The mathematics of love

I can’t remember how I came across this (I think I saw an article about it on Metro or something), but I got intrigued by Hannah Fry’s work on “The mathematics of love”. So I bought the book and read it \(-\) it’s a fairly easy read, so I got through it in just a couple of reading-sessions, while stuck on poorly ventilated trains…

Hannah is a lecturer at UCL, where she does serious work applying maths to understand complex phenomena such as outbreak investigations or the London riots. But (and I quite like this!) she has also done work in trying to explain something as complex and unexplainable as how people fall in love with maths \(-\) at face value, this is of course ridiculous, but of course, she doesn’t take things at face value and makes quite some interesting (and amusing) points (see the TED talk below).

{{< youtube yFVXsjVdvmY >}}

What was also interesting is, I think, the characterisation she gives to her work \(-\) which is to say from the perspective of a mathematician (which she is). That, I thought, was interesting as many of her points I would classify from the perspective of a statistician (which I am). I am not saying she’s wrong, of course. But I don’t think I’m either and it’s just fascinating how you see the worlds with your own googles, sometimes…