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Five mathematical gobbets

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 June 2025

Nick Lord

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At university I was intrigued by a historian friend and his constant quest for gobbets – short, apposite quotations that he avidly collected for possible use in future essays. It strikes me that there might be analogous nuggets of mathematics and I offer the following five short, self-contained items both for amusement and for possible classroom use. Each contains a surprising element and I have deliberately left a few loose ends to encourage further exploration.

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Type
Articles
Information
The Mathematical Gazette , Volume 109 , Issue 575 , July 2025, pp. 286 - 293
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Copyright
© The Authors, 2025 Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Mathematical Association

References

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