The Beauty of an Archetype: Prime Numbers
Carla Farsi and Fabio Rovai

Proceedings of Bridges 2014: Mathematics, Music, Art, Architecture, Culture
Pages 365–368
Short Papers

Abstract

Inspired by recent spectacular breakthroughs in number theory, we introduce three classroom games involving prime and Bungus numbers. Although prime numbers have captured the imagination of mathematicians for millennia, some of their most intuitive fundamental properties have proven to be very elusive to formal demonstration until up to this past year, when they were finally proven for the first time. We think that our games, if accompanied by the proper teacher guidance, will inspire students to deepen their knowledge of number theory, and to pursue further exploration of current prime numbers mathematical research and/or game designing.

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