March 13, 2018 Tuesday
Bedtime Story
Beauty of Conic Sections
So it was this decision of Emperor
Constantine that explains why nearly all the European scientists that we
discuss nearly every night including Saint-Vincent were so strong believers of
Jesus (and not Mithra, or Isis or Mani or even the Hebrew god Tetragrammaton
often shortened and anglicized as Jehovah or Yahweh) and often considered
serving their church as the default mode of life.
Of the several things that he did or may
have done in mathematics, what Saint-Vincent is most known for in the history
of mathematics, is for calculating the area under a rectangular hyperbola.
Now most average apes have very little idea
about hyperbolas and the only thing that most may know about hyperbola is the
English word hyperbole which means exaggeration especially with reference to
the figure of speech.
Very literally hyperbola means
“over-thrown” or “excessive” from its Greek origins and this perhaps gives a
far more revealing or visual understanding of the mathematical term.
Hyperbola is one of the three conic
sections, the other being parabola and ellipse.
Now the conic sections have appealed to the
great mathematical minds of all times and they have studied them deeply for
thousands of years.
It is a rich source of very interesting and
for many mathematicians “beautiful” results in Euclidean geometry.
Most average ape are concerned with the
applications of their study but this breed of apes called mathematicians often
study for sake of interest or something called beauty.
It is very hard to describe to common apes
what exactly is meant by mathematical beauty.
It is that elusive aesthetic pleasure that
one derives or experiences from activities ranging as diverse as watching a sun
set high up in remote mountains, watching a pristine waterfall crashing down on
rocky boulders as one at Yosemite National Park, on the execution of a delicate
and precise micro-surgery or even a profound religious experience that so many
describe while visiting crooked gurus.
Generally speaking, mathematical equations
are grotesque and frightening to most apes with Mon Ami himself describing one
long one as a “monstrosity” and yet towards the end of that monstrosity lay a
proof so small and brief that it could only be described as beautiful.
Mathematical beauty can manifest itself in
three ways:
Beauty in Method
Beauty in Results
Beauty in Experience
Mathematical beauty, just like a religious experience,
is an ineffable entity that simply cannot or perhaps even should not be
expressed in either spoken or written words.
Just see what Paul Erdős, the Hungarian
mathematician, who is perhaps most famous for the quote “If numbers aren’t
beautiful, I don’t know what is” had to say on the ineffability of mathematical
Beauty:
Stay tuned to the voice of an average story storytelling
chimpanzee or login at http://panarrans.blogspot.com
Good night mon ami and my fellow cousin ape.
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Another great educator and a teacher that I am aware of is
Professor Subhashish Chattopadhyay in Bangalore, India.
While I narrate stories, Professor Subhashish an electronic
engineer and a former professor at BARC, does and teaches real mathematics and
physics.
He started the participation of Indian students at the
International Physics Olympiad.
Do visit him here:
All his books can be downloaded for free through this link:
For edutainment and English education of your children, I
recommend this large collection of Halloween Songs for Kids:
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