I found Watts’ piece really enjoyable, as he managed to take several would-be ‘boring’ topics and personalise them into an educational narrative.

The bit about the runner’s pack mentality was something that makes a lot of sense that I’ve never really thought about before. I wonder how many other things are influenced by this sort of pack or mob mentality? The potential for exploration that this fusion of sociology and mathematics provides is surprisingly interesting to me. I have always enjoyed maths, but its meeting point with human behavior seems to add another layer.

In high school I studied Psychology, assuming the subject would involve exploring human thought from a scientific approach (and was terribly disappointed when the subject focused almost solely on the biological interactions of the brain and the eye and rote-learning the sleep-cycle). The potential in this topic, especially what it presents for technological advancement, is endlessly fascinating, and something that should be looked at more in schools – perhaps an effective way to get more girls students into science.