Everyday objects, carefully turned toward maths.
Mathematical Objects uses a chosen object as the route into mathematics, from a taxi cab to a slice of pizza. The conversations keep technical ideas close to tangible examples, so distance metrics, curvature, Venn diagrams, stickers, signs, and cubics stay grounded in things people can picture.
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Mathematical Objects is built around a simple constraint: each conversation begins with an object. That object might be a taxi cab, a slice of pizza, a low bridge sign, a certified mathematical object sticker, an aperiodic monotile, or a nodal cubic. From there, the show follows the mathematics that the object makes visible. It is not only about solving problems. It is about noticing where definitions, shapes, labels, measures, and categories become interesting. A taxi cab becomes a way to think about distance. A circle can stop being round once the metric changes. A pizza slice becomes a route into curvature, including the contrast between sphere-like bending and saddle-like bending. A Venn diagram becomes a familiar doorway into sets, classification, hierarchy, and examples from everyday life. The sticker episode turns on a different kind of question: what happens when something is officially labelled mathematical, and whether that label clarifies or flattens the idea. The low bridge sign material points toward measurement, unit conversion, and the oddities that can appear in public information. The more formal episodes keep the same object-first habit. An aperiodic monotile lets the conversation attend to tilings and the distinction between non-periodic and aperiodic. A nodal cubic is described through its equation, its alpha-like shape, and the point where the curve meets itself. The show is conversational and precise. It allows digressions, but the digressions usually stay near the object in hand. Named guests appear when an object benefits from a more specific angle, including Chris Ngo, Keisha Thompson, Adam, Chaim Goodman-Strauss, and Angela Tabiri. The copy of mathematics here is not grand or remote. It is tactile, visual, and often domestic: flats with mirrored layouts, a parcel forgotten on the way to the post office, a slice that droops under toppings. That ordinary scale is part of the appeal. Mathematical Objects suits a listener who wants the route into an idea before the formal destination, and who enjoys finding exact language for things that first seemed merely familiar.
Made for: Suits a listener who enjoys approachable mathematical conversation rooted in visible objects, examples, and definitions. It is especially well fitted to someone who likes geometry, classification, tiling, equations, and outreach without needing the show to flatten the ideas.
What sets it apart: The show’s object-first structure gives each episode a concrete handle before the mathematics becomes abstract. Similar maths shows may start from concepts; Mathematical Objects often starts from something on a table, road, plate, diagram, or graph.
Katie Steckles and Peter Rowlett chat about some aspect of mathematics using a mathematical object as inspiration.
A drooping pizza slice has a geometry problem, and suddenly you're discussing curvature over dinner.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A mathematical idea comes alive through a lost address, mirror-image flats, and one very familiar failure to post a letter.
A mathematical idea slips in through an absent-minded-professor setup: a man writes over the paper with his new address, goes back to the empty old place, and is forced to notice that he has moved.
Shiny gold stickers open into a thoughtful question about what counts as mathematics.
A set of shiny gold stickers gives this single-episode review an appealingly concrete doorway into a bigger question: what, exactly, gets to count as mathematics?
A taxi cab turns the familiar circle into a diamond and makes distance feel newly negotiable.
Katie Steckles and Peter Ola use the taxi cab as a neat way into taxicab geometry, where distance is measured by the routes a cab can actually take rather than by a straight line.
A familiar diagram opens onto sets, categories, workshops, and the pleasure of sorting the world.
A familiar pair of overlapping circles opens into the idea of a set, as Katie Steckles and Keisha consider why Venn diagrams have such staying power.
A floppy pizza slice leads into curvature, with a Pringle making negative curvature easy to picture.
A slice of pizza makes a neat way into the geometry of bending surfaces. Katie Steckles and Peter Olet begin with the ordinary problem of a topped slice drooping when held by the crust, with the thin end giving way and the topping sliding.
Odd math, made approachable.
Monthly maths puzzles for practical teachers.
Favorite theorems, no quiz attached.
Spinach, schoolteachers and Fields Medals: mathematics as life story
Two hosts, three problems, and the working shown.
Mathematical Objects: A Norbert Wiener Story centers on Norbert Wiener, the MIT mathematician whose absent-minded-professor folklore drives the conversation.
Chris Ngo brings Peter Ollett and Katie Steckles a gold-foil "certified mathematical object" sticker funded by Public Math and traces it to a rejected MoMath proposal called "10 Mathematical Objects." The episode uses Marcel Duchamp's 1913 "Bicycle Wheel" and the line about an object being elevated by "the mere choice of an artist" to compare art designation with math designation.
["Mathematical Objects opens with Katie Steckles and Peter Ola explaining taxicab geometry as horizontal-plus-vertical movement instead of straight-line distance.", "They compare Euclidean distance with Manhattan distance and Chebyshev distance, then show that a taxicab circle becomes a diamond shape.", "The discussion turns to G.H.
Katie Steckles and Peter Olett center this Mathematical Objects episode on the Venn diagram, with guest Keisha Thompson explaining how she uses it in poetry and performance.
Katie and Peter discuss the mathematical principle behind bending a pizza slice's crust to prevent it from drooping.
Adam Townsend discusses a low bridge sign as a mathematical object, highlighting its retroreflective properties and the curiosity of two nearby bridges with different imperial measurements for the same metric height.
Katie Steckles and Peter Ola discuss the newly discovered aperiodic monotile with guest Chaim Goodman-Strauss, exploring its significance and the nuances of aperiodicity in tilings.
Angela Tabiri explains the nodal cubic, a mathematical curve shaped like the Greek letter alpha, and discusses its properties and significance.
Katie Steckles and Peter Ollett discuss the balancing bird, a physics toy that appears to levitate due to its center of mass, with guest Alom Shaha from his book 'Marvellous Machines'.
Katie Steckles and Peter Ollett discuss the hundred square with guest Susan Okereke, exploring its use in primary school maths to teach place value and number relationships.