Topic: Mathematics (Page 11)
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π List of things named after Leonhard Euler
In mathematics and physics, many topics are named in honor of Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler (1707β1783), who made many important discoveries and innovations. Many of these items named after Euler include their own unique function, equation, formula, identity, number (single or sequence), or other mathematical entity. Many of these entities have been given simple and ambiguous names such as Euler's function, Euler's equation, and Euler's formula.
Euler's work touched upon so many fields that he is often the earliest written reference on a given matter. In an effort to avoid naming everything after Euler, some discoveries and theorems are attributed to the first person to have proved them after Euler.
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- "List of things named after Leonhard Euler" | 2019-03-09 | 69 Upvotes 24 Comments
π Monge's theorem
In geometry, Monge's theorem, named after Gaspard Monge, states that for any three circles in a plane, none of which is completely inside one of the others, the intersection points of each of the three pairs of external tangent lines are collinear.
For any two circles in a plane, an external tangent is a line that is tangent to both circles but does not pass between them. There are two such external tangent lines for any two circles. Each such pair has a unique intersection point in the extended Euclidean plane. Monge's theorem states that the three such points given by the three pairs of circles always lie in a straight line. In the case of two of the circles being of equal size, the two external tangent lines are parallel. In this case Monge's theorem asserts that the other two intersection points must lie on a line parallel to those two external tangents. In other words, if the two external tangents are considered to intersect at the point at infinity, then the other two intersection points must be on a line passing through the same point at infinity, so the line between them takes the same angle as the external tangent.
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- "Monge's theorem" | 2018-07-15 | 83 Upvotes 10 Comments
π Ant On A Rubber Rope
The ant on a rubber rope is a mathematical puzzle with a solution that appears counterintuitive or paradoxical. It is sometimes given as a worm, or inchworm, on a rubber or elastic band, but the principles of the puzzle remain the same.
The details of the puzzle can vary, but a typical form is as follows:
- An ant starts to crawl along a taut rubber rope 1Β km long at a speed of 1Β cm per second (relative to the rubber it is crawling on). At the same time, the rope starts to stretch uniformly at a constant rate of 1Β km per second, so that after 1 second it is 2Β km long, after 2 seconds it is 3Β km long, etc. Will the ant ever reach the end of the rope?
At first consideration it seems that the ant will never reach the end of the rope, but in fact it does. (In the form stated above, it would take 8.9Γ1043421 years.) Whatever the length of the rope and the relative speeds of the ant and the stretching, provided that the ant's speed and the stretching remain steady, the ant will always be able to reach the end given sufficient time. Once the ant has begun moving, the rubber rope is stretching both in front of and behind the ant, conserving the proportion of the rope already walked by the ant and enabling the ant to make continual progress.
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- "Ant On A Rubber Rope" | 2013-11-04 | 58 Upvotes 33 Comments
π Greek numerals
Greek numerals, also known as Ionic, Ionian, Milesian, or Alexandrian numerals, are a system of writing numbers using the letters of the Greek alphabet. In modern Greece, they are still used for ordinal numbers and in contexts similar to those in which Roman numerals are still used elsewhere in the West. For ordinary cardinal numbers, however, Greece uses Arabic numerals.
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- "Greek numerals" | 2018-06-29 | 80 Upvotes 10 Comments
π Karnaugh map
The Karnaugh map (KM or K-map) is a method of simplifying Boolean algebra expressions. Maurice Karnaugh introduced it in 1953 as a refinement of Edward Veitch's 1952 Veitch chart, which actually was a rediscovery of Allan Marquand's 1881 logical diagram aka Marquand diagram but with a focus now set on its utility for switching circuits. Veitch charts are therefore also known as MarquandβVeitch diagrams, and Karnaugh maps as KarnaughβVeitch maps (KV maps).
The Karnaugh map reduces the need for extensive calculations by taking advantage of humans' pattern-recognition capability. It also permits the rapid identification and elimination of potential race conditions.
The required Boolean results are transferred from a truth table onto a two-dimensional grid where, in Karnaugh maps, the cells are ordered in Gray code, and each cell position represents one combination of input conditions, while each cell value represents the corresponding output value. Optimal groups of 1s or 0s are identified, which represent the terms of a canonical form of the logic in the original truth table. These terms can be used to write a minimal Boolean expression representing the required logic.
