Advertisements for the wildly popular game of Sudoku often feature the reassuring words, "no mathematical knowledge required." In fact, the only skill Sudoku does require is the use of mathematical logic. For many people, anxiety about math is so entrenched, and grade school memories so haunting, that these disclaimers - though misleading - are necessary to avoid intimidating potential buyers.
In A Brief History of Mathematical Thought, Luke Heaton provides a compulsively readable history that situates mathematics within the human experience and, in the process, makes it more...