Freakematics

Freakematics is a word I just put together now as a way to describe a habit of mine. Freakematics is the application of pure mathematics to diverse subjects not usually covered by “traditional” pure mathematics. The inspiration came from the term Freaknomics, which is “an application of economic theory to diverse subjects not usually covered by ‘traditional’ economists (Wikipedia).

Pure mathematics should not be confused with applied mathematics. Pure mathematics is more about the beauty of finding patterns, and not necessarily used for practical application. A central concept of pure mathematics is the idea of generality. It’s the pursuit of a generality that can describe everything.

The idea of Freakematics is to use logic to show that the universe is connected. The core idea is that everything makes sense and nothing doesn’t make sense. You must always assume there are factors you don’t know and haven’t thought of. It isn’t always practical, but at least it’s never wrong.

A good way to explain why you must always assume there are unknown factors is The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: “The Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything is calculated by an enormous supercomputer over a period of 7.5 million years to be 42.” When we apply Freakematics, we’re only doing an analysis of what this supercomputer can do in a split second.