Math—the application of reasonable logic to reasonable assumptions—usually produces reasonable results. But sometimes math generates astonishing paradoxes—conclusions that seem completely unreasonable or just plain impossible but that are nevertheless demonstrably true. Did you know that a losing sports team can become a winning one by adding worse players than its opponents? Or that the thirteenth of the month is more likely to be a Friday than any other day? Or that cones can roll unaided uphill? In Nonplussed!—a delightfully eclectic collection of paradoxes from many different areas of math—popular-math writer Julian Havil reveals the math that shows the truth of these and many other unbelievable ideas. Nonplussed! pays special attention to problems from probability and statistics, areas where intuition can easily be wrong. These problems include the vagaries of tennis scoring, what can be deduced from tossing a needle, and disadvantageous games that form winning combinations. Other chapters address everything from the historically important Torricelli's Trumpet to the mind-warping implications of objects that live on high dimensions. Readers learn about the colorful history and people associated with many of these problems in addition to their mathematical proofs. Nonplussed! will appeal to anyone with a calculus background who enjoys popular math books or puzzles.

A comprehensive disctionary of common misusages illustrates the right way and the wrong way to use language and explores why dictionaries do not always provide the correct meaning or usage of a word.

The longawaited revision to 1999's News of the Stoopid [NotS]: 100% free of pipebombs...though there's plenty of new stuff for fragile people to whimper about. Now in Trade Paperback.

Spiff up your vocabulary with these powerful words from the lexicographers at the Wordnik community! This Pocket Posh Word Power collection promises a gargantuan vocabulary boost, curating 120 words that can enrich your written and spoken communications. Each entry provides pronunciation, part of speech, definition, usage in a sentence, and etymology information. From propinquity to alacrity to farrago and beyond, you’ll find words worth learning that can liven up anyone’s lexicon!

If your skill with words isn't up to scratch, you may find yourself sidelined or ignored at work and elsewhere. You create an impression with what you write, and a weak or incorrect vocabulary is a serious liability. Awesome Vocabulary offers a painless way to build an exceptional vocabulary. Readers will discover comprehensive, useful lists of words and exercises focused on improving word choices. They'll also learn: Tricks to reveal the meaning of new words Memory devices to help distinguish between similar words The difference between using words to impress and using words that make their meanings clear Examples of writing—correct and incorrect, attractive and unlovely, persuasive and off-putting—that clearly show the right stuff and how to amend the wrong stuff The secret to "balanced prose": the Rule of Three Avoiding repetition and redundancy The proper vocabulary for the proper occasion: business letters, e-mails, and casual conversation