@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

danpmoore

@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz

Pension actuary & math buff. He/him. Passionate about polytopes, integer sequences, statistics & science. Also jogging!

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danpmoore, to random
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

For today’s Worldle, Sydney is the alleged capital of Australia. Hoo boy.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@ColinTheMathmo It’s https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
Maybe they fixed it. Capitals are chosen from a list, and Canberra wasn’t on the list earlier today.

christianp, to random
@christianp@mathstodon.xyz avatar

Someone in the @TMiP WhatsApp group told me about a TikTok game where you're shown a sequence of five numbers, and have to guess what order they go in.

I've made my own version of it: https://somethingorotherwhatever.com/number-order-game/

"Order those numbers! You'll be shown five numbers, between 100 and 999. Try to guess what order the numbers will go in, from smallest to biggest." I'm shown 995, 164, 706, 576 and 227, and place them in 5th, 1st, 4th, 3rd and 2nd positions. Then it says "You did it!"

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@christianp @TMiP Reminds me of the prize board scam in the movie Paper Moon.

kjhealy, to random
@kjhealy@mastodon.social avatar

The word “nonplussed” means “at a loss” not “unperturbed” you goddamn monsters

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@BoydStephenSmithJr @kjhealy That’s not what prescriptivism means. Words still have meanings, thankfully.

christianp, to random
@christianp@mathstodon.xyz avatar

Is this thing rotationally symmetric?
Poll in the next toot.

I have a photo looking down at it from above that I will post later.

danpmoore,
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@christianp I stared at the photo for a long time (at one point turning my phone upside down) before casting my vote.

christianp, to random
@christianp@mathstodon.xyz avatar

Who can find a street with a number in its name that's bigger than the number of any building on that street?

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@christianp Googol street view, anyone?

ColinTheMathmo, (edited ) to random
@ColinTheMathmo@mathstodon.xyz avatar

Something someone mentioned recently started me wondering. So if you generally take showers (rather than, say, having a bath) then what gender are you mostly, and which way do you face?

I know gender is difficult and I'm excluding people, but I only have four options. I might try to create a 2D plot that lets people pick a point, but let's go simplistic for now.

If you feel excluded by the options, please feel free to let us know your preference in the comments.

Please feel free to boost for coverage.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@ColinTheMathmo I think most people make at least one rotation, so that their front, back and sides get wet.

ColinTheMathmo, (edited ) to random
@ColinTheMathmo@mathstodon.xyz avatar

[I'm not asking for advice ... please don't try to help me]

OK, so ...

Trying to assist to to things on the computer. These are things that they are absolutely capable of, and will (I believe) greatly enhance their quality of life.

Then Oh. My. God.

The misconceptions are f'n unbelievably. The way they think things work, the things they believe happen when they perform certain operations, it's just ... inconceivable.

I've started to unpick some of what's going on, and it's horrendous.

To start ...

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@ColinTheMathmo Suggestion: look for videos that address some of the challenges your relative is encountering.

GottaLaff, to random
@GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

Re: #FaniWillis and those phone records. Via Anna Bower: 1/...

Berkeley, an att'y:

I know that some time back when I sent a subpoena for phone records from a carrier (cannot recall which), and it advised me that the company's policy was to require a court order and not just a subpoena. That was an exception; subpoenas normally suffice.

More...

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@GottaLaff So there may be evidence that Wade phoned Willis or vice versa. What does that prove?

Toastie, to Colorado
@Toastie@journa.host avatar

This week the Ouray County Plaindealer, a newspaper serving the southern #Colorado mountain community of Ouray, published rape allegations by a 17 year old girl who said the attacks took place at the police chief's house.

On publication day, in all of the newspaper racks around Ouray, the print editions MYSTERIOUSLY DISAPPEARED.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ouray-stolen-newspapers-police-chief-rape_n_65aa9f5fe4b076abd7ab6a90?5e

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@Toastie The cops will get right on that

BartoszMilewski, to random
@BartoszMilewski@mathstodon.xyz avatar

For me, one big difficulty in reading math papers is the use of "this" or "it". There is usually a long sentence describing some complex set of ideas and it's followed by the statement that uses "this" to refer to one of the previous things. But which one?! I'm probably guilty of this too.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@BartoszMilewski The indefinite antecedent is one of my pet peeves. My writing style is probably too clunky in an effort to avoid it (although I just did).

christianp, to random
@christianp@mathstodon.xyz avatar

There's a ped/cycle crossing near my kids' school which for the past few days has been covered with shards of glass. It's been annoying me because I have to steer into the oncoming traffic lane to avoid it, with my kids in the bike bucket.

So I used my lunch break today to go up with a broom, dustpan and brush in the bucket and sweep it up.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@christianp Thank you!

ColinTheMathmo, (edited ) to random
@ColinTheMathmo@mathstodon.xyz avatar

This isn't a request for an answer ... I can look it up. It's a question about your experience.

So in your experience, will Daisy look sweet on the seat of a bicycle built for two or a bicycle made for two?

Please vote, and then reply in the comments if you're content to share your answer and rough geographical origin.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@ColinTheMathmo Midwest USA (built)

futurebird, to random
@futurebird@sauropods.win avatar

Another teacher asked me an interesting question today. "What do you think about this idea of replacing calculus with statistics. After all statistics is more useful."

That's probably true on the surface, but I can't say I'm a huge fan of the "replace calc with stats" craze... even as I lament the poor understanding many people have of stats. It's obvious we need more education on interpreting datasets and visualizations.

