Experimental Math Workshop

Oakland, California, 29-30 Mar 2004


*** Thanks to everyone who made the workshop a success! Links to presentation materials are given below. A collection of photos, courtesy Hillarie Orman and Richard Schroeppel, is available here: Photos.

The University of California, Berkeley, and the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory are pleased to host a workshop on experimental mathematics, to be held 29-30 Mar 2004, in Oakland, California, USA.

This workshop is designed to bring together a number of leading researchers and students in the emerging field of "experimental mathematics," namely the utilization of advanced computer technology as an active tool for mathematical research. Topics to be covered include computational number theory, symbolic computing tools, high-precision arithmetic techniques, integer relation algorithms, numerical discovery of new mathematical identities, applications of experimental mathematics in physics and other disciplines, experimental mathematics and art, computational techniques for formal proof, parallel computing for experimental mathematics, and others.

If you wish to attend or participate, please contact Bailey.

Organizers:

David H. Bailey, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, Berkeley, California, USA.
Jonathan M. Borwein, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.

Borwein and Bailey are co-authors of the new books "Mathematics by Experiment: Plausible Reasoning in the 21st Century" and (with Roland Girgensohn) "Experimentation in Mathematics: Computational Paths to Discovery" (AK Peters, 2004).

Logistics:

The workshop will be held at the Oakland Marriott City Center Hotel, 1001 Broadway, Oakland, California, USA. The hotel's website is at: Marriott City Center Hotel. A block of sleeping rooms at the group rate of $105 + tax per night, single or double occupancy, has been negotiated with the Marriott Oakland City Center for this meeting. The block starts on Sunday, March 28, ending on Tuesday, March 30. To make a reservation, please call Marriott Reservations at 1-800-991-7249 between 6:00 am and 11:00 pm (PST). Request the "Experimental Math" block in order to receive the group rate. Reservations must be made no later than March 7, 2004 to obtain this rate. Hotel room rates are subject to applicable state and local taxes (currently 11%) in effect at time of check in. Cancellations must be made at least 72 hours prior to the scheduled date of arrival, or one night's room and tax will be applied to the credit card on file.

The hotel is accessible from either the Oakland International Airport (most convenient) or the San Francisco International Airport. From the Oakland airport, you can take a taxi (approx $30), or the Bay Area Rapid Transit train ($3.25; take Richmond train, exit at Oakland 12st St). From the San Francisco airport, take an airport shuttle van (fare about $40).

Final Program:

Monday Mar. 29:
8:00am Breakfast (provided)
8:50am David H. Bailey, LBNL: "Welcome"
9:00am Jonathan M. Borwein, Dalhousie University: "Mathematics by Experiment: Plausible Reasoning in the 21st Century" PDF
10:15am Break (refreshments provided)
10:30am Richard E. Crandall, Center for Advanced Computation, Reed College: "Experimental Mathematics and Bioterror"
11:15am Victor H. Moll, Tulane University: "Closed Form Evaluation of Definite Integrals" PDF
12:00noon Lunch (provided)
1:15pm Helaman Ferguson, Sculptor: "Mathematical Sculpture and PSLQ" pi disk sculpture Ferguson's website
2:00pm Sherry Li: "A Comparison of Three High-Precision Quadrature Schemes" PDF
2:45pm Break (refreshments provided)
3:00pm Sinai Robins, Temple University: "Sifting Arithmetic Progressions from Taylor Series Coefficients" PDF
3:45pm Steven Gray, Independent Researcher: "Computer Experiments in Linear Geometry and Algebra" PDF Background article: PDF
4:30pm Oliver Labs, University of Mainz, "Finding Algebraic Surfaces with Many Singularities Using Finite Field Experiments" HTML
5:00pm Adjourn for the day
6:00pm Dinner (self-hosted)

Tuesday Mar. 30:
8:00am Breakfast (provided)
9:00am David H. Bailey, LBNL: "Experimental Mathematics and the Normality of Pi" PDF
10:15am Break (refreshments provided)
10:30am Panel/Group Discussion: Richard Fateman: PDF
Richard Schroeppel: PDF
Victor Moll:
12:00noon Lunch (provided)
1:15pm Rob Scharein, Westgrid: "Knot Plot" Knot Plot site
2:00pm Richard Schroeppel, Sandia National Lab: "A Few Mathematical Experiments" PDF
2:45pm Break (refreshments provided)
3:00pm Andrew de Laix, Wolfram Research, Inc.: "Numerical Experiments Using Mathematica" PDF
3:45pm Thane Plambeck, Independent Researcher: "Pretending in Misere Combinatorial Games" PDF
4:30pm Adjourn