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Juggling By the Numbers
theodp writes "The BBC News' Laura Gray reports on a juggling notation system developed in the 80's called Siteswap (aka Quantum Juggling and Cambridge Notation) and how it has helped jugglers discover and share thousands of new tricks. Frustrated that there was no way to write down juggling moves, mathematician Colin Wright and others helped devised Siteswap, which uses sequences of numbers to encode the number of beats of each throw, which is related to their height and the hand to which the throw is made. 'Siteswap has allowed jugglers to share tricks with each other without having to meet in person or film themselves,' says James Grime, juggling enthusiast and math instructor for Cambridge University. Still unclear on the concept? Spend some time playing around with Paul Klimek's most-excellent Quantum Juggling simulator, and you too can be a Flying Karamazov Brother!"
Some people juggle geese.
Skype is too convoluted... Now I'm reverse-engineering the Kyoto Protocol.
Is that like tossing dwarfs?
Four is a *LOT* harder.
Four is a lot harder... I found (and still find) four harder than five, since juggling four in a cascade pattern is basically juggling five but "passing the gap" — making sure that the gap, where the fifth ball should be, is harder for me than actually having that fifth ball in place.
A very useful (as much as any juggling is "useful"...) technique for four is to learn to juggle two in each hand simultaneously, in both rotations and in columns. Asynchronous columns of two balls in each hand (no pun intended but, in the juggling world, "take two balls in your right hand" is a common phrase!) helps with coordination greatly. If you can juggle two ball rotations in each hand, you're not too far off being able to juggle three balls in one hand — just increase the height of the rotation to give you the extra time, and then lower the pattern down as your coordination and technique improves.
Sod knows how I ended up being a lawyer, but I still have "can juggle three machetes whilst blindfolded" on my CV :)
The idea that creating the right language can make such a difference may be dismissed as obvious by the /. audience who are familiar with this effect in programming languages.
But it shows the power of having someone look at a problem from a new or unusual perspective. In this case a mathematician managed to encompass most of the act of juggling in a simple expression. It must be incredibly satisfying to get an Eureka moment of this magnitude.
As I mentioned in another post, I taught juggling to a few hundreds people.
My best students were all women.
My best student could juggle "endlessly" after 2 minutes.
I couldn't believe it, but she really didn't know how to juggle at first, and I saw the complete usual learning curve in a time span of 2 minutes.
I showed her the "Mill's mess" after that, and she managed to do it after 3 tries. It looked sketchy, but it was definitely the right movement and rhythm.
BTW, twenty minutes is longer than my teaching average. I usually begin a session by telling my student that it's only gonna take 10 minutes. :D
They don't believe me at first, but after 10 minutes, they look like children in front of a huge cake.
Then don't do that!
Why would you learn 55550 before 5 or 4? As you said, it's harder than 5 or 4, but it doesn't help to learn either one.
It's also sketchy, and tends to go out of rhythm.
If you want to learn 4, try 441 first.
If you really want to juggle 4 balls on a 5 cascade pattern, try 5551. It feels great, its rhythm is stable, it's much easier than 5 but it kinda looks like 5.
It's boring to watch, but not boring to do.
About 20-some years ago, my martial arts instructor (who is now 87) decided that I needed to learn how to juggle. Nothing fancy, just three balls. I told him I didn't know Chinese juggled and he smacked me. I got up to 4 objects and then learned to pass with another juggler. I think it helped me as a martial artist and as a musician. It also was a great source of amusement for my daughter when she was little. I could juggle and she'd fall asleep, proving that juggling is in fact boring to watch.
You are welcome on my lawn.