63 Comments

Would the SAD sufferer prefer going to work / school in the dark? I'm talking about darkness after 8 a.m. in the middle of the winter. Do you stand at a bus stop? That's a very strong memory for me in high school in 1973, when it was instituted as an energy-saver FOR ONE YEAR UNTIL THEY SAID NO MORE. I remember all the lights in the school hallways being turned up, so I doubted how much energy was saved anyway.

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I once contacted David Blatner, the author of The Joy of Pi, about an internal inconsistency in the meaning of "digits of pi." In one case, the digits of pi included the lead "3" as the first digit. In another case in the same book, it was "digits past the decimal place."

He wrote back to say his book had been out for many years, and I was the first person to have ever noticed the problem. He said it would be corrected in the next printing.

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I don’t mind having to refresh for more answers but would it be possible to have it come to first new? Having to scroll through each time is a PIA

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The older of my two daughters was born on European Approximation of Pi Day (July 22nd or 22/7 because they write their dates the wrong way). With two engineers as parents, this was by design.

The younger of my two daughters was born on the August 16rh (8/16) or 2 cubed/2 to the fourth power. This too was by design.

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It seems we can only see the poll results if we have voted. I haven't had Covid, so I can't see the results for the questions after #1. Is this something that can be changed?

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I paid $29.95 (sorry, forgot I wasn't supposed to mention that) for a disquisition on pi ? I was expecting less from you Gene. Much less. Guess you can take a kid out of Bronx Sci, but can't take Bronx Sci out of the kid. For a moment there, thought I was attending an after-party thrown by the Bureau of Standards. I mean the least you could have done was manage a figurative tug of the forelock to Archimedes of Syracuse (no, not the new men's basketball coach). But that's displaced water over the bathtub. Sorry. You're just going to have to do worse.

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Like Gene, I don’t really believe in some invisible, magic guy in the sky controlling things….,but the notion of good ol’ irrational pi does make me think there might be a Eddie Haskell smartass type up there just effing with us

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I am curious as to which of the formulas for pi you used for your computer. By the way, I think Pi Day should be celebrated at March 14, 1:59:26.535… (a.m.) UTC.

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Mar 14, 2023·edited Mar 24, 2023

It will not be based on the economy.

It will be based on popular perceptions about the economy.

Nobody is better than Trump at convincing people that things are bad, whether they are or not.

And the Democrats are champions at talking about all the people "left behind," even during good economic times.

And of course the moment Trump was elected, he started crowing about how suddenly the economy was better, to the point where even people who should know better started just conceding the economy issue to him.

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In Season 1, Episode 11 of Murdoch Mysteries, there is a character, Mr. Horton, who is said to be able to recite a thousand digits of pi. But the show was set in 1895 at that point. William Shank's calculation of 1853 was only 707 digits long and there was was an error in 528th place which wasn't discovered until 1946. This is typical of TV writers and their lack of attention to detail.

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You wanna go wonk ? I'll see your epidemiology and pi obsession and raise you Bayes' rule or theorem for calculating conditional probabilities. AI researchers use it to help machines recognize patterns and make decisions as with autonomous vehicles, for example. Bayesian software sorts spam from email, assesses medical and homeland security risks and decodes DNA. Cognitive scientists conjecture that our brains incorporate Bayesian algorithms as they perceive, deliberate, decide And as with many seemingly elegant but commonsensical tools, it can also be used to promote superstition and pseudoscience. In other words, if you aren’t scrupulous in seeking alternative explanations for the evidence which you're using to generate the probabilities, the evidence will likely just confirm what you already believe.

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Well, since Detective Murdoch effectively invented every tool on investigation, maybe he also knew pi to 1000 digits and predicted that when there would be an International System of Units, they would want to honor Pascal with the unit of pressure! :-)

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Been following mask debate and trials since onset. I'm MD researcher, do RCTs. The data on masks in community setting best described as piss-poor: masks are surgical masks with some ability to limit what you spread, but offer little protection with what you breathe in - they are not air tight; people notoriously unreliable with how diligently they wear masks. With regard to individual masking, wearing N95 appropriately would be very protective, a KN95 less so. A surgical mask not much. If I travelled by bus/subway I would wear N95. Meanwhile I caught Covid via my adult daughter, who is a diligent mask wearer and got it anyway. She gave it to my husband and I did not scramble to the guest room when he said he wasn't feeling well. Oh well......

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On the topic, my GF found the place under the cabinet where I kick the last piece of dust, food particle, etc. I’m trying to hide from her as she is inspecting my cleaning. So when she leaves, I can use it. When she returns, I need to have swept or vacuumed it. This reflects the gaming of both your GF and Art Buchwald.

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One minute's notice that the chat starts an hour early?!! C'mon.

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More of a question than a comment. My COVID, if it was COVID, began at the end of February 2020. Doctor denied that COVID was even possible. (I had not been on a cruise or to China and had not associated knowingly with anyone who had.) I'm not sure how to respond to the polls, or whether I should skip them.

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