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Liked It “amazing book except the long history backgrounds the auther gives u every while. |
Didn’t Like It1 of 1 members found this review helpful “The full title of this book is The Golden Ratio: The Story of PHI, The World’s Most Astonishing Number. Now, I know you may not believe me when I say this, but despite this being a BOOK about a NUMBER, it's really not as exciting as you might expect. |
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“amazing book except the long history backgrounds the auther gives u every while.
onsi wrote this review 6 days ago. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
the last chapter "is god a mathematician" is awesome”
“Awesome insight into the universe of ratios and the Divine Ratio. Inspired me to love math and science even more.”
Nick E wrote this review Thursday, November 19 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
“This is the second time I tried reading a book on pure mathematics and only made it about halfway through before losing interest. I'll finish it one day.”
Michael wrote this review Wednesday, August 5 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
“WAO, WAO, WAOOOOOOOOOOOO”
victor r wrote this review Saturday, June 20 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
“this book enhanced my dismal education created by my government whereby only kids from wealthy famiies advanced past grade 8........[ age 14 ]
ray a wrote this review Friday, June 5 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
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“Badly written, difficult to follow.”
Itay Sagui wrote this review Wednesday, May 13 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
“This is a great book for the casual mathematics enthusiast like myself. I like many of you am much more of a ‘language’ person than a ‘math’ person. Livio is an acclaimed astrophysicist now closely associated with the Smithsonian Institute so he definitely has the credibility to stand on his own thoughts. His book about Phi or ‘the Golden Ratio’ is a more-or-less a history book and reads like one so take comfort all ye language people! This was a book written for us. I will warn however that Livio can be a bit technical, but considering the context, I believe this is forgivable. In fact Livio does such a good job at presenting historical ideas and the various scientific opinions surrounding Phi that it borders on journalism rather than commentary. Bearing this in mind, the book is somewhat anti-climactic in a general sense, however one could easily consider it ‘multi-climactic’ as some of the chapters reveal some fascinating tidbits about the characters and discoveries made along the way to the present. I am looking forward to reading Livio’s next work – ‘Is God a Mathematician?’”
Austin wrote this review Thursday, April 30 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
“There is much that can be said about phi, the golden ratio, and the golden rectangle, used intuitively in architecture and drawings for aesthetic reasons. It was noticed because it kept ocurring and recurring, and the series that gives the number was discovered.
Dr. J. G. wrote this review Friday, October 24 2008. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
This book gives some of it but is really not mathematics and as for any reader who is a non prefessional or layperson in the subject of mathematics, it might provide some interesting history and anecdotes apart from some introduction to the basic concept, but that is about it as far as the good points go.
The strange phenomena that mars this book is that an inordinate amount of time and space is wasted in trying to prove that various people of either antiquity - including anything more than about a couple of centuries ago - or of origins other than Europe could not possibly have used the golden ratio, because according to the writer there seems to be no proof that they knew the ratio; or alternatively he gives elaborate measurements to prove that the buildings or drawings in fact do not confirm to the ratio. In some cases he argues that the measurements can be taken from any point to prove that they confirm, which is indicative of there being no such confirmation. He might have realised that his argument works both ways - if something is obvious it is his effort to disprove that indicates something.
The whole point about the golden ratio is this - it can be thought of beginning as a series of approximations that get better until one gets the idea of what exactly the ratio is and until the step (at infinity) is arrived at each step, each approximation is a better or closer one to the ratio than the ones before.
The number phi, in other words, was arrived at with the naturally occuring proportions of aesthetically pleasing architecture observed and giving rise to Fibonacci sequence and its limit - the golden ratio, phi.
Take aesthetic looking buildings such as Pathenon or take your normal writing envelopes or visiting cards or invitation cards, greeting cards, or a drawing that is more likely to please more people, and you will find the ratio - either a 2:3, or a 3:5, or 5:8, and so on. Those were the ones easily seen early and easy to make into the common everyday use objects, while a finer approach to the ratio is a more of a mathematical beauty and conceptual aesthetic necessity, but hardly a stringent demand in terms of architecture.
This discrepency does not disprove that people of ancient times might have had an inkling, while a common (rather than fine or final phi) step of approach to golden ratio in evidence of various works is still indicative of how this particular concept is intuitively aesthetic.
On the whole an interesting read as an inroduction if one has such interests or is likely to - which one can only find out by trying it, so it is not a bad idea to read this. There is also the Time & Life series volume on mathematics with their excellent and concise introductions to various concepts of beauty in the subect, and if you have children it is entirely worth keeping that series at home and making it seem like an attractive idea for them to read it, perhaps by doing it yourself.”
“Fascinating subject matter although Livio's delivery was rather dry and technical. That said, there were a few captivating sections.
scootergrrl wrote this review Saturday, August 23 2008. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
”“Interested in history, music, architecture? This book wraps it all up in the context of a number. Fascinating... and no it's NOT written like a text book. However, if you have never found anything related to math even remotely interesting, skip this one ;-)”
Filip B wrote this review Friday, May 16 2008. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
