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111 Years Ago, Indiana Almost Legislated Pi

Posted by kdawson on from the squaring-the-circle dept.

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "On February 5, 1897, 111 years ago today, the Indiana legislature very nearly passed a bill 'introducing a new mathematical truth,' that would have erroneously established pi as the ratio 'five-fourths to four' or 3.2. The story explaining the rationale behind the bill and how they were prevented from legislating it when a real mathematician intervened is quite interesting, because the man who discovered the 'new mathematical truth' wanted to charge royalties, which could have made pi the first form of irrational property."

41 of 379 comments (clear)

  1. Blashphemy ! by Ihlosi · · Score: 5, Funny
    How _could_ they even think about committing such an act. Everybody knows that pi = 3. It's in the Bible, after all.


    Then again, maybe I'll patent 22/7 as a good way to approximate pi. I heard that intellectual property is all the rage nowadays.

    1. Re:Blashphemy ! by arotenbe · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Then again, maybe I'll patent 22/7 as a good way to approximate pi. The scary thing is that you could probably actually get the patent with 339/108.
      --
      Tomato wedge sperm darts that are Republican.
    2. Re:Blashphemy ! by frup · · Score: 5, Interesting

      thats because pi to 4 decimals is 666/212 so therefore anything close real pi is of course the devils work. (I can't believe I just stumbled on something more accurate than 22/7 by accident while trying to make a real lame joke)

    3. Re:Blashphemy ! by notabaggins · · Score: 5, Funny

      Then again, maybe I'll patent 22/7 as a good way to approximate pi. I heard that intellectual property is all the rage nowadays. Hm... no, you need a process. Those are what all the cool corporations do. Patent the process of "dividing two, common whole numbers for the purpose of usefully approximating the ratio between the diameter and the circumference of a circle". Then make sure the steps described take up at least three pages. Oh and use a lot of impressive sounding words for things. Never say something like "pencil", say "graphite based, portable diagrammatic device rated at two on the graphite integrity scale". Things like that. The USPTO seems really impressed when they haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about.
    4. Re:Blashphemy ! by dkf · · Score: 5, Informative

      Everybody knows that pi = 3. Only when your circles have six sides. (Hint: regular hexagons have a circumference/diameter ratio of exactly 3...)
      --
      "Little does he know, but there is no 'I' in 'Idiot'!"
    5. Re:Blashphemy ! by rucs_hack · · Score: 4, Funny

      Only when your circles have six sides. (Hint: regular hexagons have a circumference/diameter ratio of exactly 3...)

      For this demonstration of extreme geek knowledge, you win the discussion thread.

      All you others can go home...

    6. Re:Blashphemy ! by Thanshin · · Score: 5, Informative

      Everybody knows that pi = 3. It's in the Bible, after all.

      Does any idiotic thing get modded up as long as it blasts Christianity? Nowhere in the Bible does it talk about the principles of Euclidian geometry.

      "And he [Hiram] made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one rim to the other it was round all about, and...a line of thirty cubits did compass it round about....And it was an hand breadth thick...." -- First Kings, chapter 7, verses 23 and 26
    7. Re:Blashphemy ! by Andrew+Kismet · · Score: 4, Informative

      1 Kings 7:23 "He made the Sea of cast metal, circular in shape, measuring ten cubits from rim to rim and five cubits high. It took a line of thirty cubits to measure around it." or "And he made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one brim to the other: it was round all about, and his height was five cubits: and a line of thirty cubits did compass it round about."

      While the Bible doesn't actually state the nature of pi, and a cubit is an extremely rough unit anyway, it's amusing to note that if you properly define cubit as being a fixed length and assert that the word circular refers to a near-perfect circle, the units just don't work out unless you redefine space, and along with it, Pi. Putting the "fun" back in "fundies".

      http://everything2.com/index.pl?node=Pi%20in%20the%20Bible

    8. Re:Blashphemy ! by mskfisher · · Score: 4, Informative
      It was better than close:
      http://www.khouse.org/articles/1998/158/

      The Hebrew alphabet is alphanumeric: each Hebrew letter also has a numerical value and can be used as a number.
      There was an embedded code - a word that was written strangely:

