mathematics

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Garkov: Math Invades Garfield Parody

There's a special place in my heart for weird Garfield parodies, but today's subject really raises the bar for weirdness. The Garkov comic strip activates my Nerdy Spidey Sense, as it uses a Markov chain process to create the absurdist dialog. For those of us who don't know/care what a Markov chain really is, let's just say it's a mathematical process that takes an existing body of text (say, all the dialog from Garfield comic strips) and uses it to create new text that almost makes sense. Created by... READ ON

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George Dyson on the Birth of the Computer

George Dyson returns to TED with a seventeen-minute talk explaining the origins of the digital computer -- in hilarious style. Briefly starting with Leibniz's machine-based calculus proposal from 1679, Dyson takes us on a humorous ride through early computer development, with tons of anecdotes from early computer engineers' notebooks (including scans of all sorts of amusing notes). (If you can't see the visuals well enough below, try downloading the full-size MP4 file). If you like history or math,... READ ON

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How to Solve a Rubik's Cube in Only 23 Moves

I've never solved a Rubik's Cube. I'm that guy who takes the stickers off puts them where I want them in order to get it over with. (Much to the consternation of any legitimate puzzle-solver who might try to use my cube in the future.) So it was with some amazement that I learned that Rubik's Cube solutions are an area of active mathematical research. There are scholars out there working on ideal cube-solving algorithms, and major progress is being made towards "God's algorithm" -- more on that in a... READ ON

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Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine

Danny Hillis is best known for his Connection Machine, a massively parallel supercomputer that led to breakthroughs in computational science and parallel computing. (It also was the subject of Hillis's book The Connection Machine, which was a highly technical but fascinating version of his thesis paper on parallel computing. If you want the only halfway mind-blowing version, check out The Pattern on the Stone.) Hillis later led R&D at Walt Disney Imagineering, but in my book the Connection Machine was... READ ON

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How Electronic "20 Questions" Games Work

It was about four years ago when I first saw a 20Q ball. The tiny handheld device scrolled text across its meager one-line screen, inviting me to challenge it in a game of 20 Questions. I immediately thought of an object I figured it wouldn't guess ("iPod") and began to play the game. After a series of slightly odd questions -- including "Does it bring joy to people?" -- the little ball gave its guess: "MP3 player." Wow. It was right. So how does this 20Q device work? The short answer is... READ ON

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How to Use Toilet Paper

Certain aspects of human life are simultaneously private and universal -- everyone experiences the same stuff privately and almost no one talks about it. Pretty much everything that happens in the bathroom falls into this category, which is why I was amazed to discover that serious thought has gone into the challenges presented by toilet paper. Here are a few examples. The Toilet Paper Algorithm Design guru Don Norman decided to confront a common toilet paper crisis: the problem of the roll... READ ON

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5 Reasons We'll Miss Arthur C. Clarke

The late Sir Arthur C. Clarke was loved by nerds and normals alike for his contributions to literature, film, and technology. Here's a rundown of the five biggest reasons we'll miss him. 1. Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World Clarke kept extensive files on mysterious events, objects, and locations throughout the world. Starting in the early 1980's, he mined these files to bring us Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World, a thirteen-part TV series covering topics ranging from UFOs to crystal skulls.... READ ON

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Hofstadter Docudrama: "Victim of the Brain"

Douglas Hofstadter is the author of GÃ¶del, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, a now-classic work on how the mind arises from mechanical parts. While I'll admit I haven't gotten through the entire book, I recently enjoyed Victim of the Brain, a 1988 docudrama featuring interviews with Hofstadter. It's a strange little film, following Dutch director Piet Hoenderdos as he struggles to understand philosophical questions about consciousness through interviews as well as (slightly cheesy) adaptations... READ ON

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Fun with Venn and Euler Diagrams

A Venn diagram is a mathematical illustration that shows all of the possible mathematical or logical relationships between sets. A Euler diagram resembles a Venn diagram, but does not neccessarily show all possible intersections of the sets. A Euler diagram is often more useful for showing real world data, because not all sets partially overlap with all other sets.I used the 3 Circle Venn Diagram Applet to make a diagram of food preferences in my family. I have one child who won't eat much in... READ ON

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Super Mario World + Quantum Physics = Lots of Fun

I have a soft spot for Super Mario Brothers videos, and am particularly intrigued by a series of hacked versions of various Mario games that have hit the net in the past few years. In these hacked versions, the levels have been rearranged to make them more difficult, requiring players to repeat levels over and over to figure out the way past each little section. Videos appear on YouTube showing supergamers running through the hacked levels, performing seemingly impossible feats of timing and precision --... READ ON