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Math with Cohen and Groening
An anonymous reader writes "While
math on The Simpsons and
math on Futurama has been covered by Slashdot before, new background on some of the scientific references is covered in a long transcription of A Futurama Math Conversation with David X Cohen and a short summary of a math club talk to Matt Groening and a number of writers from both shows. Some amusing tidbits are on these pages - for example, when the Simpsons writers contacted NASA for the 40,000th digit of pi, NASA actually sent them a printout of all 40,000 digits."
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i love the simpsons! where else could a fat slob like homer get some bomb-ass pussy like marge?
I don't know why they needed NASA for that. Pifast will spit out the first 40,000th digits in a very short time on modern computers. A million is a reasonable benchmarking number for that program. Finding the 40,000th digit in the text file takes longer than calculating it.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Its not their fault that you don't get it.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
-William Brendel
They could have quickly called Daniel Tammet http://www.spring.org.uk/2005/05/daniel-tammet-boy -with-incredible.htm
:-)
Daniel Tammet is an autistic savant. He can perform mind-boggling mathematical calculations at breakneck speeds.
He can figure out cube roots quicker than a calculator and recall pi to 22,514 decimal places.
The only place where pi is funny is when it smacks into someone's face, Three Stooges style.
Pi is now funny?
Of course pi(e) is funny. Haven't you watched Wobbl and Bob ? Of course The Simpsons would pick it up to display a contrast between the world views of Lisa Simpson and her father.
You can calculate the nth digit in base 16 in O(n) time with the following algorithm:
Algorithm
If you want decimal digits, it's a bit more complicated.
42
Sorry, this sig is beneath your current threshold
NO FAIR! You changed the outcome by measuring it!
that's why NASA's annual paper budget is $17.3 million.
$17.3 million? That's stretching it, even for a joke. With about 80 digits per line, 50 lines per page, and 40,000 digits per document, how many trees do ten pages kill?
It just took about 20 seconds to evaluate
evalf(Pi,40000).
In case anyone cares:
The 40000th digit is a 5.
The 40000th digit after the decimal is a 1.
i believe that episode aired in 1993... the internet was a different place back then.
An article about the Simpsons, and 19 of the first 20 replies are about pi and the other one's about how hot a blue-haired, yellow-skinned cartoon character is.
Most of my extended family are hard line Catholic republicans, they not only voted for Bush, but did so with joy in their hearts. They don't listen to much of anything anyone tried to tell them about either alternate viewpoints or even their own beliefs.
However, many of my younger cousins watch South Park and/or the Simpsons and are exposed to ideas which contradict their own, they may not immediately see it, but they are exposed to them without automatically tuning out. This is why these shows are great, because the gags allow a message to get across to people who don't listen to other sources.
Professor Frink: Gentleman please.... can I just.... your attention please.... ahem. PI IS EQUAL TO 3!
Audience: *Gasp*
In ninth grade algebra, I walk into class and the teacher had put an infinity symbol on the whiteboard. I, being the smart ass I am says,
"Mr. Dewey, who killed eight?"
Mr. Dewey says without missing a beat,
"Pi, It's an irrational number."
(Feel free to throw tomatoes at my post. But I did warn you that it was corny, plus this is as humorous as I get at 2am EDT.)
"Plans are for fools! Oglethorpe, the plutonian (Aqua Teen Hunger Force)
I'm afraid there are a bit more than that.
#include ".signature"
mmmmmmmmm, pi.
I am so smart!
I am so smart!
S-M-R-T!
I mean S-M-A-R-T!
Why'd they have to contact NASA? And don't give me any crap about it being 1993; Project Gutenberg's pi to a million digits was released before 1993.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I'm a freethinker. I let cartoons tell me how to vote.
as the comic book guy would say worst comedic pi reference, ever
I never knew that the simpsons also asked NASA for the the 40,000th digit of Pi. But I've known for a while that they asked David Bailey for it as well (Bailey is one of the B's from BBP numbers... which is the formula to calculate an arbitrary digit of Pi in Hex). You can actually see a picture of the fax that the simpsons sent him on the 4th page of this pdf http://www.cecm.sfu.ca/personal/jborwein/pi-slides .pdf
I always thought that it was pretty cool that they took the trouble to just find out what the right digit was but now I know they actually decided to confirm it as well. That's pride in ones craft right there.
He actually asked NASA for the figures for their annual paper budget, and they sent him a 17.3 million page printout....
[Pi has] 40,000 digits?
Yes it does. Here's all 40,000 of them (in base 10):
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
0
What makes South Park better at political commentary than The Simpsons is that, ultimately, South Park approaches a view based on common sense, that doesn't kowtow to the left or the right, but sits somewhere in between where most non-ideologues are.
I mean.... Voting between a Giant Douche and a Turd Sandwich? Classic!
On the other hand, The Simpsons and Futurama (I think Futurama, especially) are still not bad at political commentary because they take a situation or issue (like global warming, for instance) and, while bringing it to light in an episode, also turn the issue on its head (like when burning robot exhaust gases are used to shift the Earth into a wider orbit, thus cooling the planet). There's still a political bias there, but it isn't used to beat you over the head with like most dramas do these days, and so even if you disagree with the political views, you're still entertained and not offended.
I recall a joke by comedian Steven Wright (I think):
I went to a math conference recently, and the hotel at the conference labelled all the rooms with math symbols.
Mine was Pi. Easy enough to find, but it took FOREVER to dial on the hotel phone system.
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"That's like asking the square root of a million. No one will ever know." -- Nelson
NASA actually sent them a printout of all 40,000 digits
I'm shocked that the Simpsons writers not only knew that there *was* a last digit, but also knew that the last one was the 40,000th. Even *I* didn't know that! They must've had some help. They must have some Ph.D. mathematicians working on the writing staff. Or maybe one of them is related to a math professor.
Or maybe I'm just rationalizing.
The woman doing the article has her students figure out why it doesn't work using the odd/even mismatch. However, he used the program again later (perhaps modified, I believe) to find a more close near-miss and one that isn't as easily disproved with the odd/even mismatch.
The program is at http://www.mathsci.appstate.edu/~sjg/futurama/near miss.html
And yes, the later version checks for parity.