      The common word for circumference is qav. Here, however, the spelling of the word for circumference, qaveh, adds a heh (h).
      ...
      This indicates an adjustment of the ratio 111/ 106, or 31.41509433962 cubits. Assuming that a cubit was 1.5 ft. this 15-foot-wide bowl would have had a circumference of 47.12388980385 feet.
      This Hebrew "code" results in 47.12264150943 feet, or an error of less than 15 thousandths of an inch!
      It gives an error of 0.00265%. Quite remarkable.
      --
      0x0D 0x0A
    9. Re:Blashphemy ! by sed+quid+in+infernos · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Which doesn't say that pi = 3 any more than saying "And he [Hiram] made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one rim to the other it was round all about, and...a line of thirty-one and four-tenths cubits did compass it round about....And it was an hand breadth thick...." says that pi = 3.14. Pi is, in fact, equal to neither of those numbers, nor to 3.14159 26535 89793 23846 26433 83279 50288 41971 69399 37510. It is an irrational number for which any representation in digits is an approximation. And 3 is the proper approximation of pi to one significant digit.

    10. Re:Blashphemy ! by Maddog+Batty · · Score: 4, Interesting

      If you want a good approximation to pi then try 355/113. (remember it as 113355)

      --
      wot no sig
    11. Re:Blashphemy ! by Gandalf_Greyhame · · Score: 5, Funny

      Mathematician: Pi is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter.
      Engineer: Pi is about 22/7.
      Physicist: Pi is 3.14159 plus or minus 0.000005
      Computer Programmer: Pi is 3.141592653589 in double precision.

      --
      I am not stubborn. I am right!
    12. Re:Blashphemy ! by Skater · · Score: 5, Funny

      Frink: Pi is exactly 3! ... Sorry it had to come to that.

    13. Re:Blashphemy ! by sapphire+wyvern · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Or fourth option: we're misinterpreting the text, helped along by reading our desired conclusion into it. Apparently another quote concerning the same object mentions that it had a flared rim "like a lily". So if you measure the diameter of the flared rim, but the circumference of the (narrower) cylindrical portion of the sides, you're definitely not going to end up with a good approximation of pi. Personally I think there are much more valid reasons for criticising the scientific validity & alleged inerrancy of the Bible than that little gem. It really takes effort to read that quote as a statement that pi = 3.0. There are other less credible justifications: eg, that the cubit was not a well defined unit (doubtful in my mind, you wouldn't be able to do very good architecture or even carpentry without a measurement unit consistent from one dimension of an object to another). And even utterly specious arguments hinging on numerological rubbish.

    14. Re:Blashphemy ! by Heian-794 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      My personal favorite: 2^9/9^2 almost equals 2*pi.

    15. Re:Blashphemy ! by swillden · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The fifth option is far more likely: Accurately measuring and recording the circumference wasn't that important to them, so they either didn't measure it well, or else they rounded it off. The diameter probably wasn't exactly 10 cubits, either.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    16. Re:Blashphemy ! by Hognoxious · · Score: 4, Informative

      ummm, a hexagon does not have a diameter
      O RLY?
      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    17. Re:Blashphemy ! by joss · · Score: 4, Funny

      wow, now next time i need pie to 7 significant figures, I only have to remember 6 numbers instead of 7

      --
      http://rareformnewmedia.com/
    18. Re:Blashphemy ! by sootman · · Score: 5, Funny

      I was trying to come up with a funny reply but the only number I stumbled upon that was more accurate was 31,415,926,536/10,000,000,000.

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      Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
    19. Re:Blashphemy ! by CreatureComfort · · Score: 5, Funny


      Yeah, but turning Pi upside down gets the floor messy.

      --
      "Unheard of means only it's undreamed of yet,
      Impossible means not yet done." ~~ Julia Ecklar
    20. Re:Blashphemy ! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      qaveh, adds a heh (h).
      ...
      an error of less than 15 thousandths of an inch!

      Good thing they didn't add a lol.

