Ian Stewart (mathematician)

Ian Nicholas Stewart FRS (born 24 September 1945) is a British mathematician and a popular-science and science-fiction writer. He is Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick, England.

Stewart was born in 1945 in England. While in the sixth form at school he came to the attention of the mathematics teacher. The teacher had Stewart sit mock A-level examinations without any preparation along with the upper-sixth students; Stewart was placed first in the examination. The teacher arranged for Stewart to be admitted to Cambridge on a scholarship to Churchill College, where he obtained a BA in mathematics. Stewart then went to the University of Warwick for his doctorate, on completion of which in 1969 he was offered an academic position at the university, where he presently teaches mathematics. He is well known for his popular expositions of mathematics and his contributions to catastrophe theory.

While at Warwick, Stewart edited the mathematical magazine Manifold. He also wrote a column called "Mathematical Recreations" for Scientific American magazine from 1991 to 2001. This followed the work of past columnists like Martin Gardner, Douglas Hofstadter, and A.K. Dewdney. Altogether, he wrote 96 columns for Scientific American, which were later reprinted in the books "Math Hysteria", "How to Cut a Cake: And Other Mathematical Conundrums" and "Cows in the Maze".

Stewart has held visiting academic positions in Germany (1974), New Zealand (1976), and the US (University of Connecticut 1977–78, University of Houston 1983–84).

Stewart has published more than 140 scientific papers, including a series of influential papers co-authored with Jim Collins on coupled oscillators and the symmetry of animal gaits.

Stewart has collaborated with Dr Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett on four popular science books based on Pratchett's Discworld. In 1999 Terry Pratchett made both Jack Cohen and Professor Ian Stewart "Honorary Wizards of the Unseen University" at the same ceremony at which the University of Warwick gave Terry Pratchett an honorary degree.

In March 2014 Ian Stewart's iPad app, Incredible Numbers by Professor Ian Stewart, launched in the App Store. The app was produced in partnership with Profile Books and Touch Press.

Mathematics and popular science

Science of Discworld series

• The Science of Discworld, with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett
• The Science of Discworld II: The Globe, with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett
• The Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch, with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett
• The Science of Discworld IV: Judgement Day, with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett

Textbooks

• Catastrophe Theory and its Applications, with Tim Poston, Pitman, 1978. ISBN 0-273-01029-8.
• Complex Analysis: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Plane, I. Stewart, D Tall. 1983 ISBN 0-521-24513-3
• Algebraic number theory and Fermat's last theorem, 3rd Edition, I. Stewart, D Tall. A. K. Peters (2002) ISBN 1-56881-119-5
• Galois Theory, 3rd Edition, Chapman and Hall (2000) ISBN 1-58488-393-6 Galois Theory Errata
• The Foundations of Mathematics, 2nd Edition, I. Stewart, D Tall. (2015) ISBN 978-019870-643-4

Science fiction

• Wheelers, with Jack Cohen (fiction)
• Heaven, with Jack Cohen, ISBN 0-446-52983-4, Aspect, May 2004 (fiction)

Science and mathematics

In 1995 Stewart received the Michael Faraday Medal and in 1997 he gave the Royal Institution Christmas Lecture on The Magical Maze. He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2001.

Stewart was the first recipient of the Christopher Zeeman Medal, awarded jointly by the LMS and the IMA for his work on promoting mathematics.

Stewart married his wife, Avril, in 1970. They met at a party at a house Avril was renting while she trained as a nurse. They have two sons. He lists his recreations as science fiction, painting, guitar, keeping fish, geology, Egyptology and snorkelling.