Math For the Rest of Us
2009 September 10
I was bored in math the other day and came up with the following math problem, based on what I had seen several years earlier. The concept is rather elementary, but it’s application is quite exquisite.
Suppose:
6666 > 7111
1111 < 8809
9312 = 1
8193 = 3
8096 = 5
7777 = 0
Solve:
2581 = ?
I’m hoping Matthew, one of my good friends, will be able to give me an answer in less than 1 minute. It’s one of those problems that make you want to say “DOH!” after you have it solved because it’s just too easy. Any ideas? Leave them in the comments and I’ll let you know who wins!
2581 = 2.
I won’t say why in case others want to work on it as well.
By the way, how is the application exquisite?
Ultimately its not math at all. Its simplicity is where the trick comes in. For that reason, the application of patterns proves to be incredible.
That would be “Its” simplicity. And simplicity is in the eye of the beholder, at least to some extent. And that’s hardly a good reason for why “the application of patterns proves to be incredible”. I’m not sure that that even makes sense.
I’m also being a nitpicking jerk here because I needed to leave a comment so I could remind you to come over to my apartment.
Fine, then take my non-sensical ramblings and ignore them. I only wanted to highlight how, when most people hear math, they put themselves in a particular mindset to “solve” a math problem. Although you can equate each number to the number of loops and then do simple addition, the most simplistic way of solving is simply “counting the circles”.
And yes, I will come over to your apartment for tea.
Yeah, your wordpress theme isn’t handling these divs really well, eh?
I think I broke Wordpress.