Popularizing Mathematics at the Undergraduate Level

Summary

This is a personal account of an attempt, and failure, to popularize mathematics in the undergraduate community of a university. We hope to convince you that this was an exciting adventure, with much scope and promise, and to warn you of the political problems that arose and finally aborted the project. The idea was to offer a mathematics enrichment course for students who had completed freshman mathematics but were pursuing careers in other disciplines. Two particular target groups were in mind: the first consisted of students and alumni we meet occasionally who are still enthusiastic about mathematics. Although they never went beyond freshman mathematics they can still wax nostalgic about their former romance with mathematics. They want to know more about mathematics. The second was a more nebulous group, students who might be destined for positions of influence for funding mathematics at the national level, and therefore presumably would obtain university degrees and see something of mathematics along the way.

To the first group we hoped to offer a course that was exciting, satisfying and gave a broad perspective on the role of mathematics. Mathematical in nature, but naturally not a standard, technical mathematics course. To the second group, we hoped to show the centrality of mathematics, both historically and presently, and to convey a picture of a living, evolving subject with many questions and issues yet unresolved.