Pi Day

[Lauren Hynde]

Today is March 14 (3.14), Pi Day. Pi may be irrational and transcendental, but often (unfortunately for the former and hopefully for the latter) so is poetry. Let us celebrate this special day by writing a poem in honour of this oh so special number.

If Pi doesn't do it for you, write about any other equally irrational number - φ, e, √2, etc - or about any mathematical theme in general.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

And if you don't like Pi, there's something wrong with you.

 

[Salvor-Hardon]

YEAH! PI DAY!

Ok now I have to write something for this.......

 

[Salvor-Hardon]

To Amita on Numb3rs

I look at her and her luscious curves
The proportions of her body
And think that how her desire serves
To prove that math is naughty

Her nipples hint at pi R square
Her build the golden mean
Chaos theory rules her hair
My log swells in between

Her legs are open at a degree
They can form an acute angle
When line of sight I then can see
My parts no longer dangle

My girlfriend is a mathematician
But times like this, she's more magician

 

[Lauren Hynde]

mathematic variations with cat
(with a non-mathematic nod to Schrödinger on Einstein's birthday)

drawing a circle around the fable's invisible avenue
following the white premonitions
the hyperboles and the polygons
of your desire

the city suspends
disproves the thesis enounced by the high priests
the ruins of the temple
are figures of transcendence.

when we see a cat go by
we declare the impossibility of all deaths
we elude the demonstration
and the war thinkers

i hesitate on parallel lines
on the infinity that travels them
notice the intelligence
of my hand inside the mouth you drew

let us return to steel
to the gelid theorem
the sacred book of brumes and myth
with silence for pages

 

[flyguy69]

LOL!

I look at her and her luscious curves
The proportions of her body
And think that how her desire serves
To prove that math is naughty

Her nipples hint at pi R square
Her build the golden mean
Chaos theory rules her hair
My log swells in between

Her legs are open at a degree
They can form an acute angle
When line of sight I then can see
My parts no longer dangle

My girlfriend is a mathematician
But times like this, she's more magician

 

[flyguy69]

mathematic variations with cat
(with a non-mathematic nod to Schrödinger on Einstein's birthday)
....
the hyperboles and the polygons
of your desire....

Are you suggesting my desire will never touch your asymptote?

 

[Lauren Hynde]

My asymptote is high-maintenance. It requires something more tangible than mere desire.

 

[flyguy69]

My asymptote is high-maintenance. It requires something more tangible than mere desire.

Everybody has their limit.

I'd settle for a slice of your pi.






gotta run!

 

[ishtat]

00

Are you suggesting my desire will never touch your asymptote?

An infinite attempt to zero in perhaps ?

 

[Tzara]

Supertask

I could count unto infinity
and never number all your charms.
Nor even pass around cigars
at David Hilbert's Grand Hotel
to show the world I honor you.

Not stalk its halls at night
and cut through logic's dark
with J. F. Thomson's lamp
which is never off nor on.

Or is it always both?

I see you not as aleph-null
nor even aleph-one. Transfinite
is your set, beyond
Cantor's cardinalities,
where even even numbers map
to ones and counting.

You are your own paradox,
and mine. Concept receding
into time. I love your throat.

So how do I love thee?
To what depth and breadth and height?

I dunno. 'Slike bird in flight.
Gödel's third theorem
or whatever. Kick over eight

small stones washed
in a smooth and steady river
scrubbed by sand and silt.

for Laur 2.7182818284590... n

 

[Senna Jawa]

Einstein, math, science and even GO+chess

Today is March 14 (3.14), Pi Day. Pi may be irrational and transcendental, but often (unfortunately for the former and hopefully for the latter) so is poetry. Let us celebrate this special day by writing a poem in honour of this oh so special number.

If Pi doesn't do it for you, write about any other equally irrational number - φ, e, √2, etc - or about any mathematical theme in general.

