What's new
Essays arrive in groups rather than one at a time, and a group usually opens up a subject the collection had not covered before. Between one group and the next nothing changes, so a reader who has seen the most recent group has seen everything.
9 September 2026
33 essays on algebra, analysis, applied, computation, discrete, dynamics, geometry, logic, number, probability and topology
The square that cannot be negative
Cauchy–Schwarz is the load-bearing inequality of the whole subject and is nearly always asserted. It is one line away from a fact nobody would argue with, and the line is a parabola with no room to cross the axis.
One subtraction clears a direction
A basis is a set of directions to measure along, and most bases are awkward because the directions get in each other's way. Removing one shadow at a time turns any basis into one where every coordinate is a shadow and nothing interferes.
The nearest point of a flat thing
More equations than unknowns almost never have a solution. Asking instead for the point of a plane nearest to where the answer should have been turns an unanswerable question into a shadow, and the shadow is what a line of best fit is.
An error with an unknown in it
Taylor's theorem does not say a partial sum is close to anything. It says the error is one more derivative evaluated somewhere nobody can name, and everything the theorem is worth comes from what happens when that somewhere is replaced by the worst case.
The centre is a choice
A Taylor series is nearly always written about zero, and nothing about the construction prefers zero. Moving the centre moves the interval the series works on, and moving it repeatedly walks the function into places its first series could never reach.
The points that ruin the fit
A polynomial through eleven points of a gentle curve should be a good approximation to it, and adding more points should make it better. On evenly spaced points it makes it worse, without limit, and the reason is not the polynomial but where the points were put.
A signal both can see
Two choosers who randomise privately can reach a set of outcomes that is smaller, and worse, than the set they reach when a device draws one cell and whispers each of them their half of it. Nothing is enforced and nobody is bound, and the arrangement is stable anyway.
The landscape nobody is looking at
Letting participants move one at a time to whatever is currently better can cycle forever, and on a network of congestible roads it cannot. The reason is a single number attached to each state that falls by exactly what the mover saves.
Two equilibria and no way to choose
A game can have two states nobody wants to leave, one paying more than the other, and the definition of an equilibrium has nothing to say about which happens. The two standard tie-breakers disagree, and the one that wins is usually the worse.
A dissection that never comes apart
The plane theorem lets the pieces be picked up and put down anywhere. Require instead that they stay joined at their corners and swing, and the theorem survives — which was open for a century and is a much stronger statement about the same cuts.
Slid, but never turned
Every construction on this ladder turns its pieces. Forbid the turn — allow the pieces to be slid and nothing else — and equal area stops being enough, for a reason that is a single number attached to each direction and that a cut cannot change.
Finitely many, and nobody says how many
The theorem promises a dissection exists and the proof produces one. Running the proof on a hexagon produces thirty-nine pieces, ingenuity produces five, and there is no method for proving that five cannot be four.
The run that lands one place along
Add up a run of entries down one of Pascal's diagonals and the total is another entry of the triangle — one row further down and one place along. The same triangle holds four more sums of that kind, and each is a different question answered by the same additive rule.
Every entry counts the routes to it
Turn Pascal's triangle forty-five degrees and it becomes a grid of street corners, with each entry counting the ways of walking there. Identities between the entries then become statements about routes, and the statements are proved by cutting the routes in one place.
The carries decide the divisibility
How many times a prime divides a binomial coefficient is not a fact about the coefficient at all. It is a count of the carries that happen when two numbers are added in that prime's base, which is a question about column addition and has nothing to do with choosing anything.
Infinite on one side and nought on the other
Box counting returns a growth rate. Hausdorff's definition returns a measure — a quantity that is infinite for every exponent below the dimension and zero for every exponent above it, and the dimension is the one place where it is neither.
A carpet with two dimensions
For every set on this ladder so far the two definitions of dimension agree, and the agreement is a theorem about sets built from copies of themselves scaled equally. Stretch one direction more than the other and the two numbers come apart, by an amount that can be computed exactly.
A dimension from the stretching rates
An attractor has no construction rule, so its dimension has to be counted — that was the rung below's argument for defining dimension by counting at all. Kaplan and Yorke's formula computes it instead, from two numbers that describe the map and never look at the set.
