Naked Science Forum

General Science => General Science => Topic started by: PhirePhly on 29/05/2005 11:46:33

Title: Pi
Post by: PhirePhly on 29/05/2005 11:46:33

I'm beginning to understand why Nobel omitted mathematics from his prizes.

Those guys are nuts.  

Just looking at this stuff makes my head hurt.

At any rate, the "algorithm used" clicker on the second link pretty thoroughly answered my question, even if I don't quite understand all of the answer yet.

Title: Re: Pi
Post by: chimera on 29/05/2005 12:08:47

http://www.myownlittleworld.com/pi/pitable.html

ah, found it:

http://numbers.computation.free.fr/Constants/PiProgram/pifast.html

there are an infinite ways to calculate pi, I fear. Some faster than others, but the number is infinite because it is such a truly universal number, that the number of possible approaches is beyond enumeration.

check out for instance Buffon's needle:

http://www.angelfire.com/wa/hurben/buff.html

but pi is also found in the number of meanderings of a large river...

Title: Re: Pi
Post by: DoctorBeaver on 30/05/2005 18:50:39

Rob - can you explain the river thing?

Title: Re: Pi
Post by: chimera on 30/05/2005 19:13:57

Couldn't find a copy of the original paper, but it boils down to this:

Pi also appears as the average ratio of the actual length and the direct distance between source and mouth in a meandering river (Stølum 1996, Singh 1997).

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Pi.html (scroll to near bottom)


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