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perldiver at 09:39pm on 02/11/2004
perldiver at 09:39pm on 02/11/2004So, I'm sitting here watching the election coverage with my friend Adrienne (a Barnard student majoring in Math). She's smooshing the binding on my copy of Fellowship of the Ring, and I squick. So, I start pointing out to her all the other options for marking your page aside from spreading the book flat and thereby breaking the binding.
"See these little numbers in the top left corner? They increment on each page...each page has a unique number. If you just remember the number, you can turn right back to this page. For example, you're on page 244. That's a very interesting number, you know."
She looks at me with that "Oh really? Why is it so interesting, smartass?" expression, and, not having had anything in mind when I said that, I start to scramble.
"well....see, if you had been one page further along [sic: should have said one left-hand-side page], it would be 246, which is a nice progression....um...oh! Look, 244 is also the product of two squares."
(I felt pretty triumphant to have spotted that.)
She stares at it with a concentration-furrowed brow, summoning her not-inconsiderable math prowess to the fore to determine what the two squares might be.
Now, for the record, Adrienne is a far better mathematician than I am. Which is really annoying, since she's also 12 years younger. In any case, given that I had seen it in about 2 seconds it is a little surprising to watch her sit there frowning in an attempt to recognize that 244 = 144 + 100 = 12^2 + 10^2.
"You know," I say. "If I can see this easily, you REALLY should be able to."
The frown clears. "Ah," she says. "It's 15^2 and 4^2."
So, I promptly grabbed the keyboard and entered this. And now she wants to be the first respondent below.
PS: WOOHOO! The coup-de-grace! It's not 15^2 + 4^2! In fact, there are no other sum-of-two-squares solutions aside from the one I so brilliantly spotted. *takes a truly obnoxious victory lap*
However, she tells me, it is the sum of two cubes: 7^3 + 1^3.
*sigh*
"See these little numbers in the top left corner? They increment on each page...each page has a unique number. If you just remember the number, you can turn right back to this page. For example, you're on page 244. That's a very interesting number, you know."
She looks at me with that "Oh really? Why is it so interesting, smartass?" expression, and, not having had anything in mind when I said that, I start to scramble.
"well....see, if you had been one page further along [sic: should have said one left-hand-side page], it would be 246, which is a nice progression....um...oh! Look, 244 is also the product of two squares."
(I felt pretty triumphant to have spotted that.)
She stares at it with a concentration-furrowed brow, summoning her not-inconsiderable math prowess to the fore to determine what the two squares might be.
Now, for the record, Adrienne is a far better mathematician than I am. Which is really annoying, since she's also 12 years younger. In any case, given that I had seen it in about 2 seconds it is a little surprising to watch her sit there frowning in an attempt to recognize that 244 = 144 + 100 = 12^2 + 10^2.
"You know," I say. "If I can see this easily, you REALLY should be able to."
The frown clears. "Ah," she says. "It's 15^2 and 4^2."
So, I promptly grabbed the keyboard and entered this. And now she wants to be the first respondent below.
PS: WOOHOO! The coup-de-grace! It's not 15^2 + 4^2! In fact, there are no other sum-of-two-squares solutions aside from the one I so brilliantly spotted. *takes a truly obnoxious victory lap*
However, she tells me, it is the sum of two cubes: 7^3 + 1^3.
*sigh*
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