Aimed at one focus, turned towards the other
An ellipse sends every ray leaving one focus through the other. A hyperbola does something that sounds like the same sentence and is not — it takes a ray aimed at the far focus and turns it towards the near one, which is what the second mirror of a telescope is for.
Two families that cross at right angles
Fix two points and draw every ellipse with those foci, then every hyperbola with the same two. Each curve of the first family meets each of the second at a right angle, so between them they are a coordinate system — and the reason is one sentence about angle bisectors.
One sign decides which curve
The general quadratic in two variables has six coefficients and draws a conic. Which of the four it draws is settled by a single combination of three of them, and the other three cannot change the answer however they are chosen.
The assumption a proof pays back
A tableau assumes the opposite once and takes it apart. Natural deduction assumes things freely, uses them, and then withdraws them — and the withdrawal is what turns a derivation of a consequence into a proof of an implication.
A lemma, and the proof that never mentions one
Proving something by first proving a lemma is what makes mathematics readable, and it is exactly what makes a proof system impossible to search — because the lemma can be any formula at all. Gentzen proved the step can always be removed, and the removal is not free.
The instance that has to be guessed
Every rule of a propositional tableau replaces a formula by shorter ones, which is why it stops. The rule for a universal claim does not replace it — it keeps it and adds an instance — and one word changing turns a decision procedure into a search that may run forever.
Two matrices that generate the tree
A node of the Stern–Brocot tree is not really a fraction — it is the pair of fractions it lies between. Written as the columns of a matrix, the two turns of the tree become two multiplications, and the determinant that kept everything in lowest terms becomes a property of a product.
Every rational in one sequence
The tree lists every positive fraction once and needs a tree to do it. One recursion on the whole numbers lists them in a single row — and each term of it counts something nobody was asking about, which is why the enumeration works.
The fractions that beat every smaller one
Walking down the tree towards a number produces a sequence of fractions closing in on it. Most of them are steps along the way; a few are the best approximations there are — closer than every fraction with a smaller denominator — and which few is decided by where the turns change direction.
When the numbers are shown
The secretary rule wins a third of the time and cannot do better, because it is told only who is ahead. Show the actual values and say where they came from, and the same problem is won three times in five — by a standard that falls as the end approaches.
Giving up on the best
The secretary rule treats landing the second-best exactly as badly as landing the worst, which is a strange thing to want. Ask instead for the smallest average rank and the answer is about the fourth-best candidate — whatever the size of the field, and whether it is ten or ten million.
Half of what an oracle takes
Compare an online rule not against the best it could have done but against a rule that has seen every value in advance. One fixed threshold secures half of what the oracle collects, whatever the distributions are — and there is an example on which half is all there is.
The symmetries a cover has of its own
A covering space can be shuffled without disturbing anything below it, and how many ways there are is decided by the subgroup it corresponds to. When there are as many symmetries as sheets the covering is called regular, and that is the same statement as the subgroup being normal.
A covering is a permutation
Describing a covering means saying where each loop sends each sheet, which is a permutation for every generator. So a covering of a wedge of circles is nothing but a homomorphism to a symmetric group, and the subgroup it corresponds to is a stabiliser.
Folding a graph until it decides
A subgroup of a free group usually arrives as a list of words, and almost nothing about it is readable from the list. Draw the words as loops, merge every pair of edges with the same label leaving one point, and what is left is a machine that decides membership by reading.
Before that
Everything published earlier, newest first. Titles only — the cards are on the full listing.
