thnik again!

Painting by Rene Magritte.

Exactly one of these statements is false.

Exactly two of these statements are false.

Exactly three of these statements are false.

Exactly four of these statements are false.

Exactly five of these statements are false.

Exactly six of these statements are false.

Exactly seven of these statements are false.

Exactly eight of these statements are false.

Exactly nine of these statements are false.

Exactly ten of these statements are false.

Problem by Greg Ross.

To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself. – Albert Einstein

What’s happenin’ in math these days? One way to find out is to read Math News by Umberto Cerruti. 

Please send me any news you like about mathematics, mathematical models and mathematicians! If this is of general interest, I’ll publish it in these “Math News”. Please write “mathnews” in the object.

(I can only guess Umberto wants “mathnews” in the object and not in the subject for quality reasons.)

Last week I found an interesting article in Math News called ‘Why We Can’t Predict the Long-Term Effects of the Bailout’ by John Allen Paulos. His ending is worth quoting.

The bottom line is that when dealing with complex systems we should act with a certain humble dubiousness, not with an unblinking rashness. 
A bit of psychology backs up this counsel. A study a few years ago by Cornell psychologist David Dunning found that incompetent people are generally not aware of their own incompetence. Part of the explanation, Dunning wrote, is that the skills that constitute competence are often the very ones needed to recognize incompetence. 
This is perhaps why the most clueless politicians are the most self-confident.
Too often in politics, economics, religion, and everyday life, knowledge and tentativeness battle ignorance and certitude.

Mathieu puzzle M₁₂, which represents the sporadic simple group M₁₂, was designed by the authors to be played on the Internet. The puzzle begins with a scrambled version of the numbers 1 through 12. The object is to unscramble them using combinations of just two moves, both conveniently executed at the click of a button. The diagram shows the effect of each move on the unscrambled numbers. – More

To play click More and in the window that opens Play the M₁₂ Puzzle online.

The eleven dwarfs liked cookies. Actually, they couldn’t live without them! One day they asked Snow White to make cookies for them with only three conditions.

1. The number of cookies should be divisible by 11 so they could share them equally.
2. A lot of the finest chocolate should be used.
3. The number of cookies should use all of the digits from 0 to 9, but only once each.

The nice thing about egotists is that they don’t talk about other people. - Lucille S. Harper

- What are you doing?
- Putting plants down in my garden.
- I see. That’s neat!
- Thank you.
- But why do you do it so slowly?
- I am trying to put them down in a special way.
- Which way?
- I am trying to avoid having just two plants in a straight line.
- Please translate!
- Pick any two plants.
- That one and that one.
- OK. Now imagine a straight line going through them.
- How big are the plants?
- They have neither width nor area.
- I find that strange.
- I bought them from Euclid.
- I am imagining the straight line.
- Does the straight line go through at least one other plant?
- Yes. As a matter of fact it does!
- OK. That is my task. To put the plants down in such a way that not two plants lie on a straight line alone.
- That is easy! Put them all on a straight line!
- Would that be beautiful?
- Maybe not. However, I find this to be a strange exercise. Why do you do it?
- It is a request from my wife.
- And is it possible?
- That is irrelevant.
- What do you mean?
- It is a request from my wife.

The effort to understand the universe is one of the very few things that lifts human life a little above the level of farce, and gives it some of the grace of tragedy. - Steven Weinberg

- I sent an email last night I really regret that I sent!
- You mean, when you were not entirely sober?
- I guess so. I really don’t remember.
- Someone should have stopped you from sending the email.
- I know, but my cat was asleep.
- I mean, Gmail should have stopped you!
- What do you mean?
- They should have asked you some math question and if you didn’t get them right you could not send the email.
- You must be joking!

Gmail asks arithmetical questions that even a drunk cat can answer. Come up with better math questions that separate the drunk from the sober.

An ignorant person is one who doesn’t know what you have just found out. - Will Rogers