Who'd have thought that a family based cartoon series would have so many maths links, but it turns out the Simpsons does. A significant number of the script writers on the Simpsons have some form of maths or science background, and arrived at the studios having either dropped out or after post doc studies. In this book Singh introduces us to them, and some of their backgrounds, as well as outlining many of the ways that they have sneaked maths puzzles and jokes into the scripts and illustrations. It is not an in-depth maths book, which is what you would expect, as it is being pitched at Simpsons fans. Overall it was Ok I suppose. I do have one tiny confession though, I have never watched an episode of the Simpsons, so a fair amount of it washed straight over me. Worth 2.5 stars as Singh does write well, and the concepts are clear and well illustrated..

Can a math book be charming? This one was. I came for the Simpsons, but stayed for the math--he's an excellent writer (I'll be seeking out other volumes by him) who's able to explain the mathematical concepts clearly and interestingly. Really a pleasure to read. (Note: 5 stars = rare and amazing, 4 = quite good book, 3 = a decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. There are a lot of 4s and 3s in the world!)

A decent book of math concepts written by a Simpsons apologist - at times, it seems like Singh is saying you should like The Simpsons because...Uh...math!! Interesting. Disclosure: despite that show being in its 28th season, and boasting 615 episodes as of this review, I think if I cobble together every second of every bit of The Simpsons that I have watched since it debuted as a stand-alone show after its run on The Tracy Ullman Show, it would total less than one episode. The visuals of Matt Groenig's animation invoke in me as much a visceral response as seeing the "word" ... "y'all"...in print (keying that in prompted both a mental and physical cringe). Yes. That bad. One of the writers, David S. Cohen, says, “It’s very easy working in television to not feel good about what you do on the grounds that you’re causing the collapse of society. So, when we get the opportunity to raise the level of discussion—particularly to glorify mathematics—it cancels out those days when I’ve been writing those bodily function jokes” In this he clearly does not understand the nature of the mathematics he by pedigree should grasp much better than he did...that is not an equation, rather an inequality, for no amount of math, blatantly obvious or surreptitious, inserted into the plethora of episodes can forgive even one of the bodily function jokes. Singh recounts the math resumes of so many of the writers of that and the spawn show Futurama. Work is work and I guess there aren't that many jobs in math that can pay like a sitcom writer. So, is it a perversity that so many of the jokes are so subtle that someone has to be an über geek armed with a wikiSimpsons crowd-sourced microanalysis, or the über-über geeky patience of single stepping frame by frame in order to hopefully catch a freeze-frame grab? Little in this book is new, but two offerings stand out, one for two reasons: 3,98712 4,36512 = 4,47212 seemingly disproves Fermat's Last Theorem, and as such is admittedly devilishly clever. But in describing it and the episode sneaking it in, Singh commits a conceptual error that screams at my senses: he says the equation of the character Homer is a “so-called near-miss solution”. No. It is a near-hit solution. Jeez. Does that make me even more of a geek than the fans? The second new-to-me are the episode titles recounted, which vary between clever and as if the result of consultation with those responsible for the ...imaginative...names of Pokemon... I wonder if Thomas Jefferson could cut out the Simpsons refs along the lines of his The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth? Would that make this more interesting to me? Not likely, because there is a morbid train-wreck fascination with Singh's episode cross-referencing. I suspect that math geeks might like this book on its own merits. I have no idea how non-math geek fans of the show would feel about learning of the math geekery encroaching on their baffling like of donuts and "doh!"...but it matters not. Three stars for the math.

One of my favorite jokes of The Simpsons happens to be a Math joke. This is odd because I absolutely detest Mathematics. I believe it was but on this Earth just to mock me but I digress. The joke, which is discussed in this book, is when Lisa discovers that nerds actually release a pheromone via their sweat glands that negatively attract bullies. This is a breakthrough and Lisa writes a paper about her findings. She is then invited to a big Science conference to present it. Everyone in the conference is speaking amongst themselves and Dr. Frink is trying to get everyone to quiet down. At the end of his stuttering, Frink yells out: Pi is exactly three! The audience is stunned and I, the self-proclaimed Math Hater, laughed hysterically. It was a cute joke an universally appealing. Anybody who has been subjected to any type of Math class knows the Pi is an irrational number: 3.14159...To me, to say that Pi is exactly three was a bit blasphemous in the Math world. This was one of the more overt jokes about Mathematics in The Simpsons but Simon Singh details all the hidden little jokes, the freeze frame gags, that have appeared over The Simpsons 24 year, and counting, span. The reason: many of the writers have bachelors, Masters, and PhDs in Mathematics, Physics, Computer Science, and other like degrees. They have written research papers for respected journals, they have low Erdos numbers, and they have even started a Math club where they discussed everything math related and present papers. The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets was an awesome read. I feel it was a spiritual successor to Stephen Hawking's And God Created the Intergers. Hawking spoke about the most famous Mathematicians and how their contributions helped the field of Mathematics grow and prosper. Singh, conversely, speaks about the lesser known Mathematicians and formulas. Lesser known to those outside of the Math circle. Like the significance of the number 1729 that appears many times in Futurama, explainations of binary code and cryptography, and narcisstic numbers which I had no idea existed. Singh does a sort of good job explaining the math definitions and various formulas for the laymen to understand. Personally, I felt he got to boggled down in all of the technical jargon but when he explained the history of a certain part of Mathematics in his little anecdotes, he did that beautifully.

the mathematics is not very detailed, but the book is very entertaining (if you are a Simpsons fan). Amazing how much mathematics slipped by without being noticed. Really made me want to watch Futurama.

Needs more maths. I know that Simon Singh says in the intro that it's not a maths book, but it keeps doing this very odd thing, where you get the basics of the topic, and some upper A level bits of the same topic but not the middle bit. Which is a problem. I know the basics, and I'm fine down there, but I need a little help to move upwards. I know why he starts with "this is not a maths book," it's so that people will read a maths book, but it's a bit oddly defensive. Singh is an engaging writer, and I plan on getting his cryptography book when I can, but, enjoyable as it was (and it was very enjoyable), this book left me wanting more. Not a Simpsons person, so I can't comment on the amount of Simpsonia. Although, really, the title should have been the maths of the Simpsons and Futurama.