8 September 2026
21 essays on algebra, analysis, applied, computation, discrete, dynamics, geometry, logic, number, probability and topology
- The puzzle that is exactly half solvable — algebra
- When the label may be a matrix — algebra
- Three points, however many there are — analysis
- A wall between two bodies — analysis
- Four ways out, and what each costs — applied
- The best a code can be — computation
- Past half the distance — computation
- Sixteen polygons with one dot inside — discrete
- The dots a circle catches — discrete
- How short a cycle could be — dynamics
- Every pattern happens exactly once — dynamics
- The least area a width can hold — geometry
- The same question in space — geometry
- The game the algorithm was playing — logic
- A language that can name a set — logic
- Every class, and in equal shares — number
- The sieve that cannot finish — number
- The window where the giant is born — probability
- Sharp, or merely a threshold — probability
- One chart is never enough — topology
- The circles that fill a three-sphere — topology
5 September 2026
50 essays on geometry, discrete, topology, dynamics, computation, applied, probability, analysis, logic, number and algebra
- One dimension up, and the circles disappear — geometry
- Every site in the middle of its own cell — geometry
- When the sites are not the same size — geometry
- The tree inside the triangulation — geometry
- The shape described from outside — geometry
- Counting the paths that go wrong — discrete
- One word, and four objects — discrete
- The equation a sequence satisfies — discrete
- The solid whose corners are triangulations — discrete
- The theorem that has no version in space — discrete
- The group a space has at a point — topology
- Every cover is a subgroup — topology
- Cutting a space to find its group — topology
- Why the second group commutes — topology
- Angles survive and areas do not — topology
- The sphere that complex numbers live on — topology
- The flow that is really a map — dynamics
- A closer start buys only time — dynamics
- Stretch, fold, and what is left — dynamics
- Neither a surface nor a solid — dynamics
- Almost every number comes down — dynamics
- The heuristic that cannot be a proof — dynamics
- The test that ranks the generators — computation
- Four numbers and the rule is yours — computation
- Randomness that has to be earned — computation
- Nineteen thousand bits of state — computation
- One circle, and a straightedge — computation
- The compass that will not open — computation
- Seats to parties and places at once — applied
- The corners are whole assignments — applied
- A price for every person and task — applied
- One table, two lotteries — applied
- Where the corners stop being whole — applied
- No rule escapes the doctrinal paradox — applied
- Deciding the premises or the conclusion — applied
- How long until it forgets — probability
- The moment a giant appears — probability
- Two thresholds, not one — probability
- Finding a threshold with two moments — probability
- A staircase with no steps — analysis
- A line under every point — analysis
- The function seen from its tangents — analysis
- Where the guarantee stops — analysis
- How many worlds a formula can need — logic
- Nearly always, or nearly never — logic
- The distance a sentence can see — logic
- Infinitely many of one kind — number
- Which infinitudes are proved — number
- Two hundred and forty directions — algebra
- The only bit that survives — algebra
3 September 2026
20 essays on number, algebra, analysis, probability and logic
- The two supplements, and where the eight comes from — number
- The symbol is the sign of a shuffle — number
- One sum, squared two ways — number
- Which primes a form takes — number
- A rotation of four-space takes two of them — algebra
- The identity that multiplies sums of squares — algebra
- The integers among the quaternions — algebra
- What is lost at eight — algebra
- No interval in it, and length to spare — analysis
- Covering a set from outside — analysis
- Which functions can be added up — analysis
- A set that has no size at all — analysis
- The chain that stops — probability
- The chain that runs the same backwards — probability
- The time spent and the share held — probability
- Where the shares have nowhere to go — probability
- Two diagrams the language cannot tell apart — logic
- Worlds built out of sentences — logic
- The axiom with no property of the arrows — logic
- Necessity that means provable — logic
1 September 2026
20 essays on topology, computation, applied, geometry and discrete
- A curve that has area — topology
- Every loop is a circle in disguise — topology
- Two pieces, in every dimension — topology
- A ball whose outside is not one — topology
- Every necklace, in order — computation
- A memory of four bits — computation
- A page that knows where it is — computation
- A cycle for every pair — computation
- Five rules and one dial — applied
- The rule with no favourites — applied
- Two out of three, and never all three — applied
