mathematics

Muriel Seltman

Muriel Seltman is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Muriel Seltman rather than just read about it. In short: Muriel Seltman (née Barnett; 27 March 1927 – 2 December 2019) was a British left-wing activist, mathematics educator, historian of mathematics, and author of books on mathematics, religion, politics, and philosophy. Life Seltman was born in Stamford Hill, a Jewish neighborhood of London, on 27 March 1927.

Key takeaways

Muriel Seltman belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Muriel Seltman to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Muriel Seltman from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Muriel Seltman (née Barnett; 27 March 1927 – 2 December 2019) was a British left-wing activist, mathematics educator, historian of mathematics, and author of books on mathematics, religion, politics, and philosophy.

Life Seltman was born in Stamford Hill, a Jewish neighborhood of London, on 27 March 1927. She studied mathematics and mathematics education at Trinity College Dublin, and met her husband there. They joined the Communist Party of Great Britain in 1952, but by the early 1960s had been expelled from the party for their anti-revisionism (sympathy for Maoism and opposition to the Khrushchev Thaw). They traveled with their son to North Korea, where Seltman worked as a teacher, but, bored with the North Korean cult of personality and their life there, left for China in 1965, just in time for the Cultural Revolution. Disillusioned, they returned to England in 1966, and Seltman later wrote a book What's Left? What's Right? describing her experiences. She taught mathematics at Avery Hill College beginning in 1968, retiring in 1981 but continuing on a part-time basis for another 20 years, through the college's 1985 incorporation into the University of Greenwich. Her works in mathematics and the history of mathematics include a translation of a book on algebra by Thomas Harriot, originally published in 1631, a few years after Harriot's death. Co-editor Robert Goulding provided the translation, while Seltman was responsible for the book's detailed commentary on Harriot's work, with both translation and commentary based on a master's thesis she wrote at University College London, A Commentary on the Artis Analyticae Praxis of Thomas Harriot (1972). She also completed a PhD at University College London, with the dissertation Descartes's "Regulae ad directionem ingenii": a case-study in the emergence of early modern algebra (1987). Although of Jewish descent, she became a nontheist Quaker, and despite her early experiences continued to describe herself as a Marxist. She died on 2 December 2019.

Books Seltman's books include:

Piaget's Logic: A Critique of Genetic Epistemology (with Peter Seltman, George Allen & Unwin, 1985) Thomas Harriot's Artis Analyticae Praxis: An English Translation with Commentary (edited with Robert Goulding, Springer, 2007) What's Left? What's Right?: A Political Journey via North Korea and the Chinese Cultural Revolution (Dorrance Publishing, 2010) Bread and Roses: Nontheism and the Human Spirit (Matador, 2013) The Changing Faces of Antisemitism (Matador, 2015) Rescuing God From Religion (Matador, 2016) Rescuing Jesus from Christianity (Matador, 2018) Marx the Humanist (Troubador, 2019)

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Muriel Seltman

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Muriel Seltman claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Muriel Seltman before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Muriel Seltman ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Muriel Seltman

In research: Muriel Seltman appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Muriel Seltman in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Muriel Seltman is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1927 births, 2019 deaths, Academics of the University of Greenwich, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Muriel Seltman outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Muriel Seltman in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Muriel Seltman means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Muriel Seltman out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Muriel Seltman in simple terms?

Why does Muriel Seltman matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Muriel Seltman?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Muriel Seltman.