Yes, it is what you think it is. It is a day for Pi! Wuhoo!
Pi or approximately known as π = 3.14 is one of the natural existing constant of this world. Though mathematicians have yet posses a full understanding of this captivating entity, Pi had contributed much to the advancement of technology. Mathematicians all around the world work closely and are in love the constant Pi.
The first recorded discovery of Pi dated back in 2 000 BC where the mathematicians of Babylon and ancient Egypt were the firsts to be curious of the existence of Pi when they stumbled upon a seemingly coincidental ratio radius of circle to its circumference. The earliest approximations of Pi was 3.125 by the Babylonians and 256/81 by the Egyptians. Not bad for a first-timer, I would say. Not bad, not bad.
Though Pi was discovered a very long time ago, the famous symbol of π was just been introduced in recent centuries. It was a man who goes by the name of William Jone first wrote down π on a piece of paper in 1706. He was a pretty important mathematician of his time by the fact that he and Isaac Newton was close pals.
Yes, today, March 14th, is the Pi Day. A day was picked to commemorate the discover of Pi. A day put aside to spare a special time to appreciate the magnificent beauty of Pi. One of the cool thing about Pi Day (beside it the fact it sounded funny: pai-dei) is that it was picked on a witty reason. The kind of reason of which I call a 'mathematically-cute' reason. You'll see why. If you look back at the history, today never was stated as the exact day when Jone wrote down the symbol π or even the first Babylonian/Egyptian discover the ratio Pi. However, the reason lies in the date itself. If you live westward of Greenwich Meridian Timeline, you would probably have guessed it by now. March 14th was specifically picked because the first three digits of Pi are 3, 1 and 4. These three digits happen to be in the date 3/14! Tara~ You were surprised dincha? I know you did. Just admit it.
LOL. By the way, yes, mathematicians indeed couldn't resist any chance to do this kind of 'mathematically-cute' things. Yerp, they really couldn't. Why you ask? Because they really couldn't!
There are a lot of approximations of Pi that we are able to observe in history books as it progressed through the many era of humanity. The one that might be most familiar to us today is π = 22/7. However, the exact value of Pi has yet to be discover. Mathematicians, scientists and computer programmers had been constantly working to generate the entire digits of Pi. The nearest approximation of Pi that I know was generated back in 2003 by a Japanese mathematician (regrettably, I didn't remember his exact name). He approximated Pi to around 1.24 trillion decimal place. Crazy fellow! Though many mathematicians believe that Pi is an irrational number, I beg to differ. I personally believe that Pi is just yet to be proven rational. Probably it can be express elegantly in some weird overlapping number system. Or some other whole new concept that is yet to be discover. Who knows? I don't. But I'm dead curious. Being a math geek, this is the kind of thing I put into my Things-I-Want-To-Know-Before-I-Die list. It comes and haunt me on my bed every time I'm trying to catch a good night sleep:
Is Pi truly is irrational?
So mathematicians worldwide, start figuring some witty theory or crunching some algorithm into computers, because I want to know!
XD
If you have yet to come to love the number Pi, then you should. Yeah. I mean, seriously. Why? Because it is cool!
LOL. Click on the
π if you want to get to know it more intimately. ^_^
Anyway, try to go out, chill, have a pie and have some fun or just take your old math book and do some geometry exercises. Why? Because today is Pi Day!
If that is too geeky for you, here are some links you might like to visit on Pi day:
Pi Digit Birthday Locator,
Pi Jokes,
Pi Song,
Debate on Pi Song,
Pi Sudoku!
Happy Pi Day everyone!
And today happens to be Einstein's birthday. Happy birthday pak-cik-tua-yang-sangat-pandai!
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