- Choosing what unfair means — applied
- Eight circles touching three — geometry
- Curvatures that stay whole — geometry
- The number four points agree on — geometry
- Every flat graph is a pile of circles — geometry
- Everybody's share of the chains — discrete
- The cube cut into chains — discrete
- The largest family that always meets — discrete
- How many ways to sort it — discrete
30 August 2026
20 essays on computation, logic, algebra, number and dynamics
- A field's worth of squares — computation
- The plane hiding in the squares — computation
- Nine thousand four hundred and eight — computation
- Sixteen of five hundred and seventy-six — computation
- One step in front of infinitely many — logic
- Every ordinal in base omega — logic
- Reached from below, or not at all — logic
- An ordinal as a growth rate — logic
- The only function that behaves like a volume — algebra
- One point in every big enough shape — algebra
- A determinant that counts trees — algebra
- The same sum without its minus signs — algebra
- Every partition, hidden in a product — number
- The terms that cancel almost everything — number
- The size of a number with no formula — number
- Every fifth one divides — number
- A table folded into a surface — dynamics
- A room that cannot be lit — dynamics
- The obstacle that makes a table chaotic — dynamics
- The triangle nobody can settle — dynamics
29 August 2026
20 essays on topology, number, logic, dynamics and applied
- The bottle that needs a fourth dimension — topology
- A disc sewn to a Möbius band — topology
- Two sheets over a one-sided surface — topology
- Orientation is a sign — topology
- Which roots refuse to be fractions — number
- A tail too small to be a whole number — number
- An integral that cannot be a whole number — number
- Approached too fast to be algebraic — number
- The arithmetic that loses subtraction — logic
- A line with as many points as a square — logic
- Countable, and everywhere — logic
- The size that cannot be pinned down — logic
- How fast the staircase arrives — dynamics
- The same map in different coordinates — dynamics
- The histogram an orbit leaves — dynamics
- The orbit a computer draws — dynamics
- None of the four conditions is spare — applied
- A share of the votes is not a share of the power — applied
- Too many orders to list — applied
- Sharing a cost that is not the sum of its parts — applied
28 August 2026
20 essays on algebra, analysis, geometry, probability and discrete
- The polynomial whose roots are the stretches — algebra
- The same map in a better basis — algebra
- Symmetry forces a right angle — algebra
- What a map does to a circle — algebra
- The area that names the number — analysis
- The equation with only one answer — analysis
- The exponential of a square — analysis
- The constant that counts what does not happen — analysis
- Thirteen more when one word is dropped — geometry
- The four that are allowed to cross themselves — geometry
- Six in four dimensions, and three forever after — geometry
- The five solids as three groups — geometry
- The error that does not care how many dimensions — probability
- Sampling where the answer lives — probability
- A walk that samples a distribution — probability
- Points too even to be random — probability
- Eighteen people, and the seventeen that escape — discrete
- The colouring nobody has ever seen — discrete
- Three in a row on the number line — discrete
- The sequence that cannot avoid a staircase — discrete
26 August 2026
15 essays on geometry, analysis, discrete, probability, dynamics, number, logic, computation, topology, algebra and applied
- The line with only two points on it — geometry
- The curve of the average, and the average of the curve — analysis
- A limit that forgets to be continuous — analysis
- The edge that forces a triangle — discrete
- The bottleneck is the whole story — discrete
- The widest layer and the longest chain — discrete
- The moment everything joins up — probability
- A dimension that is not a whole number — dynamics
- The orbit written as a word — dynamics
- One solution that makes all the others — number
- The choice nobody can write down — logic
- The mark that changes what is reachable — computation
- Linked, and no two of them are — topology
- The group that will not come apart — algebra
- The objection nobody can make louder — applied
25 August 2026
15 essays on topology, probability, algebra, applied, computation, logic and dynamics
- Zero can mean two different things — topology
- The subgroup that is freer than the group — topology
- When the whole histogram deviates — probability
- A shared root, found without finding it — algebra
- The crossings that will not come out even — algebra
- The lattice that runs the other way — algebra
- A multiplication that remembers the order — algebra
- The order everybody arrives in — applied
- A split nobody can walk away from — applied
- The court that contradicts itself — applied
- Equal area is enough, and equal volume is not — computation
- The straightedge buys nothing — computation
