Matt Cook, "Sleight of Mind: 75 Ingenious Paradoxes in Mathematics, Physics, and Philosophy" (MIT Press, 2020)
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What is the background of Matt Cook and how did his magician experience inspire the book?
Hello everybody, this is Marshall Poe. I'm the editor of the New Books Network, and I'm here to bring you another installment in the New Books Network seminar. These are books that we think will have a broad appeal across all our channels. Today the book is by Matt Cook and it's called Slight of Mind. This is really quite an incredible book because it's about paradoxes, that is things that reason tells you should be true, but can't be true, or things that must be true, but reason tells you they can't be true. I'm already a nuts just talking about it. In any event, the author of this book is a magician. Yes, that's right, a magician who knows a lot about math and science and the social sciences and has ferreted out all kinds of paradoxes and offers ways in which these paradoxes can be resolved.
Anyway, this is a fascinating interview, and I think a lot of you will enjoy it, particularly while you are sequestered at home during the COVID-19 shutdown. So without further ado, Here it is.
Hi, this is Jim Stein, your host for New Books in Mathematics. Our guest today is Matt Cook, the author of Slight of Mind. Matt is also a magician which ties into today's theme of paradoxes. One of the most appealing aspects of both math and science are counterintuitive ideas, ideas that seem to defy logic. This delightful book presents and analyzes some of the best known of these ideas and also exposes the reader to many that are not as familiar but are equally enchanting. These tantalizing ideas do more than tease and perplex. They are often the gateway to better understanding. And isn't that what we want from math and science? Matt, welcome to the show.
Thanks for having me, Jim. It's a pleasure to speak with you.
Matt, I hear you used to perform as a professional magician and that you were trained at the Hollywood Magic Castle. Does that have anything to do with your motivation to write this book?
Yes, as a matter of fact, it does. Paradox is really a sophisticated kind of magic trick. Uh a magician's purpose on stage. is to create the appearance of contradiction. pull a rabbit from an empty hat. uh to violate the physical rules or or whatever it is. Uh paradox is something similar, yet it doesn't require concretes like rabbits and hats. It works in the abstract uh with words and symbols. and concepts and it sort of makes magic in the mind. Most people can typically explain magic tricks in general terms. They may not know the exact secrets. but they're familiar with the ideas of misdirection. Gimmicks. uh sleight of hand and things like that. Paradox, on the other hand, achieves the same effect. But it does so without anything tangible.
And I like to call it sleight of mind. Hence the title of the book. And uh the motivation behind the book as well.
Yeah, I thought it was a very nice title for the book.
What is the principle of non‑contradiction and why can it not be proved?
It's what uh it's what initially appealed to me. Um, what is the principle of non-contradiction and who discovered it?
Sure. The principle of non-contradiction, uh often abbreviated P and C. is the axiom that two or more mutually exclusive propositions cannot be simul simultaneously true. Now that sounds redundant because that's what mutually exclusive means. But it's actually a significant statement about reality. It has to be true and it has to apply to everything that is. Um and you asked who discovered it. Well PNC um principle of non-contradiction was uh famously identified by Aristotle. Uh Aristotle what is he's one of my favorite people from history, by the way. He was a brilliant and prolific thinker. And his fields of study, it's amazing how many fields he he wrote about. Uh he wrote about philosophy, physics, geology.
uh psychology, even biology, medicine. um, art, language, many, many more. It basically if it was a thing at the time, he wrote about it. And his teachings have had a big influence on civilization. Uh in rational thought. Among his achievements was the conception of formal logic. So his ancient Greek predecessors passed down. uh certainly a very rich intellectual heritage. Um, but I think logic was was maybe the greatest achievement in the championship of reason itself.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the background of Matt Cook and how did his magician experience inspire the book?
0:00–3:05
2
What is the principle of non‑contradiction and why can it not be proved?
3:05–6:17
3
How does the book distinguish between a paradox and a contradiction?
6:17–7:01
4
What are Quine’s three categories of paradoxes (veridical, falsitical, antinomical)?
7:01–9:38
5
What is the ‘Pirates of Penzance’ paradox and how does it relate to calendar design?
9:38–14:03
6
How does the book explain infinity, Cantor’s sizes of infinity, and the Hilbert Hotel?
14:03–17:35
7
What are Zeno’s paradoxes of motion and how are they resolved?
17:35–22:17
8
What are super‑tasks (e.g., Thompson’s lamp) and why do they raise questions about limits?
22:17–52:50
Speakers
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Daniel Cohnitz and Jussi Haukioja, "Foundations for Metasemantics" (Oxford UP, 2025)
Philippe Huneman, "When Metaphysics Meets Biology: Kantian Approaches to the Concept of An Organism" (Routledge, 2026)
Rivka Weinberg, "The Meaning of It All: Ultimate Meaning, Everyday Meaning, Cosmic Meaning, Death, and Time" (Oxford UP, 2026)
PJ DiPietro, "Sideways Selves Travesti and Jotería, "Struggles Across the Américas" (U Texas Press, 2025)