But, there is a subtext to this argument I dislike. 1/

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@futurebird to me, the bigger problem is that people graduate with a degree in statistics, but believe that statistical significance is sufficient to prove a result, and the concept called effect size (or clinical significance) is entirely left out.

rebeccawatson, to random
@rebeccawatson@mstdn.social avatar

After getting my booster yesterday I was wondering if working out would increase my chances of side effects. Not only does it not, but 90 minutes of post-vax exercise might boost your immune system. Cool! https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/search/research-news/15511/

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@rebeccawatson I got my first COVID booster about 5 miles from home while I was out jogging. A local pharmacy was set up at a park. Sweet!

gbhnews, (edited ) to fediverse
@gbhnews@mastodon.social avatar

🌞 Good morning ! This is GBH News bringing you the world from . It's 59F at Logan Airport and visibility is 10 mi.

The Writers' Guild has reached a tentative deal to end their strike; SAG-AFTRA is still on strike.

Some residents of a complex for the elderly and disabled in have been trapped in their apartments for 9 days because elevators are not working.

Flamingos have showed up on the shores of Lake Michigan.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@gbhnews My office has an EvacuChair on each floor. I don't know how it works, but maybe this, and some abled volunteers could ameliorate the situation.

ZachWeinersmith, to random
@ZachWeinersmith@mastodon.social avatar

What are your answers to the three questions on the cover?

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@ZachWeinersmith Yes, eventually, no.

rebeccawatson, to random
@rebeccawatson@mstdn.social avatar

I’ve held this in for too long and I honestly just can’t take it anymore: the first two lines of the chorus of TLC’s 1999 hit “No Scrubs” is a tautology. It is pointless to define a scrub as “a guy” you “don't want” AND who can “get no love from (you)”

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@rebeccawatson I have no problem with tautologies. They’re true, at least. What bugs me is when somebody says that a tautology is false.

ColinTheMathmo, to random
@ColinTheMathmo@mathstodon.xyz avatar

I don't understand why this misconception happens:

"If a number is irrational then the decimal expansion goes on forever and never repeats.

"Therefore every finite sequence of numbers must appear somewhere."

This is clearly, demonstrably false, and yet some people cling to it, dismissing any attempt to explain why it's not true.

They're not stupid, so:

  • Why do they believe it?

  • Why do they reject the demonstration that it's false?

I don't understand ...

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@ColinTheMathmo @vsaraph @penguin42 How about this: First, take an irrational number written in base 9. To the right of the (decimal?) point, it has digits 0 - 8, which never repeat any pattern infinitely. Now, take the base 10 number which has the same representation in digits (a different number). It’s irrational, as the digits to the right of the decimal point never repeat a pattern infinitely. It doesn’t contain any ‘9’ digits, so it doesn’t contain any digit strings that contain a 9.

johncarlosbaez, (edited ) to random
@johncarlosbaez@mathstodon.xyz avatar

Here's an 'Apollonian gasket'. To get one of these, start with 3 circles snugly packed in a bigger circle. Then keep putting in more circles, each tangent to 3 that are already there.

Each number here is the curvature of a circle - that is, the reciprocal of its radius. Frederick Soddy, a Nobel prize winner in chemistry, showed something wonderful in 1936. If the 3 circles and the big circle you start with have integer curvatures, all the rest will too!

What integers can show up in this game? This turns out to be an amazingly interesting question!

For example, say you pick integer curvatures for the 3 circles and the big circle you start with. Then the other integers that show up can only take certain specific values mod 24.

Yikes! The appearance of the number 24 shows we're getting into deep waters. This number shows up all over math, linking different subjects in amazing ways. I've been trying to write a paper about this, but there aren't enough hours in the day.

Are there any other restrictions on the curvatures? For a long time people thought basically NO. That is: after you pick integer curvatures for the 3 circles and the big circle you start with, all
sufficiently large integers that have allowed values mod 24 actually do show up as curvatures of circles in your Apollonian gasket!

(Well, at least if the curvatures for the 3 circles and the big circle you start with are relatively prime. If they're not, you can divide them all by the same number N, and then all the other circles will have curvatures divisible by N.)

But recently two students doing a summer research project noticed this is WRONG! Check out the new Quanta article:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/two-students-unravel-a-widely-believed-math-conjecture-20230810/

(1/2)

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@johncarlosbaez If only we has a Douglas Adams-style serendipity generator!

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@johncarlosbaez Fascinating stuff! I will be reading this & trying to grok it over the next weeks!

johncarlosbaez, (edited ) to random
@johncarlosbaez@mathstodon.xyz avatar

When etiquette expert Emily Post was asked about the polite way to eat spaghetti, she replied:

"There is no polite way to eat spaghetti."

Similarly when we want to write a fraction that's bigger than 1, we have two main choices: use an improper fraction, or a vulgar fraction.

(The pedants can now step in and correct me. It was just a joke.)

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@johncarlosbaez In grade school we called them mixed numbers; the sum of an integer & a fraction. Mixed numbers are sometimes superior to an improper fraction, e.g., when you want an elapsed time for a compound interest calculation, given that some years are leap years, and interest accrues evenly over each year.

danpmoore,
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@johncarlosbaez Sloping vinculums are so declasse.

danpmoore,
@danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

@johncarlosbaez Thanks! Turns out there's a name for most everything.

marcelias, to random
@marcelias@mas.to avatar

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    danpmoore,
    @danpmoore@mathstodon.xyz avatar

    @marcelias Good! Kudos!

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