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The first numbers that come to mind when thinking about Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland might be how much money the movie is raking in at the box office. But mathematicians say the books are full of algebraic lessons — such as why a raven is like a writing desk.
The first numbers that come to mind when thinking about Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland might be how much money the movie is raking in at the box office. But numbers also appear to be woven in among the talking rabbits and smoking caterpillars of the original stories. Author Lewis Carroll was also a math teacher in Oxford, England, and mathematicians say the Alice books are full of algebraic lessons — such as why a raven is like a writing desk. That’s the riddle the Mad Hatter asks Alice. And, as Weekend Edition Math Guy Keith Devlin tells NPR’s Jacki Lyden, “That particul...