Four Ways to Think

David Sumpter, a professor of applied mathematics at Uppsala University and the author of several popular science bestsellers, invites readers to reflect on the world around them by using four different ways of thinking — statistical, interactive, chaotic, and complex. While explaining the essence of these approaches, the differences between them, and the benefits that anyone can derive from them, Sumpter draws on the research of R. Fisher (who introduced the concept of maximum likelihood), C. Shannon (who described the mathematical theory of information), and A. Kolmogorov (a pioneer of chaos theory and a star of Soviet mathematics). The author vividly and convincingly describes how one can delve into the mysteries of human existence through numbers, but at the same time urges us to remember that we are all immensely complex and capable of always discovering something new both in others and in ourselves.