

The arrangement of numbers in Pascal's triangle obviously lends itself to play, and many mathematical recreations refer to it.



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The final installment in our three-part series on methods for solving problems with a minimum of technical machinery. The aim is to discover an imaginative, original approach that shifts the puzzle into familiar territory.

Christian Boyer, Vincent Thill, Jean Moreau de Saint-Martin and Philippe Fondanaiche—all passionate amateur mathematicians—agreed to answer our questions about how their interest in mathematics began and the activities they have developed in their favorite areas.

If you talk to people about the history of arithmetic, whatever your specific subject, you can expect someone to ask this question at the end: why is our numeral system base 10 when base 12 would be so much more practical?

can numbers be arranged so perfectly that they produce equal sums in every direction? The challenge is certainly difficult, but construction methods do exist! The magic of arithmetic...
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