Today, 14 March, is a very special day. It’s ‘Pi Day’, and mathematicians and scholars around the world celebrate it every year on March 14th (3/14) because the number Pi (π) = 3.14. (Interesting side note: March 14th is also the birthday of the famous scientist Albert Einstein.)
As I’m sure all of you are aware, Pi is a very special number in mathematics. It is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. Another way of understanding Pi is to divide ANY circle’s circumference by its diameter and you will always get the same answer: 3.141592… or Pi! The symbol π (Pi) represents this number and it is an infinite number – the decimal digits never end. At the moment, Pi has been calculated to 105 trillion decimal digits by a computer storage company in the U.S. It took 75 days to complete and used up 1 million gigabytes (a thousand terabytes) of data.
The first official Pi Day celebration happened on March 14, 1988, in San Francisco, USA. A scientist named Larry Shaw organised the event. They celebrated by very imaginatively marching in circles and eating pies. Over the years, more and more people started celebrating Pi Day and do fun and creative things like reciting as many digits of Pi as they can remember, or dressing up as famous mathematicians (and yes, some people do still eat pies on Pi day!).
To end off, here are some interesting facts about Pi:
- In the first 31 digits of Pi, there are no zeros!
- The current world record for reciting Pi is held by Suresh Kumar Sharma, who recited an incredible 70 030 digits of π in 17 hours and 14 minutes.
The practice of memorising Pi is know as Piphilology.
- Pi appears in the Bible!
- The Greek letter π is the 16th letter of the Greek alphabet.
In ancient times, Archimedes was the first person to study Pi.
There are actually other names for Pi – such as Ludolph’s Number, Archimedes constant and Circular constant.
Parent problem of the week
A local pizzeria had a special on pizzas. They offered 2 large (16-inch) pizzas for the same price as 3 medium (14-inch) pizzas. Which one should a person go for to get the most pizza?
Solution to last week’s problem
Last week’s problem was based on the number 7:
As I was going to St Ives,
I met a man with seven wives,
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cat had seven kits:
Kits, cats, sacks and wives,
How many were going to St Ives?
How many were going to St Ives?
This is one of those problems or riddles where the answer is dependent on the interpretation of the questions. You can interpret it by saying that YOU are the only one going to St. Ives and no one actually knows where the man and his many wives are going. So the answer could be 1 person going to St Ives.
However, if you interpret it as everyone in the riddle going to St Ives (i.e. kittens, cats, sacks, wives, and 1 man,) then:
2 men + 7 wives + (7×7 sacks) + (7x7x7 cats) + (7x7x7x7 kittens) = 2802.
You could also argue that sacks don’t count, so then its 2802 – 49 = 2753.