    21. Re:Blashphemy ! by jafuser · · Score: 5, Informative

      I found this quite interesting:

      pi is close to sqrt(g), where g = gravitational acceleration on the surface of Earth in m/(s^2).

      Apparently, this is not a coincidence.

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      Please consider making an automatic monthly recurring donation to the EFF
    22. Re:Blashphemy ! by Marvin01 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Every time I try to do that I always get 8.675309...

  2. Tabled in the Senate by Ignis+Flatus · · Score: 4, Funny

    Introduced by Record
    IN THE SENATE
    Read first time and referred to
    committee on Temperance, February 11th, 1897
    Reported favorable February 12th, 1897
    Read second time and indefinitely postponed February 12, 1897

    sounds to me like they just never got a Round Tuit

  3. In Kansas... by Cracked+Pottery · · Score: 5, Funny

    There was an attempt to outlaw i and it's use in mathematical equations. Lawmakers who objected to its use complained that it wasn't real and their constituents required too much imagination to accept it.

    1. Re:In Kansas... by mathnerd314 · · Score: 5, Funny

      You must mean "fjgurjng"

      --
      Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
    2. Re:In Kansas... by KefabiMe · · Score: 4, Insightful

      There was an attempt to outlaw i and it's use in mathematical equations. Lawmakers who objected to its use complained that it wasn't real and their constituents required too much imagination to accept it.

      What's really sad is I don't know if that's a joke or if it's informative.

      I mean, and I'm 100% serious here... It could go either way. I have no clue!

    3. Re:In Kansas... by clickety6 · · Score: 5, Funny

      if we're making bad puns, don't forget the story of Polly Nomial and Curly Pi

      Once upon a time pretty little Polly Nomial was strolling across a field of vectors when she came to the edge of a singularly large matrix.

      Now Polly was convergent and her mother had made it an absolute condition that she must never enter such an array without her brackets on. Poll however, who had changed her variables that morning and was feeling particularly badly behaved, ignored these conditions on the ground that they were unnecessary, and made her way amongst the complex elements.

      Rows and columns enveloped her on both sides. Tangents approached her surface; she became tensor and tensor. Quite suddenly two branches of a hyperbola touched her at a single point. She oscillated violently, lost all sense of directrix and went completely divergent. As she reached a turning point she tripped over a square root which was protruding from the erf and plunged headlong down a steep gradient. When she was differentiated once more she found herself alone, apparently in a non-Euclidian space.

      She was being watched however. That smooth operator, Curly Pi, was lurking inner product. As his eyes devoured her curvilinear co-ordinates, a singular expression crossed his face. Was she still convergent, he wondered. He decided to integrate at once.

      Hearing a vulgar fraction behind her, Polly turned round and saw Curly Pi approaching with his power series extrapolated. She could see at once by his degenerate conic and his dissipative terms that he was bent on no good.

      "Eureka" she gasped.

      "Ho Ho" he said, "what a symmetric little polynomial you are. I can see you're absolutely bubbling over with secs."

      "Oh Sir", she protested, "keep away from me, I haven't got my brackets on."

      "Calm yourself, my dear," said our suave operator, "your fears are purely imaginary."

      "i,i," she thought. "Perhaps he's homogeneous then."

      "What order are you," the brute demanded.

      "Seventeen", replied Polly.

      Curly leered. "I suppose you've never been operated on yet", he said.

      "Of course no," Polly exclaimed indignantly. "I'm absolutely convergent".

      "Come, come," said Curly, "lets off to a decimal place I know and I'll take you to the limit".

      "Never" gasped Polly.

      "EXCHLF" he swore, using the vilest oath he knew. His patience was gone. Coshing her over the coefficient with a log until she was powerless, Curly removed her discontinuities. He started at her significant places and began smoothing her points of inflection. Poor Polly, all was up. She felt his digit tending to her asymptotic limit. Her convergence was gone for ever.

      There was no mercy, for Curly was a Heavyside operator. He integrated by partial fractions. The complex beast even went all the way round and did a contour integration. What an indignity. To be multiply connected at her first integration. Curly went on operating until he was absolutely and completely orthogonal.

