Stephen Baker: The Numerati (2008)
Filed under book | Tags: · advertising, algorithm, blogging, computing, data, data mining, internet, mathematics, privacy, psychology, social media, surveillance, technology
An urgent look at how a global math elite is predicting and altering our behavior — at work, at the mall, and in bed.
Every day we produce loads of data about ourselves simply by living in the modern world: we click web pages, flip channels, drive through automatic toll booths, shop with credit cards, and make cell phone calls. Now, in one of the greatest undertakings of the twenty-first century, a savvy group of mathematicians and computer scientists is beginning to sift through this data to dissect us and map out our next steps. Their goal? To manipulate our behavior — what we buy, how we vote — without our even realizing it.
In this tour de force of original reporting and analysis, journalist Stephen Baker provides us with a fascinating guide to the world we’re all entering — and to the people controlling that world. The Numerati have infiltrated every realm of human affairs, profiling us as workers, shoppers, patients, voters, potential terrorists — and lovers. The implications are vast. Our privacy evaporates. Our bosses can monitor and measure our every move (then reward or punish us). Politicians can find the swing voters among us, by plunking us all into new political groupings with names like “Hearth Keepers” and “Crossing Guards.” It can sound scary. But the Numerati can also work on our behalf, diagnosing an illness before we’re aware of the symptoms, or even helping us find our soul mate. Surprising, enlightening, and deeply relevant, The Numerati shows how a powerful new endeavor — the mathematical modeling of humanity — will transform every aspect of our lives.
Publisher Mariner Books, Boston/New York, 2008
ISBN 0618784608, 9780618784608
256 pages
review (Marcus du Sautoy, The Guardian)
review (Rob Walker, The New York Times)
review (Tim Walker, The Independent)
A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates (1955/2001)
Filed under book | Tags: · computing, cryptography, mathematics, probability, randomness, statistics
“Not long after research began at RAND in 1946, the need arose for random numbers that could be used to solve problems of various kinds of experimental probability procedures. These applications, called Monte Carlo methods, required a large supply of random digits and normal deviates of high quality, and the tables presented here were produced to meet those requirements. This book was a product of RAND’s pioneering work in computing, as well a testament to the patience and persistence of researchers in the early days of RAND. The tables of random numbers in this book have become a standard reference in engineering and econometrics textbooks and have been widely used in gaming and simulations that employ Monte Carlo trials. Still the largest published source of random digits and normal deviates, the work is routinely used by statisticians, physicists, polltakers, market analysts, lottery administrators, and quality control engineers. A 2001 article in the New York Times on the value of randomness featured the original edition of the book, published in 1955 by the Free Press. The rights have since reverted to RAND, which reissued a new edition of the book in its original format, with a new foreword by Michael D. Rich, RAND’s Executive Vice President.”
Originally published by Free Press, Glencoe, Illinois, 1955
With a foreword by Michael D. Rich
Publisher Rand Corporation, 2001
ISBN 0833030477, 9780833030474
628 pages
Reviews (Amazon.com)
PDF (47 MB, updated on 2018-3-17)
PDF (a file containing the Table of Random Digits in plain text form, TXT)
PDF (a file containing the Table of Random Normal Deviates in plain text form, TXT)
Nils Röller: Medientheorie im epistemischen Übergang: Hermann Weyls Philosophie der Mathematik und Naturwissenschaft und Ernst Cassirers Philosophie der symbolischen Formen im Wechselverhältnis (2000) [German]
Filed under thesis | Tags: · consciousness, epistemology, history of mathematics, knowledge, mathematics, media, media theory, philosophy, philosophy of science
Ein “Medium des freien Werdens” – so nennt der Mathematiker Hermann Weyl (1885–1955) im Jahre 1921 das Kontinuum. Diese Bezeichnung ist bildet den Anlaß, die medientheoretische Bedeutung der philosophischen Schriften Hermann Weyls zu untersuchen. Die vorliegende Publikation erarbeitet dabei die Differenzen zwischen den Diskursen Weyls und des Philosophen Ernst Cassirer. Laut Weyl ist das konstruktive Kontinuum, in dem seiner Meinung nach die Physik präparierte Ereignisse ansiedelt, scharf von der anschaulichen Wirklichkeit zu trennen. Er sieht dieses als Produkt des menschlichen Bewußtseins. In seiner “Philosophie der symbolischen Formen” macht Ernst Cassirer deutlich, dass aus seiner Sicht und entgegen Weyls Theorie das konstruktive Kontinuum zusammen mit dem mathematischen Symbolismus eine Brücke zwischen Bewußtsein und Wirklichkeit bildet. Das Wechselverhältnis zwischen dem Mathematiker Weyl und dem Philosophen Cassirer zeigt beispielhafte Formen der Vermittlung zwischen Philosophie und moderner Naturwissenschaft. Weyls Schriften werden vor dem Hintergrund der Rezeptionsgeschichte in der “experimentellen Epistemologieö und der “nomadischen Mathematik” als paradigmatisch für die Medientheorie gedeutet.
Doctoral Thesis
Fakultät Medien, Bauhaus-Universität Weimar
Advisor: Joseph Vogl
220 pages