Polytechnic University of the Philippines

Sta. Mesa, Manila

Assignment No. 1
Title: The Math Mystery: Mathematics in Nature and Universe

Name: Imee Casenas

Year & Section: BSTM 1-1D
Course: Tourism Management
Submitted to: Engr. Oscar L. Palayapay
 This documentary guide leads students through this thought provoking documentary
about how mathematics is all around us. It poses the unique question of whether the universe
behaves according to mathematics? Or if the relationship between the universe and mathematics
is a creation of the human mind to explain what is around us? As we learn more about
mathematics are we actually learning more about nature of the universe or the nature of the
human mind?

Mathematics is everywhere in this universe. We seldom note it. We enjoy nature and are
not interested in going deep about what mathematical idea is in it. We live in an age of
astonishing advances: engineers can land a car-sized rover on Mars, physicists probe the essence
of all matter, while we communicate wirelessly on a vast worldwide network. But underlying all
of these modern wonders is something deep and mysteriously powerful. But where does math
come from? And why, in science, does it work so well?

Human beings have always looked at nature and searched for patterns. Ages ago we gazed
at the stars and discovered patterns we call constellations, even coming to believe they might
control our destiny. We’ve watched the days turn to night and back to day, and seasons, as they
come and go, and called that pattern “time”. We see symmetrical patterns in the human body and
the tiger’s stripes, and build those patterns into what we create, from art to our cities.

But what do patterns tell us? Why should the spiral shape of the nautilus shell be so
similar to the spiral of a galaxy or the spiral found in a sliced open head of cabbage?

When scientists seek to understand the patterns of our world, they often turn to a powerful
tool: mathematics. And it works, revealing the secrets behind the elliptical orbits of the planets to
the electromagnetic waves that connect our cell phones. Mathematics has even guided the way,
leading us right down to the sub-atomic building blocks of matter, which raises the question,
“Why does it work at all? Is there an inherent mathematical nature to reality? Or is mathematics
all in our heads?”

If you look at nature, there are numbers all around us. These numbers occur very often.
These may sound like random numbers, but they’re all part of what is known as the “Fibonacci
sequence”, a series of numbers developed by a 13th century mathematician. You start with the
numbers one and one, and from that point on you keep adding up the last two numbers. So one
plus one is two, now one plus two is three, two plus three is five, three plus five is eight, and you
keep going like this.

Today, hundreds of years later, this seemingly arbitrary progression of numbers fascinates
many who see in it clues to everything from human beauty to the stock market. While most of
those claims remain unproven, it is curious how evolution seems to favour these numbers. It’s
been called the language of the universe, and perhaps it’s civilization’s greatest achievement. Its
name? Mathematics.