Math for everyone

A tour of the Museum of Machines: mathematics and mechanisms at the CNAM

Mathematics isn't visual? You can't really represent it "in the real world," let alone make it tangible? Think again! The Musée des arts et métiers (60 rue Réaumur, 75003 Paris) invites you to revisit its collections… through the surprising lens of mathematics.

Ulysse Lacoste: art, mathematics and performance

Mathematics, art, poetry, craftsmanship, kinematics, performance… Ulysse Lacoste's work embraces all this and more, blurring boundaries in pursuit of a distinctive alchemy that sets this singular artist's approach apart.

An interactive journey through mathematical history

Reading Tangente already lets us travel through mathematical time and space—but have you ever thought of taking a virtual tour around the world and, at each stop, discovering the full history of mathematics rooted there?

Best illusion of 2017: Dynamic Müller-Lyer

The 2017 edition of the Best Illusion of the Year Contest, an annual international optical-illusion competition, took place in early October.

Spiral Jetty: Great Salt Lake's mathematical spiral

In 1970, American land-art pioneer Robert Smithson used bulldozers to create an enormous spiral of volcanic rock northeast of the Great Salt Lake, in Utah, in the western United States

Bull's-eye: the results

Tangente's 30th anniversary coincides with another milestone: the 20th anniversary of Affaire de Logique, the weekly column in Le Monde, which celebrated its 1,000th installment with a competition run weekly for 26 weeks that drew… 1,000 participants!

A world of oscillations: from Huygens's clock to quantum physics

Huygens's invention of the first pendulum clocks in 1650 helped shape modern differential geometry—with unexpected repercussions for a very recent problem in quantum mathematical physics.

Punch cards: from Jacquard to Hollerith

Interfaces are a defining feature of our culture: the punch-card control system of the Jacquard loom transformed textile manufacturing. But who remembers it today? It was a first step towards the computer, which now governs how we interact with the world.

Sam Loyd: a puzzle-making mathematician in 15 minutes

Fifteen minutes to retrace the key moments in a mathematician's career: that was the challenge set—twice during the day—for the outstanding speakers in the conference room at Tangente's 30th-anniversary celebration (times in parentheses).

Mathematics to make you think: games and mental arithmetic

To celebrate Tangente's 30th anniversary, here are a few small mathematical challenges to get you thinking carefully...

Hands-on mathematics: maths at your fingertips

Mathematics can be hands-on too! Such activities will be on offer on December 3, for Tangente's 30th anniversary.

Tangente turns 30 in Brussels | Tangente Magazine

Tangente is also celebrating its 30th anniversary in Brussels. Here is the programme, built around the theme "Popularizing isn't vulgar!".

Tangente's 30th anniversary program | Tangente Magazine

Here is the programme (which will be updated regularly) for Tangente's 30th anniversary celebrations at the Musée des arts et métiers on Sunday, December 3, 2017. Admission is free for everyone!

The Ramanujan–Hardy duo on screen | Tangente Magazine

Kepler's law of equal areas

It is number two on the list of Kepler's laws, yet it is the easiest to prove. The law of equal areas is one of three results by the German astronomer who revolutionized our view of the heavens at the dawn of the 17th century.

The value of polar coordinates

Using integral calculus to calculate areas can sometimes be cumbersome in Cartesian coordinates. Switching to polar coordinates can then be a considerable help. It also makes it possible to normalize the normal distribution in probability.

Areas and antiderivatives: a close connection

Areas and antiderivatives have been linked ever since the foundational work of Leibniz and Newton in the 17th century. This connection has simplified the calculation of the areas of many regions in the plane, but the relationship between area and the integral goes far deeper than this computational question.

Area briefs

Discover different ways to calculate the areas of polygons

Approximately π

We can play with areas to calculate π, but we can also start with π and choose areas accordingly. For a change from Archimedes' famous method of exhaustion, we can revive a historical approach probably devised by the Egyptians... Can you do better?

Charlie Chaplin's polynomial

Representing the motion of an object, such as a ball, in a film is now within everyone's reach thanks to new technology! Here is an example based on a famous scene from the silver screen, with the help of a graphing calculator...