String theory is a theory of everything in which everything's made of strings — but why strings? What do they do? Find out in our equation-free introduction for beginners.
Life is full of coincidences, but how do you work out if something is really as unlikely as it seems? In this article Rob Eastaway and John Haigh find chance in church and work out the odds.
NHS budgets, third world debt, predictions of global warming, inflation, Iraqi war dead, the decline of fish stocks or hedgehogs, the threat of cancer — there's hardly a subject people care about that comes without measurements, forecasts, rankings, statistics, targets, numbers of every variety. Do they illuminate or mislead? Introducing their new book, Michael Blastland and Andrew Dilnot take a look at numbers in the media and show that a little maths goes a long way in unravelling dodgy media claims.