- The planes a recurrence cannot leave — computation
- The axiom is the shape of the graph — logic
- The staircase that is flat almost everywhere — dynamics
23 August 2026
15 essays on geometry, discrete, topology, dynamics, probability, logic, computation, applied and algebra
- The map that trades circles for lines — geometry
- One bottleneck and nothing else — discrete
- A polynomial that counts — discrete
- Two loops and one number — topology
- The same loop, unrolled — topology
- A bounce is a fold of the table — dynamics
- A twist that cannot avoid two points — dynamics
- The tail is not a bell — probability
- A game that decides what can be said — logic
- A proof with one rule — logic
- Every word once, around a cycle — computation
- A lottery over whole assignments — applied
- The polygon an equation forces — algebra
- The group drawn as a map — algebra
- A tower whose degrees multiply — algebra
22 August 2026
15 essays on number, geometry, probability, discrete, analysis and topology
- A tree that holds every triple — number
- Circles that are diamonds and squares — geometry
- The walk that becomes a curve — probability
- Three colours force a triangle — discrete
- A map that shrinks everything — analysis
- Where the fixed point escapes — topology
- Counting what has no formula — number
- Always one before the double — number
- The sieve written as a product — number
- The shape that averaging leaves alone — probability
- An average that never settles — probability
- How fast the bell arrives — probability
- A rectangle grown on two sides — analysis
- The flat map that fits closest — analysis
- The slope of the mirror image — analysis
21 August 2026
15 essays on geometry, topology, probability, analysis and discrete
- The rope that squares a corner — geometry
- Two right angles and the diagonal of a box — geometry
- The triangle that a globe gets wrong — geometry
- Two trees, and every edge in exactly one of them — topology
- Seven hundred and twenty degrees of gap — topology
- The solid where the answer is not two — topology
- The path folded at its first touch — probability
- Half the time is the rarest answer — probability
- Two barriers and a fair game — probability
- Where the coefficients come from — analysis
- When the period grows without bound — analysis
- The corners go first — analysis
- Five colours, and a chain that can be followed — discrete
- Counting the colourings — discrete
- Seven regions on a doughnut — discrete
20 August 2026
15 essays on topology, algebra, probability, discrete, analysis and geometry
- One line that halves them both — topology
- A loop that cannot be pulled tight — topology
- Colours that count more than three — topology
- The blocks a subgroup cuts out — algebra
- What a map throws away — algebra
- What the coefficients already know — algebra
- How far from the average a thing can be — probability
- The average settles and the wobble does not — probability
- When to stop looking — probability
- Two graphs that will not lie flat — discrete
- Sixteen trees on four points — discrete
- A curve with a corner at every point — analysis
- Almost none of it left, and still uncountably many — analysis
- Every ray comes back to the other focus — geometry
- Three trisectors and a triangle nobody expected — geometry
19 August 2026
15 essays on algebra, probability, topology, discrete, analysis and geometry
- Eight ways to leave a square alone — algebra
- Colourings nobody can tell apart — algebra
- The number that says how much room is left — algebra
- A loop that cannot miss the middle — algebra
- Nobody gets their own hat — probability
- How long until every one turns up — probability
- The rule that forgets where it came from — probability
- Which side of the line is inside — topology
- Every surface is a sphere with handles — topology
- A walk that changes one thing at a time — discrete
- Area by counting dots — discrete
- The sum that fits in one square — analysis
- The staircase that is not the diagonal — analysis
- The most area a fence can hold — geometry
- Nine points on one circle — geometry
17 August 2026
15 essays on applied
- The majority that goes in a circle — applied
- Five rules and five winners — applied
- Four conditions, and no rule that has all of them — applied
- A lie that pays — applied
- The seat that vanishes when the house grows — applied
- One cuts and the other chooses — applied
- Three people and a trimmed piece — applied
- Envy-free, up to one item — applied
- Nobody has a reason to run away — applied
- The side that proposes wins — applied
- No stable rule is safe from a lie — applied
- Two numbers that have to meet — applied
- What a constraint is worth — applied
- The value from both sides — applied
- The road that makes everyone later — applied
15 August 2026
15 essays on computation
- What two points can build — computation
- Every step is a square root — computation
- The cube that will not double — computation
- The angle that will not divide by three — computation
- Which polygons can be drawn — computation
