thnik again!

… 17 is famous in mathematics for Carl Friedrich Gauss’s famous straightedge-and-compass construction of a regular 17-gon, for the 17 “wallpaper” symmetries of the plane, and for the fact that if you connect 17 suitably spaced dots with a segment of red, blue, or green, you will automatically create a “monochromatic” triangle whose three vertices are among the original 17 dots. And nobody has yet created a solvable Sudoku puzzle with fewer than 17 original entries. How about that? …

The answer is taken from an interview with Derrick Niederman, author of ‘Number Freak: From 1 to 200, The Hidden Language of Numbers Revealed.’

What is your answer?

It seems quite unrealistic to judge a curriculum by its general outline, or to judge a course by its syllabus. We can “cover” very impressive material, if we are willing to turn the student into a spectator. But if you cast the student in a passive role, then saying that he has “studied” your course may mean no more than saying of a cat that he has looked at a king. Mathematics is something that one does. – Edwin E Moise

From today’s mail.

My psychologist suggested I should send you an email as you may be the only one able to solve my problem. Every month I print a newsletter I make. It has 28 pages.  I use my own printer. I print 40 copies. To be ecological I print on both sides of the paper.

First I print 20 copies of all 28 pages. Then I take the first 20 printouts of page 1, turn them over and put them back into the printer and print page 2 on them. After that I take the next 20 printouts of page 2, turn them over and put them back into the printer and print page 1 on them. So far I have 40 copies of pages 1 and 2 using 40 sheets of paper.

I continue like this this till the entire newsletter has been printed. My psychologist believes there is a simpler way to do the printing, but when I asked him how he only answered: What do you think the solution is? I told him I don’t have a clue, so he gave me your email.

Many teachers are concerned about the amount of material they must cover in a course. One cynic suggested a formula: since, he said, students on the average remember only about 40% of what you tell them, the thing to do is to cram into each course 250% of what you hope will stick. - Paul Halmos

I found these beautiful images at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton_fractal. Naturally I would like to create them and play with others. But where do I find free PC software for this? Do you know?

Problem source: Plotting the roots of run-of-the-mill polynomials yields dazzling results.

A, B, and C, were dealt three cards each of Ace, 2, 3, …, 9 of diamonds.

When A drew one of his cards randomly he was more likely to draw a higher card than a random card from B. Similarly, B would beat C and C would beat A.

Which cards did A, B, and C, get? I kind of forgot.

Problem source: Dan’s problem of the week.

The noblest of all dogs is the hot-dog; it feeds the hand that bites it.  - Laurence J. Peter

How we perceive time is a funny business. Here are two things to think about.

1. In order to have the perception of a long life should every moment be boring so it feels like an eternity or can you suggest better ways?

2. Why do other people’s children seem to grow up so much faster than one’s own?

Problem source: Where Did the Time Go? Do Not Ask the Brain by Benedict Carey.

As a matter of principle, I never attend the first annual anything. – George Carlin