I didn't realize that there is such a connection between Einstein and pi (via birthday; Lauren, how come you have φ, e, √2 but not true pi; you may add to your collection Euler's gamma too). Both, the golden ratio (mean) φ, and the square root of two, √2, are very easy to compute with great precision. But back to poems, e.g.:

Shamu on my GO board
I need your two eyes!
​

I hope that you enjoyed this minature even if you have never heard about the famous baby-dolphin Shamu. It'd help also if you knew that Go is played with white and black stones which form all kind of patterns on the Go board. Finally, it's nice to know the Go concept of a safe group and of the double eye, which assures that a group is safe.

This example is highly atypical for me. As a rule I make sure that my poems can be fully enjoyed without knowing any exotic reference. This is in particular true in the case of my poems which in addition have a technical background. But the following two (of many) address rather the social angle: 19-th hole & across.... (Sorry for the horrible format. No, it's not on purpose, and it's not for the better. It has happened to many of my poems on Literotica, and I don't have energy or time to fix it--then what? Literotica will change its ways again).

Hardly anybody would suspect that a stroll... has anything to do with science, but it does in a big way. That's how I like it. A poem should be a poem, and not a circus shambo-mambo.

Some of you may remember the recent achilles. I hope that you will not stop at just recognizing the Zeno paradox, which serves here only as a start point. Go much beyond it or else the poem is wasted.

Yes, bridges... is characteristic for being just a poem, while there is an event from the history of mathematics behind it.

OK, my selection has already reached letter b in my Literotica index. I'll stop now.

Enjoy,

Senna Jawa​

 

[Lauren Hynde]

(Lauren, how come you have φ, e, √2 but not true pi; you may add to your collection Euler's gamma too). Both, the golden ratio (mean) φ, and the square root of two, √2, are very easy to compute with great precision.

Hi, Senna. No special reason, I was just throwing out there a few extra examples of irrational numbers anyone might find more inspiring or intriguing than pi. φ and √2 may be easy to compute with great precision, but they are irrational just the same, and with me being an architect, and a non-american one at that, φ and √2 were obviously the first two that popped into my head. They're all around me, daily.


PS: I can be wrong, but if I remember correctly, it hasn't been proven if Euler's constant is indeed irrational or if its denominator is just incredibly large. Were there any recent progresses made on that one?

 

[Senna Jawa]

Hi, Senna. No special reason, I was just throwing out there a few extra examples of irrational numbers anyone might find more inspiring or intriguing than pi.

I meant: why ascii "pi" in place of the true Greek graphic "pi"? I see, that's the penalty on "pi" for being less inspiring than φ.

φ and √2 may be easy to compute with great precision, but they are irrational just the same

I mentioned the easy computability of φ and √2 as a curio and not as a drawback. Yes, they are irrational but algebraic (not transcendental). This simply means that they are roots of the polynomials with integer coefficients, namely of

x^2 - x - 1
x^2 - 2
​

respectively.

and with me being an architect, and a non-american one at that, φ and √2 were obviously the first two that popped into my head. They're all around me, daily.

Indeed, we Americans pop popcorn and soda-pops, not φ and √2.

The golden mean (golden ratio) is common in the Nature. And the square root of 2 occurs as the ratio of the edges of the standard sheets of paper, which was a clever idea by someone a long time ago.

PS: I can be wrong, but if I remember correctly, it hasn't been proven if Euler's constant is indeed irrational or if its denominator is just incredibly large. Were there any recent progresses made on that one?

You are right.

I don't follow the math news any more than anybody interested in sci news. Quite recently I was rediscovering, just for fun, certain inequalities (the upper and lower estimates) for Euler's gamma or, what is about the same, for the sum of the finite harmonic series:

1 + 1/2 + ... + 1/n
​

How do you get Greek letters, etc. on Literotica (in a post) without copying them from somewhere and pasting?

Regards,

Senna Jawa​

 

[Lauren Hynde]

I meant: why ascii "pi" in place of the true Greek graphic "pi"? I see, that's the penalty on "pi" for being less inspiring than φ.

Oh, that. To tell the truth, I just didn't like the way lowercase π looks in Verdana font on the title of the thread, and after that, it was moot. But I suppose I could have changed font in the body of the post. Pi is transcendental, though, so that should compensate the non-Greek factor. (Curiously, Pi-the-number has been around for over 3600 years, but π (Times New Roman - better ) was only used as a notation for the first time in 1737 by none other than Euler.)