- The circle that will not square — computation
- Distance is a picture — computation
- Sixteen spheres that fill a cube — computation
- Finding the error without reading the message — computation
- A polynomial through the gaps — computation
- The field with four elements — computation
- Every element is a power of one of them — computation
- Seven points, seven lines — computation
- A schedule where every pair meets once — computation
- The thirty-six officers — computation
14 August 2026
15 essays on logic
- A formula is a corner of a cube — logic
- One connective is enough — logic
- The map that puts neighbours side by side — logic
- Four circles cannot do it — logic
- Twenty-four out of two hundred and fifty-six — logic
- Every row, or one column — logic
- The tree that closes — logic
- Two worlds that both obey the rules — logic
- An infinite tree has an infinite path — logic
- The row that is not on the list — logic
- A list that cannot contain itself — logic
- The sentence that says it has no proof — logic
- Two injections make a bijection — logic
- A sequence that explodes and still stops — logic
- The middle that is not excluded — logic
12 August 2026
15 essays on dynamics
- The staircase that shows the whole orbit — dynamics
- A point that pulls, and a point that pushes — dynamics
- The road paved with doublings — dynamics
- A constant that does not care which map — dynamics
- A difference too small to draw — dynamics
- How fast two orbits part — dynamics
- The shape in every picture of itself — dynamics
- One c, one picture — dynamics
- Where Newton's method goes instead — dynamics
- Eight rules and a triangle — dynamics
- The rule that computes — dynamics
- Three gaps and no more — dynamics
- The orbit that must come back — dynamics
- Two lobes and no cycle — dynamics
- The question nobody can answer — dynamics
11 August 2026
15 essays on number
- The primes are what is left over — number
- There is no last prime — number
- A fraction that never closes — number
- Every fraction, exactly once — number
- How close a fraction can get — number
- One way to factor, and no other — number
- The shape of a number's divisors — number
- Numbers that are their own parts — number
- Two squares, and a lattice — number
- Every triple, on one circle — number
- Necklaces that prove a theorem — number
- Two dials at once — number
- Counting one rectangle, twice — number
- The square that cannot shrink — number
- A diagram turned on its side — number
10 August 2026
12 essays on geometry, analysis, algebra, discrete, topology and probability
- An angle that does not care where it stands — geometry
- The plane, divided by whoever is nearest — geometry
- Euclid proves it without moving anything — geometry
- The same terms, in a different order, adding to whatever is asked — analysis
- Area is the undoing of slope — analysis
- Completing the square, by completing a square — algebra
- Numbers that wrap — discrete
- Six people at a party — discrete
- Three moves, and what they cannot undo — topology
- Nothing on a sphere can be combed flat — topology
- A walk that always comes home, until it does not — probability
- The door that was not opened — probability
6 August 2026
15 essays on geometry, analysis, algebra, discrete, topology and probability
- The rectangle that eats itself — geometry
- A circle unrolled into a triangle — geometry
- Round is not the only way to be the same width — geometry
- A sum whose terms vanish and whose total does not — analysis
- One point's worth of information — analysis
- The slope of a single point — analysis
- The dot product is a shadow — algebra
- The directions a map leaves alone — algebra
- More things than boxes — discrete
- Four colours, and a proof nobody can read — discrete
- One sequence, counting everything — discrete
- Every corner pays for itself — topology
- Something always stays put — topology
- Twenty-three people — probability
- Bayes' theorem is a picture of a square — probability
2 August 2026
18 essays on geometry, analysis, algebra, discrete, topology and probability
- Two squares, four triangles, and no algebra — geometry
- Every square is a stack of odd numbers — geometry
- The oldest algorithm, drawn as a tiling — geometry
- Why the list of perfect solids stops at five — geometry
- One cone, four curves — geometry
- A sine wave is a circle seen from the side — analysis
- Adding up rectangles until they stop being rectangles — analysis
- A square wave built entirely out of round ones — analysis
- The curve that is its own slope — analysis
- A matrix is a picture of what happens to the grid — algebra
- Multiplying is turning — algebra
- Seven bridges, and the invention of throwing things away — discrete
- Pascal's triangle, in two colours — discrete
- The primes on a spiral, and a pattern nobody ordered — discrete
- The surface with one side, and what happens when it is cut — topology
- A sphere is a plane plus one point — topology
- A bell curve assembled out of coin flips — probability
- Getting pi by dropping needles on the floor — probability