A PDF on a phone screen ruins the spatial memory of where the "Gems" are located. If you can, buy the used paperback. But if you cannot find it, a high-quality OCR (Optical Character Recognition) PDF is better than nothing.
: The first half of the book features biographies ("Brief Lives") of mathematicians from ancient times to the late 19th century. Reviewers note that this gives a "human face" to the subject, showing mathematics as a human struggle rather than just abstract theory. calculus gems simmons pdf better
: A biographical history featuring mathematicians from Thales to Weierstrass. Simmons uses these stories to show that math is a social and philosophical endeavor, not just a list of data. Part B: Memorable Mathematics A PDF on a phone screen ruins the
: The second half consists of independent "gems"—mathematical essays on topics such as number theory, geometry, and physics (e.g., a simple approach to : The first half of the book features
It humanizes the math. You aren't just learning a theorem; you are learning about the rivalries, the obsessions, and the breakthroughs of the people who discovered them. PDF Advantage:
It is often recommended as a supplement to standard calculus courses (Stewart, Thomas, etc.) because it explains why calculus was invented and how the great masters thought.