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π π π π π π π π Pi Day Links π π π π π π π π
General Information |
Calculating Pi |
Probability Pi |
Fun with Pi |
Memorizing Pi |
Pi Humor
General Information
- If you'd like to download (or buy) a copy of the poster we'll be
displaying at this year's Pi Day, try here.
- A general intro to Pi plus many links. Also, part of the
Math Forum site which has pages on other interesting aspects of math.
- A more detailed history of our knowledge and understanding
of Pi, including a several formulas for computing it. Good
references to books and articles and many links to other web pages.
- A very good overview with sections on the role Pi plays in many
areas of mathematics (not just geometry).
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A page containing 7 video clips that together comprise "The Story of
Pi". For those who learn better by looking and listening than reading.
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Nothing new here, but a rather eclectic collection of tidbits, some of
them with a nice slant.
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This is the site for you. There are other sites with more, but do you
really need them?
- If you need lots of digits but don't have a fast internet
connection, then maybe you'll want to compute the first billion digits
on your own PC. If so, this program claims to be the fastest.
- A discussion of the arctangent function and its role in
computing Pi geared to high school level. (The arctan-based methods
are no longer used to compute Pi, but that doesn't detract from their
interest, especially as there is a tie-in with the Fibonacci Numbers.)
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He has written two books and several articles on Pi and is a co-author
of the first algorithm for computing the Nth digit of Pi without
computing digits 1 - (N-1).
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It used to be that to determine the Nth digit of Pi you had to compute
all N digits. No longer. In 1997, David H. Bailey, Peter Borwein and
Simon Plouffe published a paper (Bailey, 1997) on a new formula for
computing Pi that allows the computation of the Nth hexadecimal digit without
computing digits 1 - (N-1). Since then, others have followed with for
formulas of decimal digits and digits in other bases.
Probability Pi
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Reports progress towards answering the question from a theoretical
perspective.
This article claims that applying the standard tests used to
evaluate "psudo-random sequences" gives the result that Pi is
a good but not great source of random digits.
Looking at the
first 10,000 digits, most would conclude that it really isn't
random. But then, humans are very good at seeing patterns that aren't
there.
- A good look at this classic probability problem and its
relationship to pi. (Or, How to Get a Poor Approximation of Pi By
Dropping Needles. :-)
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The program at this site is of essentially no use as it is a Delphi source file,
but the explanation of what is going on is the best exposition of Buffon's needle
that I've seen on the
net - it has particularly good graphics.
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Best text explanation of the problem I've seen on the net.
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Compose a piece for pi!
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Just for fun, 3 completely silly Pi Day songs
- Send an Internet greeting card for Pi Day (3/14) and confuse your friends.
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It is believed that any finite sequence of digits will eventually occur
in the representation of Pi. Want to find where the first occurrance of
your birth date is in the
sequence of digits? (Note that this only searches the first
200 million digits so not all long sequences (11 digits or longer)
will appear.)
- For "proof" (false, of course :-) that pi is rational...
an alternative pi resource.
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Also has 'Top ten reasons why e is inferior to pi' :-)
- A list of some of the felonies you've committed if you are
caught with a "complete" binary version of Pi (thanks to the recent Digital
Millenium Copyright Act).
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Unfortunately, this is not a joke, but if I didn't laugh, I'd have to cry.
This is the story of how the state
of Indiana House of Representatives really did pass a bill that
declared Pi to be equal to 3.2 or 4.0 or 3.23 or .... (The state Senate tabled the
bill so it never became law.)
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World records of number of digits memorized, etc.
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A number of poems whose word lengths are the digits of pi. Lots of fun.
- A fun little page about memorizing pi and other numbers.
π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π
We'd like to thank Yuval Peduel of our Volunteer program for compiling and writing up these links.
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