Big Math
Steven Strogatz, Alex Townsend
The Hidden Codes That Run Our World
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Release Date: 19/11/2026
The Hidden Codes That Run Our World Imagine every photo on your phone, every movie you stream, and every secure credit card transaction you make online. Big Math (i.e., linear algebra) is operating under the hood for each of these everyday miracles. It is:
BIG MATH is the secret of modern life decoded - en exploration of how BIG TECH has turned into BIG MONEY by award-winning mathematicians and professors Steven Strogatz and Alex Townsend.
- The mathematical machinery that compresses images so they can be quickly uploaded to Instagram.
- The secret sauce behind Netflix to recommend your next favorite show.
- The sentinel that encrypts your data to keep it safe from prying eyes.
- The force behind Google's search algorithm allowing you to sift through the vastness of the internet with a few keystrokes.
The brainpower enabling the AI revolution, from self-driving cars to large language models like ChatGPT.
Big math provides the concepts and algorithms needed in today's digital world. Yet Big Math isn't limited to practical applications. It promotes a broader, multi-dimensional thinking style critical for solving problems in all walks of life. It teaches us to see and manipulate relationships in a cloud of numbers, understand structures and patterns, and simplify complex problems into manageable pieces. This skill set is invaluable for scientists, engineers, programmers, entrepreneurs, financial quants, and anyone who deals with the colossal amounts of data that define our information-saturated age.
BIG MATH is the first book to introduce linear algebra to a non-technical audience - exploring what it is, who created it, and why it matters.