Slashdot Mirror
10 Ways To Celebrate Pi Day
alphadogg writes "There are holidays, and then there are holidays for nerds, and March 14 (3.14) is one of those. Based on the mathematical constant number that represents the ratio between the circumference and the diameter of a circle, Pi Day has grown to become somewhat of a day to celebrate for mathematicians and techies. Here are 10 things to do on the big day."
Gonna go home tonight, and grill up a few steaks. And then hopefully the wife will give me a hummer... screw pie day, it is Steak & BJ Day!
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
The American way reads the way the date is normally spoken
Only in America though- most people elsewhere say 14th of March. That said- just about all countries have thier idiosyncracies... ... admittedly America has more than most.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Like it matters at this point...
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
I am a little happy that Pi day is noticed, and perhaps gives an excuse to think deeply about something rather than just bake pies - but it's a pretty lame list. I propose my own:
1) Read about Tau vs. Pi. The arguments for what we can choose in mathematics vs. what is given, require one to think quite a bit about what is useful in math vs. what is convention and makes one, frankly, appreciate pi far more than any of the activities in the article.
2) Actually try to measure pi. Note I didn't say, 'calculate'. It is revealing how hard it is to actually measure things in the real world beyond three or four significant figures, and it makes one appreciate the beauty of abstract calculations.
3) Read about e. e is actually much cooler in many ways, but because there is no ridiculuously simple, visualizable definition of it, it doesn't get the limelight (such as it is.) A great historical book on e: "e": The Story of a Number
But if you insist on knowing what the slideshow list of ten things is:
1) Make a pi-themed pie
2) Rock a Pi Day T-shirt
3) Write Pi-kus or Pi-ems
4) Go on a pi scavenger hunt (this, at least, has some vague mathematical attraction, although you could accomplish the same with a random sequence)
5) See how many digits of pi you can recite
6) Watch "Pi" the movie (gibberish math, but a cool movie that gets a little bit of the obsessional nature that can capture those who dive into abstract mathematics)
7) Listen to Pi music
8) Tell Pi Day jokes
9) Celebrate Albert Einstein's birthday (same day)
10) Read a book about pi (they don't even suggest the classic historical work on pi, by Beckman: A History of Pi
Like I said - mostly silly, not very mathematical. I would prefer pi day be a day of observance rather than a secular holiday :-)
1337% of pi is 42