The ancient scholar Hippasus of Metapontum was punished with death for his discovery of irrational numbers—or at least that’s the legend. What actually happened in the fifth century B.C.E. is far from ...

In 1886 the mathematician Leopold Kronecker famously said, “God Himself made the whole numbers — everything else is the work of men.” Indeed, mathematicians have introduced new sets of numbers besides ...

Choosing the right type of chart helps you display discrete data more effectively. Discrete data consists of whole numbers that are counted rather than measured. For example, when you track items sold ...

For centuries, prime numbers have captured the imaginations of mathematicians, who continue to search for new patterns that help identify them and the way they’re distributed among other numbers.

It’s surprisingly difficult to prove one of the most basic properties of a number: whether it can be written as a fraction. A broad new method can help settle this ancient question. In June 1978, the ...