I wonder how many readers of the Sunday funnies understood the Foxtrot cartoon this morning. (Update: for those of you who landed on this page looking for a definition of the term “Fibonachos,” go here.)
Month: February 2009
Math on a bridge
God Plays Dice posted a link to a photo of some mathematics displayed prominently on a bridge. (No not that bridge.) Below is the photograph of the mean value theorem on a bridge in Beijing. Does anyone know the story behind this? [photo by Vmenkov published under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License]
The Great British Venn Diagram
I was very happy to stumble upon (thanks Ed) this explanation of the terms United Kingdom, Great Britain, etc.—via a Venn diagram. The precise definitions of these terms have always confused me. It was created by Sam Hughes. Follow the link to his page to read a more detailed discussion of the terms. My favorite line was the last…
Units are important
This made me laugh. My favorite line is “Well, I mean, it’s obviously a difference of opinion.” [via failblog]
Gibbs’ phase rule and Euler’s formula
Regular readers of this blog are probably well-acquainted with Euler’s beautiful polyhedron formula. Because I have written a few things about Euler’s formula, I get email about it from time-to-time. Most of the messages are very interesting and thought-provoking. The other day I received an email that asked: …Is the Gibbs phase rule for Variables, Phases, and Components the same thing as the Euler…
100th post
In honor of my 100th post I would like to share a quote from Freeman Dyson which appears in this month’s Notices of the American Mathematical Society. Some mathematicians are birds, others are frogs. Birds fly high in the air and survey broad vistas of mathematics out to the far horizon. They delight in concepts that unify our thinking…
Clearance price fail
Happy Monday! Here’s a funny math-related photo from yesterday’s Failblog. Where to begin with this one? There’s so much wrong with it (what’s a Sentai Fortrs?). But despite all of its problems, at least they put a negative sign next to the sale price to match the direction of the price difference! [failblog.org]
David Richeson: Division by Zero 