      When Polly got home that evening her mother noticed that she was truncated in several places. But it was too late to differentiate now. As the months went by, Polly increased monotonically. Finally, she generated a small but pathological function which left surds all over the place until she was driven to distraction.

      The moral of the story is this: If you want to keep your expressions convergent, never allow them a single degree of freedom.

      --
      ----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
  4. What's wrong with that? by QuickFox · · Score: 4, Funny

    would have erroneously established pi as the ratio 'five-fourths to four' or 3.2. What's wrong with that? It's fairly close to the truth, much closer than many of the current federal administration's views on reality. And far less disastrous.
    --
    Terrorists can't threaten a country's freedom and democracy. Only lawmakers and voters can do that.
    1. Re:What's wrong with that? by Ihlosi · · Score: 5, Insightful
      And far less disastrous.

      Apparently, you haven't imagined yet what many engineering projects would be like if they assumed that pi = 3.2.

    2. Re:What's wrong with that? by QuickFox · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'm sure every sane engineer would look at that 3.2 and decide that, for reasons related to what's practical and works well, the exact 3.20000000 can't be used with full precision, instead a rough approximation is needed, say 3.14159265 or thereabouts.

      --
      Terrorists can't threaten a country's freedom and democracy. Only lawmakers and voters can do that.
    3. Re:What's wrong with that? by biased_estimator · · Score: 5, Funny

      And do you know what the really scary part is? I had an engineering buddy back in undergrad (at the University of Michigan, not exactly a terrible engin school) vociferously argue with me that pi was exactly 22/7. I asked him if he know what an irrational number is--he said yes. I asked him if he accepted that pi is an irrational number--he said yes. I asked him how pi could be exactly 22/7 if it is irrational... What an exhausting conversation that was. It turns out that pi wasn't the only irrational part of that conversation.

  5. Re:Hah. by mathnerd314 · · Score: 4, Funny

    "the American Mathematical Monthly, the leading exponent of mathematical thought in this country."

    Nice word choice

    --
    Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
  6. no wonder you need so many lawyers by petes_PoV · · Score: 5, Funny
    ... if your laws contain text like this:

    "It is impossible to compute the area of a circle on the diameter as the linear unit without trespassing upon the area outside of the circle to the extent of including one-fifth more area than is contained within the circle's circumference, because the square on the diameter produces the side of a square which equals nine when the arc of ninety degrees equals eight."

    Not that other countrys' are any better, I suppose

    --
    politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
  7. Just adding fuel to the fire ... by Ihlosi · · Score: 4, Funny
    I'm sure every sane engineer would look at that 3.2 and decide that, for reasons related to what's practical and works well, the exact 3.20000000 can't be used with full precision, instead a rough approximation is needed, say 3.14159265 or thereabouts.

    ... and not too long ago, there was an article about engineers supposedly having a terrorist mindset. I think we could add "Criminally adulterating the legislated value of pi" to the list of possible terrorist acts.

  8. Strictly speaking... by PinkyDead · · Score: 4, Funny

    This happened 111.19 years ago, you must remember to include the leap years.

    --
    Genesis 1:32 And God typed :wq!
  9. old news by TapeCutter · · Score: 4, Funny

    1897, c'mon slashdot this really is old news!

    --
    And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
  10. Re:And this is why by ettlz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And this is why scientists and intelligent people in general often have little success in politics.
    It's called dignity.
  11. The Slashdot headline in 2105 by williegeorgie · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I hope we read this in about 100 years.... About 100 years ago, the Dover Pennsylvania school board very nearly succeeded in enforcing 'introducing a new scientific truth,' that would have erroneously established intelligent design as a rational alternative to evolution. The story explaining the rationale behind the idiocy is best described by the federal judge who prevented the school board from ....

    1. Re:The Slashdot headline in 2105 by rishistar · · Score: 5, Funny

      I hope we read this in about 100 years

      I hope so to. It'll mean we're not dead, and we've still got our eyesight.

      --
      Professor Karmadillo Songs of Science
  12. Indiana by LaminatorX · · Score: 4, Funny

    Perhaps in another century or so they'll be able to decide on a time-zone.