The Unimaginable Mathematics of Borges' Library of Babel
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Product details:
- Edition number and title Bach
- Publisher OUP USA
- Date of Publication 21 August 2008
- ISBN 9780195334579
- Binding Hardback
- No. of pages224 pages
- Size 213x147x22 mm
- Weight 386 g
- Language English
- Illustrations 60 line illustrations 0
Categories
Long description:
The Library of Babel is arguably Jorge Luis Borges' best known story-memorialized along with Borges on an Argentine postage stamp. Now, in The Unimaginable Mathematics of Borges' Library of Babel, William Goldbloom Bloch takes readers on a fascinating tour of the mathematical ideas hidden within one of the classic works of modern literature.
Written in the vein of Douglas R. Hofstadter's Pulitzer Prize-winning Gödel, Escher, Bach, this original and imaginative book sheds light on one of Borges' most complex, richly layered works. Bloch begins each chapter with a mathematical idea-combinatorics, topology, geometry, information theory-followed by examples and illustrations that put flesh on the theoretical bones. In this way, he provides many fascinating insights into Borges' Library. He explains, for instance, a straightforward way to calculate how many books are in the Library-an easily notated but literally unimaginable number-and also shows that, if each book were the size of a grain of sand, the entire universe could only hold a fraction of the books in the Library. Indeed, if each book were the size of a proton, our universe would still not be big enough to hold anywhere near all the books.
Given Borges' well-known affection for mathematics, this exploration of the story through the eyes of a humanistic mathematician makes a unique and important contribution to the body of Borgesian criticism. Bloch not only illuminates one of the great short stories of modern literature but also exposes the reader-including those more inclined to the literary world-to many intriguing and entrancing mathematical ideas.
Table of Contents:
Preface
Introduction
Combinatorics: Contemplating Variations of the 23 Letter
Topology and Cosmology: The Universe (Which Others Call the Library)
Information Theory: Cataloging the Collection
Geometry and Graph Theory: Ambiguity and Access
Real Analysis: The Book of Sand
More Combinatorics: Disorderings into Order
A Homomorphism: Structure into Meaning
Critical Points
Openings
Acknowledgements
Appendix IThe Logos of Logarithms
Appendix IIFlat-Out Disoriented
Appendix IIIPeeling the 3-Sphere
Appendix IVA Labyrinth, not a Maze
Appendix VAn Example of the Ars Combinatoria
Bibliography
