 |
 |
 |
 |
have felt very connected, and would have (literally) been on a level playing field. Hardy’s great passion, apart from mathematics, was cricket. Cricket is in my blood too, thanks to my late Australian father, Jack Eastaway. As a young man, my father played briefly with two cricketers that Hardy would have known all about, and maybe even watched in the flesh: Bill O’Reilly and Arthur Morris, both of whom played Test cricket for Australia.
It’s not uncommon for mathematicians to have a love of cricket, thanks in part to the fact that cricket is such a numerical game. Scorecards filled with numbers invariably throw up the odd pattern and coincidences, such as the time when the great batsman, Brian Lara - sponsored by a jeans company – compiled a score of 501. Alas, his sponsor was not Levis. On another occasion, a dismissal in a Test match read: Lillee caught Willey bowled Dilley. Mathematicians seek out patterns, and take a delight when they crop up - even when those patterns have no deeper meaning.
Cricket is also remarkably tolerant of people with very different abilities. A cricket team can include a professional in its ranks and still have a role for old Bert, the eleventh man, who lobs up the occasional donkey drop that can lure the big-hitting opponent into a mishit. In cricket, it is often true that the best players and the rank amateurs feel a connection, partly because there are some nuances of the  game that can be appreciated regardless ... |
|
 |
 |
Maths Is To Cricket As Socks Is To Googly
In 2007 I was honoured to become President of the Mathematical Association, a one year role. The MA is an illustrious body. It has been supporting the teaching of maths for over 100 years, and connections can be made from members still active today to some great minds of the late Victorian era.
I’m not the first MA President to have looked at the list of past Presidents and been somewhat overawed by the company. Among the many eminent names in that list, there is one that particularly stands out for me: G.H.Hardy.
Hardy was one of the outstanding mathematicians of the 20th century, famous for his collaboration with the brilliant self-taught Indian, Ramanujan, and also for his book A Mathematician’s Apology, in which he was the first to describe in an accessible way what a pure mathematician actually does. He is said to have deliberately sought out maths that had no practical applications.
At this point I feel like I need to make An Apology to a Mathematician, for not only is the gulf in mathematical ability between myself and G.H.Hardy a vast one, but I deliberately shunned maths as a degree so that I could go into the applied world of engineering. Hardy must be turning in his grave.
And yet...there is one area in which G.H. Hardy and I would |
|
 |
|