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How to choose your relations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

Tony Crilly  and
Colin R. Fletcher
Tony Crilly
Affiliation:
10 Lemsford Road, St Albans ALI 3PB, e-mail:[email protected]
Colin R. Fletcher
Affiliation:
Atalaya, Lon Glanjraed, Llandre, Ceredigion SY24 5BY, e-mail:Atalayal tiibtiruemet.com
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Extract

Mathematicians are fascinated by relatios and have worked our extensive theories about them. The treatments tend to be abstract and sometimes the basic ideas are lost in the abstraction. Here we investigate some common ground between mathematical relations and down-to-earth genealogy, the study of family relations.

Family relations have been studied by mathematicians, perhaps none more playfully than Thomas P. Kirkman (the nineteenth century expert in combinatorial mathematics) in his little puzzle rhyme he sent to the Educational Times [1, p.117]:

Baby Tom of Bay Hugh

The nephew is and uncle too;

In how many ways can this be true

Type
Articles
Information
The Mathematical Gazette , Volume 94 , Issue 530 , July 2010 , pp. 193 - 202
Copyright
Copyright © The Mathematical Association 2010

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References

1. Biggs, N. L., Kirkman, T. P., Mathematician, Bulletin of the London Mathematical Society, 13 (Part 2), (1981).Google Scholar
2. Wilson, R. J., Introduction to graph theory (4th edn.) Longman (1996).Google Scholar
3. The Guardian, 18 October 2007.Google Scholar
4. Macfarlane, A., Problem in relationship, Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, 15 (1887-1888) pp. 116–117.Google Scholar
5. www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0s5Kn9QXtU Google Scholar
6. Voles, Roger, Finding lost cousins, Math. Gaz., 92 (March 2008) pp. 138–141.Google Scholar