopolis, the kingdom of mathematics.

Notable mathemagicians

* Jin Akiyama * Persi Diaconis *

Richard Feynman Richard Phillips Feynman (; May 11, 1918 – February 15, 1988) was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of the superf ...

* Karl Fulves *

Ronald Graham Ronald Lewis Graham (October 31, 1935July 6, 2020) was an American mathematician credited by the American Mathematical Society as "one of the principal architects of the rapid development worldwide of discrete mathematics in recent years". He ...

Royal Vale Heath Royal Vale Heath (5 January 1883 – 25 July 1960) was a wealthy New York stockbroker and writer who became widely known as a magician and puzzle enthusiast.

* Colm Mulcahy *

Raymond Smullyan Raymond Merrill Smullyan (; May 25, 1919 – February 6, 2017) was an American mathematician, magician, concert pianist, logician, Taoist, and philosopher. Born in Far Rockaway, New York, his first career was stage magic. He earned a BSc fro ...

W. W. Rouse Ball Walter William Rouse Ball (14 August 1850 – 4 April 1925), known as W. W. Rouse Ball, was a British mathematician, lawyer, and fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge, from 1878 to 1905. He was also a keen amateur magician, and the founding ...

Notable mathemagicians

References

Further reading