Uploaded August 2021 | Updated September 2026, 18 hours ago
I am a Mathematical Analyst or an Applied Mathematician, depending on who you ask. What I am not is a combinatorist. (Is that what they call themselves?) I have always admired people that could perform that kind of thinking. People like Paul Erdos, Richard Stanley, or my own instructors Andrew Vince or Miklós Bóna. The ability to work with discrete structures and seemingly impossibly difficult problems, and to pull out a pattern of some kind has always impressed me.
Understanding combinatorics is on my mathematical (post-tenure) bucket list.
Probably my favorite example of finding patterns is in Ramsey theory, and as a tribute, I made this video.
The idea that you can't avoid patterns, no matter what you do, is so very cool. This video talks about patterns in colorings for a complete graph on a finite number of vertices, but there are also variants of the Ramsey theorem for colorings of the plane (with a continuum of points). The latter uses Thales' theorem.
I'd also sacrifice an ox to learn more combinatorics.
(That last line was about Thales. Just in case you were concerned...)
#VeritasiumContest
Email: rosenfeldj@usf.edu
Music:
TacoVille by Toby Tranner
I am a Mathematical Analyst or an Applied Mathematician, depending on who you ask. What I am not is a combinatorist. (Is that what they call themselves?) I have always admired people that could perform that kind of thinking. People like Paul Erdos, Richard Stanley, or my own instructors Andrew Vince or Miklós Bóna. The ability to work with discrete structures and seemingly impossibly difficult problems, and to pull out a pattern of some kind has always impressed me.
Understanding combinatorics is on my mathematical (post-tenure) bucket list.
Probably my favorite example of finding patterns is in Ramsey theory, and as a tribute, I made this video.
The idea that you can't avoid patterns, no matter what you do, is so very cool. This video talks about patterns in colorings for a complete graph on a finite number of vertices, but there are also variants of the Ramsey theorem for colorings of the plane (with a continuum of points). The latter uses Thales' theorem.
I'd also sacrifice an ox to learn more combinatorics.
(That last line was about Thales. Just in case you were concerned...)
#VeritasiumContest
Email: rosenfeldj@usf.edu
Music:
TacoVille by Toby Tranner
