Mathematics for Human Flourishing

The book includes correspondence (letters) between the author and Christopher Jackson, a prisoner who has been learning mathematics on his own while serving time (even now). The author, a Harvey Mudd College professor, shares his own mathematical journey, from growing up in rural Texas to almost quitting while in graduate school at Harvard. The essential theme of the book is the link between mathematics and what it means to be a human.The message of the book is this: the “proper practice of mathematics cultivates virtues that help people flourish” (p. 10). Su disputes the misconception that mathematics is just a tool; rather, he powerfully demonstrates that it is for human flourishing, just like music and art are, nurturing virtues. He writes, “The skills society needs from math may change, but the virtues needed from math will not” (p. 11). He heavily criticizes both the outdated math curricula and pedagogy.He describes “math explorers,” which could, in his opinion, be all humans. He stresses creativity, imagination, abstraction (p. 43), fun, joy, beauty, struggle, and reflection. These virtues then become the outline of the entire book. Chapters have titles like “permanence,” “truth,” “justice,” and “freedom.”He also has a plenty of personal stories, including how he discovered he was adopted, his recent marriage, growing up as a Chinese American in Texas, being the first person of color to lead the MAA (the title “Finally, An Asian Guy Who’s Good at Math” is hilarious, p. 154).A photo of Francis Su and Christopher Jackson, taken in prison (p. 221), is also inspirational.Throughout the book, there are very interesting math questions and puzzles that encourage critical thinking. My favorites include ants on a log, 100 lightbulbs, and 5 points on the sphere.

Francis Su presents a wonderful case for the fullness of mathematics as a humanizing endeavor. Su lifts our gaze from math's projection into the classroom and helps us see it more fully along the dimensions of Great Ideas (and others) like: truth, beauty, goodness, freedom, and justice. In an age when mathematics has been reduced to just another piece of a curriculum delivering knowledge and skills, Su reminds us that mathematics is so much more.

I read this book on the recommendation of an acquaintance and it was kind of a different book than I have read before. This quote from page 10 summarizes the book’s main theme, “Mathematics helps people flourish. Mathematics is for human flourishing.” What is human flourishing, you may ask. Here’s a quote from the chapter titled “Truth” on page 103, “Truth is a mark of human flourishing. A flourishing society values truth, while oppressive societies suppress it.” The author continues on page 188, “None of us can flourish without a supportive community.”Each chapter in the book explores important concepts and how he sees math contributing to these areas and thus, benefiting humanity. He extends his hope to expand human flourishing through improvements in teaching math as well. From pages 207-208, “Too often, those of us who teach math professionally say, “My job is to teach math,” as if teaching math were only about teaching facts and procedures. We forget that “my job is to teach people” whose experiences often intersect with mathematics in completely different ways than our own experiences do. And that means education has to take into account the whole person…”In addition to each topical chapter, there is an ongoing conversation between the author and an inmate, Chris, who has been studying math from prison. Over time they develop a friendship and excerpts from their correspondence are included in each chapter to illustrate how mathematics is helping Christ to flourish despite his situation. There is also a math puzzle or two in each chapter to challenge the reader to be a math explorer.I would recommend this book to those who wonder why schools should teach more advanced math courses and encourage everyone to look for the math behind technology, medicine, communication, and everything which leads to human flourishing.

The book goes above Math concepts and its applications. This is simply an encouraging piece of art, connecting dots of our natural way of functioning and how re-connecting with these roots is essential. The author establishes a mathematical approach to almost every experience from an individual connecting these with society as a whole. This is the absolute best content I have read in years due to it’s simplicity, ingenuity, value, and methodology; resulting encouraging and definitely bringing up human lifting results. Dr. Sue approaches Life in its very basic values, with full tools equipment possibilities for equally everyone. Professors like these are very much needed in this era. This piece of work is remarkably valuable and cam be applied virtually in every aspect of our lives. Pr. Sue objectives are fully majestically well achieved by un-complicating the now complicated human attitudes that run in auto-pilot as a result of social disconnection and cultural bias. Each government and country should establish this book which is a piece of genuine Art, as an essential read in last year high school and early college days. It brings so much value to the reader that no one will approach life the same after going through it. This is a Soul touching effort from a humble amazing human being that had the courage to openly recognize how he has committed mistakes and the processes he went through to overcome these and turn into a flourished human using the unlimited tools and resources of mathematics.