In our mind’s eye, the universe seems to go on forever. But using geometry we can explore a variety of three-dimensional shapes that offer alternatives to “ordinary” infinite space. When you gaze out ...

In 1847, an eccentric British mathematician named Oliver Byrne released a new edition of Euclid’s famous mathematical treatise, The Elements of Geometry. Byrne added a rather longwinded but ultimately ...

IN a recent number of NATURE (June 30) there appeared a review of a book by G. Mannoury on the philosophy of mathematics, and the reviewer emphasised a statement of the author to the effect that the ...

Euclidean geometry is a mathematical well-known system attributed to the Greek mathematician Euclid of Alexandria. Euclid's text Elements was the first systematic discussion of geometry. It has been ...

Virtual reality can take you to some far-out places — mountaintops, distant cities and even fantastical game worlds. A team of artists and mathematicians is now adding to that list: universes where ...

Everyone learns the number one rule about triangles in high school: the angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees. But did you know that sometimes they don't? Triangles are much more interesting than ...

Geometry may be one of the oldest branches of mathematics, but it’s much more than a theoretical subject. It’s part of our everyday lives, says Professor Jennifer Taback, and key to understanding many ...

Margaret Wertheim gave a talk for the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute at their 2016 annual Summer School. We have built a world of largely straight lines – the houses we live in, the ...

THE philosopher Kant declared that Euclidean geometry was inherent in the human mind and expressed the truth about space. We now recognize that non-Euclidean geometry is equally valid as an abstract ...