Mathematics is the breathtaking invention of ours that expands the reach of the human mind, puts us in touch with the tiniest particles of physics, and takes us to the outermost reaches of the cosmos. Perhaps because of its power and its abstraction, math scares many people. The Universe and the Teacup is a poetic and passionate book that reveals how the tools of mathematics get us to these fundamental truths and shows us why math need not be intimidating.

Using the O. J. Simpson trial and the Lani Guinier affair, the bell curve and Emmy Noether, the nineteenth-century woman scientist whose work was essential for Einstein's Theory of Relativity, Cole shows how mathematics breaks the mind barrier.