A Gardner's Workout: Training the Mind and Entertaining the Spirit

Martin Gardner, as the Master of Mathematical Games and Puzzles, has used his personal exuberance and his fascination with puzzles and magic to entice a wide range of readers into a world of mathematical discovery. As the author of Scientific American's "Mathematical Games" column for 25 years, he gained a large following among puzzlers, magicians, and mathematicians. In the years since then, Gardner has continued to write articles for academic journals and popular magazines. Forty-one of those pieces, never before published in book form, are collected in this volume. Truly a treat for Martin Gardner's many fans, the articles span a wide range of topics. They include games of chance (and why a "computer" will always beat a human player), word ladders and mathematical word play games, tiling puzzles, magic squares, computer and calculator "magic" tricks, and other mathematical puzzles. Providing the tools to furnish our all-too-sluggish minds with an athletic workout, Gardner's problems foster an agility of the mind as they entertain.