Algebra
by Alexander Shen, Israel M. Gelfand
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Book Summary Information
Author: Alexander Shen, Israel M. GelfandEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1993-12-01
ISBN: 0817636773
Number of pages: 150
Publisher: Birkhäuser Boston
Accessories:
- Elements of Algebra
- Rings, Fields, and Vector Spaces: An Introduction to Abstract Algebra via Geometric Constructibility (Undergraduate Texts in Mathematics)
Book Reviews of Algebra
Book Review: I can't think of a title. Just buy the book!
Summary: 5 Stars
Well, H. Wu on his page and N.F Taussig here have written quite good reviews, so I guess I can't really add anything new. Still, I feel the need to praise this book some more. Could it be used for a main text or should it be just a supplement? I don't know, but there is much more mathematics contained in these 149 pages than in any standard 500 page high school text on the market today. That's the unsurprising result of accomplished mathematicians writing a math book. Sure, some topics are missing. You won't find 3 or 4 chapters devoted to the several "different" ways to graph a line. There aren't fifty problems in a row that start with "suppose Sam rows upstream at 5 miles per hour and it takes her seven times as long as..." Unfortunately, there isn't even a treatment of complex numbers, the only omission that seems wrong.
You will find several interesting and serious topics that would be dangerous to bright students who insist they hate math, or rather what they've been told is math. Imagine their initial embarrassment when they find out that they can enjoy the subject! Maybe more importantly, imagine their relief when they realize that there IS a reason why we "FOIL", there IS a reason why negative times negative is positive, there IS a reason why we say a^(-1)=1/a, and it's not because "the teacher said so" or "that's just the rule" (ok, it is the rule, but now you'll see why). And there's no attempt to sneak anything by the reader. The authors are quick to acknowledge any gaps in their reasoning, and to assure the reader that in the future he or she will fill them.
It's this honesty and attention to rigor without being too formal or dry that give this book some extra charm. It moves smoothly from basic arithmetic (which everyone should still read if only to learn a different way of explaining it to a student/younger sibling/child) all the way to proofs, both algebraic and visual when possible, of some important inequalities. Cauchy's inductive proof, first for powers of two and then filling in the gaps, of the AM-GM inequality is here, as is the standard proof of Cauchy-Schwarz by the discriminant of a polynomial. Go to your local high school and look at its algebra book. I doubt that's in there.
I'll end with a few of the funny, sometimes weird, little remarks:
After illustrating the associative law using the example (sugar + coffee) + milk = sugar + (coffee + milk), the next problem is: "Problem 25. Try it."
"Please keep in mind that a monomial is a polynomial, so sometimes for a mathematician one is many."
"Probably you are discouraged by this solution because it seems impossible to invent it. The authors share your feeling."
One section begins: "62. How to confuse students on an exam: As usual, there are many evil ways to make use of knowledge."
Summary of Algebra
The need for improved mathematics education at the high school and college levels has never been more apparent than in the 1990's. As early as the 1960's, I.M. Gelfand and his colleagues in the USSR thought hard about this same question and developed a style for presenting basic mathematics in a clear and simple form that engaged the curiosity and intellectual interest of thousands of high school and college students. These same ideas, this development, are available in the following books to any student who is willing to read, to be stimulated, and to learn. "Algebra" is an elementary algebra text from one of the leading mathematicians of the world -- a major contribution to the teaching of the very first high school level course in a centuries old topic -- refreshed by the author's inimitable pedagogical style and deep understanding of mathematics and how it is taught and learned. This text has been adopted at: Holyoke Community College, Holyoke, MA * University of Illinois in Chicago, Chicago, IL * University of Chicago, Chicago, IL * California State University, Hayward, CA * Georgia Southwestern College, Americus, GA * Carey College, Hattiesburg, MSMathematics Books
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