Infinity and Beyond! Math for Primates Episode 14

I’ve just uploaded our new episode on Infinity and Fractals at the Math for Primates website.

In this episode:

• Zeno’s beach bungalow and why he can’t come out to play
• Do train tracks actually touch at infinity?  How do YOU know? Have you been there?
• Watch out for the Hordes!!
• Welcome to the Hilbert Hotel … you can check in any time you like, blah, blah, blah …
• What do you do with an infinite number of mathematicians? Run!
• Explaining jokes at the Unit Interval, a great neighborhood bar.
• Is one type of infinity BIGGER than another kind?
• Counting ALL the Real Numbers, “… 2, ah ah … 3, ah ah … pi, ah ah!”
• The Power Set:  the enemy of the X-Men.
• Fractals, Hippies, and gettin’ trippy
• Is Nick a quantum human?

Combinatorics: Let My People Count – Math for Primates Episode 011

Tom and I have gone all fancy and started working with a producer for our math/comedy program “Math for Primates”.  We enlisted the help of Keith Schreiner of Auditory Sculpture.

The format is more fun, there are musical interludes etc.  Check out the new episode here.

In This Episode:

• All about Combinatorics – the Mathematicians fancy way of “counting”.
• The magical musical and production styling’s of Keith Schreiner make Tom and Nick seem “almost” respectable.
• Tom invents the natural numbers in under 3 minutes.
• 5 primates are standing in a line … can you come up with a punch line?
• Is the factorial [5! = 5x4x3x2x1] just a way for mathematicians to justify yelling?
• How many ways can you cage 2 primates out of 5?  And is this illegal?
• The importance of watching Stargate SG1.
• Why is your genome smarter than your computer?
• If you went far enough on a space ship, would your toothpaste taste like rye bread?
• Apparently Nick ‘Horton’ has an alter-ego, Nick ‘Lion’.  It does sound more manly.

  The Stargate SG1 picture above will make more sense once you’ve heard the episode.

Pi Day – What’s the Big Deal?

Tom and I, being math podcasters, were forced by a code of mathematical obedience to do a  podcast in honor of pi day (March 14th). Yes, , the Greek letter turned mathematical object, number, and spawner of cults across the world.

Both Tom and I approached this topic with hesitation.  You see, while the most common response that math-folk like us get when we tell someone the we are math people is something akin to fear, distrust, disdain, and outright horror.

But, the second is a kind of strange respect normally reserved for guru’s and shaman.  A common refrain that accompanies this type of reaction is something like this, “Wow, you do math. That’s so … like … cool.  I really like pi myself.  It’s part of everything.  It’s, like, at the center of the universe …”

Frightening, to say the least.

But we are hardly the only people to have experienced such weirdness.  The Greeks suffered all manner of cults that worshiped this little unassuming number/letter.  And I’m sure some of them have survived to this day.

Tom and I aimed to dispel some of the myth of pi.  It’s just a number.  A weird number, yes.  Lot’s of applications to lots of cool stuff, yes.  But, mystical, no.  Our relationship with is purely platonic (get it, Platonic … Greek … OK, that was bad).

Here’s the link to the podcast again.

In this podcast:

• Tom and Nick are not as happy with Pi Day as you’d expect.
• Why do Hippies like Pi so much?
• Where does pi come from, and why do we care?
• Is mounting a Ferris Wheel on a Flat-Bed Truck a good idea?
• How many digits of pi can YOU recite?  I’ll bet not 69,000!
• Nick and Tom give you back 23 hours and 40 minutes of your life … ish.

Math for Primates episode 009 – Partial Orderings and What’s Wrong with the Olympics

We’ve posted our 9th episode over at Math for Primates on Partial Orderings. 

Here’s the breakdown of our discussion

• What’s wrong with the “medal count” ordering in the Olympics?
• Is it really all that surprising that Canada is good at Curling?
• quasi ordering vs partial ordering vs total ordering – who cares?
• Nick, leave the carrots out of this!
• Dealing with our Daddy issues with an ancestor semi-lattice
• Are you your own ancestor?
• For that matter, is a sandwich equal to 5 dollars?
• Discovering the quasi-order of joy-points