George Pólya (1887–1985)
Author of How to Solve It: A New Aspect of Mathematical Method
About the Author
Series
Works by George Pólya
Mathematical Discovery: On Understanding, Learning and Teaching Problem Solving Combined Edition (1981) 87 copies, 2 reviews
Problems and Theorems in Analysis II: Theory of Functions, Zeros, Polynomials, Determinants, Number Theory, Geometry (1968) 52 copies
Problems and Theorems in Analysis I: Series, Integral Calculus, Theory of Functions (1972) 50 copies
Analysis 2 copies
Analysis I 2 copies
Inequalities 2 copies
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Pólya, George
- Birthdate
- 1887-12-13
- Date of death
- 1985-09-07
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Hungary
Switzerland
USA - Birthplace
- Budapest, Austria-Hungary
- Place of death
- Palo Alto, California, USA
- Education
- University of Budapest (Ph.D|1912)
- Occupations
- professor (mathematics)
- Relationships
- Walter, Marion (student)
- Organizations
- ETH Zurich
Stanford University - Awards and honors
- American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1974)
National Academy of Sciences (1976)
Academie des Sciences
Hungarian Academy
Academie Internationale de Philosophie des Sciences - Short biography
- George Pólya (/ˈpoʊljə/; Hungarian: Pólya György [ˈpoːjɒ ˈɟørɟ]) (December 13, 1887 – September 7, 1985) was a Hungarian mathematician. He was a professor of mathematics from 1914 to 1940 at ETH Zürich and from 1940 to 1953 at Stanford University. He made fundamental contributions to combinatorics, number theory, numerical analysis and probability theory. He is also noted for his work in heuristics and mathematics education. He has been described as one of The Martians, a term used to refer to a group of prominent Jewish Hungarian scientists (mostly, but not exclusively, physicists and mathematicians) who emigrated to the United States in the early half of the 20th century [from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_P...]
Members
Reviews
Not for the general reader (one star). This mostly about induction, mathematical and logical. Useful as an introduction to a limited readership interested in science with a strong leaning toward Mathematics. Valuable mostly in pointing out inductive fallacies. That is worth the third star.
Probably suited best to high school math whizzes and college undergrads majoring or minoring in Mathematics or a closely related field such as Physics.
I have a math degree (48 years ago) and found that the most interesting parts were stuff I already knew, and most of the rest not especially engaging. I did enjoy Euler's discovery of a pattern in the primes, which was new to me. It would seem that has deep implications for group theory, but this was only hinted at and not explored. Also enjoyed some of Archimedes's proofs.… (more)
Probably suited best to high school math whizzes and college undergrads majoring or minoring in Mathematics or a closely related field such as Physics.
I have a math degree (48 years ago) and found that the most interesting parts were stuff I already knew, and most of the rest not especially engaging. I did enjoy Euler's discovery of a pattern in the primes, which was new to me. It would seem that has deep implications for group theory, but this was only hinted at and not explored. Also enjoyed some of Archimedes's proofs.… (more)
I'm conflicted about this book. There is a lot of good advice around the art of problem solving, but my god is there a lot of shit too. The layout is mostly a big alphabetical glossary of _math things_ --- everything from leading questions to notions of symmetry to anecdotes about absentminded professors --- and the layout doesn't particularly help. It's not organized by topic or ordered by first things first, it's just plopped down alphabetically. As such, it's hard to get into the flow.
This book however is lacking primarily in that it deals with how to solve "well-posed questions," which is to say, toy problems. There is very little about conducting your own open-ended research, and about how to turn wisps of ideas into well-posed ones.… (more)
This book however is lacking primarily in that it deals with how to solve "well-posed questions," which is to say, toy problems. There is very little about conducting your own open-ended research, and about how to turn wisps of ideas into well-posed ones.… (more)
How to Solve It is decent, but overrated – the first 10% are pretty good, and then there are a few nuggets of really good advice interspersed with the neverending examples of the principles introduced in the first part.
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Statistics
- Works
- 42
- Also by
- 3
- Members
- 3,075
- Popularity
- #8,306
- Rating
- 4.0
- Reviews
- 19
- ISBNs
- 80
- Languages
- 11
- Favorited
- 3
The best lesson i learned from this work was to first try to understand the problem before slogging into it with some random sort of method.