And the square root of 2 occurs as the ratio of the edges of the standard sheets of paper, which was a clever idea by someone a long time ago.

That's what I meant. Most of the world, US and Canada excluded, uses ISO126 paper formats, based on the Deutsches Institut für Normung's standard. The original idea to use √2 was supposedly French, though, in the early 1800s.

How do you get Greek letters, etc. on Literotica (in a post) without copying them from somewhere and pasting?

Regards,

Senna Jawa​

I don't think so, other than altering the keyboard type each time you need to do that. It's not worth the trouble, I think. I usually copy/paste what I need from the system map of characters.

 

[Senna Jawa]

golden ratio φ

You may compute it as follows:

start with the fraction 1/1. Next, when you already have a fraction b/a, then write the next fraction as equal to (a+b)/b. Do it infinitely many times and you'll get φ. Actually, already after a few steps your fraction will approximate φ very well, and still much better after each next step. Here are the first terms of the approximating sequence:

1/1 ; 2/1 ; 3/2 ; 5/3 ; 8/5 ; 13/8 ; 21/13 ; 44/21 ...
​

Enjoy,

 

[Senna Jawa]

√2

The square root of 2 is only slightly more complex than the golden mean. Start with the fraction 1/1 again. Once you get fraction b/a then the next one is (2*a+b)/(a+b). Go on, you'll get:

1/1 ; 3/2 ; 7/5 ; 17/12 ; 31/29 ; 89/60 ; ...
​

Take the square b^2/a^2 of any of these fractions b/a, and you'll see that the difference

|b^2/a^2 - 2| = 1/a^2
​

i.e. the error is as small as possible for the given denominator a^2. Just look at the numerator of the difference: |b^2 - 2*a^2| -- it's always 1. For instance, for 7/5 we have 7^2=49 and 2*5^2=50. This shows you how well our fractions approximate √2.

Enjoy,

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Thanks, Senna. I still think that determining either of them geometrically is easier and more fun.

 

[CharleyH]

And if you don't like Pi, there's something wrong with you.

I LOVE PI! 3*2^36.

(ok, so, like, I prefer lemon merangue and got this equation off a nerd site) NERD! There is a good poem in there some where!

Lauren + Pi = lemon merangue?

 

[OT]

extracted from something I wrote long ago

Do The Math

<...>

multiplying moans
prime number screams
imaginary numbers
a single sigh

erotic degrees of freedom
impossible to divide
two become one

 

[Senna Jawa]

busy

Does it count?

*****

my Indian friend's phone is busy --
the Indian population exceeds a billion
​

*****

Enjoy,

 

[Liar]

How do you get Greek letters, etc. on Literotica (in a post) without copying them from somewhere and pasting?

Regards,

Senna Jawa​

You can, but it's more trouble than it's worth.

1. Make sure Num Lock is on.
2. Hold down the Alt-key.
3. Type the character's HTML character number on the numeric pad.
4. Release the Alt-key.

The HTML charset code for pi is 960: π
Here are some other:

916 - Δ
920 - Θ
937 - Ω
8730 - √
8706 - ∂
931 - Σ
9774 - ☮

More here

This works in Windows. If you're on Mac or other systems, I'm not sure how to do it.

But really, copy-paste it from Word seems like an easier way.

 

[Senna Jawa]

The HTML charset code for pi is 960: π

More here

This works in Windows. If you're on Mac or other systems, I'm not sure how to do it.

But really, copy-paste it from Word seems like an easier way.

Thank you "Liar", and Lauren too. Hm, these are ISO-88 59-2 codes. However, unicode is taking over, and is more convenient to use. Thus let me try on my mini Mac if it will work: ... I guess it does not

When I type in my Polish poems on Internet, using the on-line editors then indeed I copy and paste. I have more than one file with Polish characters for this. I will add other characters there too (math, chess, etc). Perhaps we could have a page with all kind of funny characters here, glued/fixed... or whatever you call such pages at the top of the index. We could have it among our recources.