Karnaugh maps are used to simplify real-world logic requirements so that they can be implemented using a minimum number of physical logic gates. A sum-of-products expression can always be implemented using AND gates feeding into an OR gate, and a product-of-sums expression leads to OR gates feeding an AND gate. Karnaugh maps can also be used to simplify logic expressions in software design. Boolean conditions, as used for example in conditional statements, can get very complicated, which makes the code difficult to read and to maintain. Once minimised, canonical sum-of-products and product-of-sums expressions can be implemented directly using AND and OR logic operators. Diagrammatic and mechanical methods for minimizing simple logic expressions have existed since at least the medieval times. More systematic methods for minimizing complex expressions began to be developed in the early 1950s, but until the mid to late 1980s the Karnaugh map was the most common used in practice.
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- "Karnaugh map" | 2017-12-24 | 66 Upvotes 24 Comments
π (e^(i * pi)) + 1 = 0
In mathematics, Euler's identity (also known as Euler's equation) is the equality
where
- e is Euler's number, the base of natural logarithms,
- i is the imaginary unit, which by definition satisfies i2 = β1, and
- Ο is pi, the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter.
Euler's identity is named after the Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler. It is considered to be an exemplar of mathematical beauty as it shows a profound connection between the most fundamental numbers in mathematics.
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- "(e^(i * pi)) + 1 = 0" | 2010-05-01 | 41 Upvotes 48 Comments
π Fast inverse square root
Fast inverse square root, sometimes referred to as Fast InvSqrt() or by the hexadecimal constant 0x5F3759DF, is an algorithm that estimates β1ββx, the reciprocal (or multiplicative inverse) of the square root of a 32-bit floating-point number x in IEEE 754 floating-point format. This operation is used in digital signal processing to normalize a vector, i.e., scale it to length 1. For example, computer graphics programs use inverse square roots to compute angles of incidence and reflection for lighting and shading. The algorithm is best known for its implementation in 1999 in the source code of Quake III Arena, a first-person shooter video game that made heavy use of 3D graphics. The algorithm only started appearing on public forums such as Usenet in 2002 or 2003. At the time, it was generally computationally expensive to compute the reciprocal of a floating-point number, especially on a large scale; the fast inverse square root bypassed this step.
The algorithm accepts a 32-bit floating-point number as the input and stores a halved value for later use. Then, treating the bits representing the floating-point number as a 32-bit integer, a logical shift right by one bit is performed and the result subtracted from the number 0x5F3759DF, which is a floating point representation of an approximation of β2127. This results in the first approximation of the inverse square root of the input. Treating the bits again as a floating-point number, it runs one iteration of Newton's method, yielding a more precise approximation.
The algorithm was originally attributed to John Carmack, but an investigation showed that the code had deeper roots in both the hardware and software side of computer graphics. Adjustments and alterations passed through both Silicon Graphics and 3dfx Interactive, with Gary Tarolli's implementation for the SGI Indigo as the earliest known use. It is not known how the constant was originally derived, though investigation has shed some light on possible methods.
With subsequent hardware advancements, especially the x86 SSE instruction rsqrtss
, this method is not generally applicable to modern computing, though it remains an interesting example both historically and for more limited machines.
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- "Fast inverse square root" | 2017-01-24 | 17 Upvotes 4 Comments
- "Fast inverse square root" | 2009-10-22 | 37 Upvotes 20 Comments
π Trachtenberg System for Rapid Mental Calculation
The Trachtenberg system is a system of rapid mental calculation. The system consists of a number of readily memorized operations that allow one to perform arithmetic computations very quickly. It was developed by the Russian Jewish engineer Jakow Trachtenberg in order to keep his mind occupied while being in a Nazi concentration camp.
The rest of this article presents some methods devised by Trachtenberg. Some of the algorithms Trachtenberg developed are ones for general multiplication, division and addition. Also, the Trachtenberg system includes some specialised methods for multiplying small numbers between 5 and 13.
The section on addition demonstrates an effective method of checking calculations that can also be applied to multiplication.
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- "Trachtenberg System of Mental Calculation" | 2024-09-21 | 20 Upvotes 2 Comments
- "Trachtenberg System for Rapid Mental Calculation" | 2018-06-22 | 31 Upvotes 4 Comments
- "The Trachtenberg System for mental arithmetic" | 2010-03-29 | 27 Upvotes 5 Comments
π Homotopy Type Theory
In mathematical logic and computer science, homotopy type theory (HoTT ) refers to various lines of development of intuitionistic type theory, based on the interpretation of types as objects to which the intuition of (abstract) homotopy theory applies.
This includes, among other lines of work, the construction of homotopical and higher-categorical models for such type theories; the use of type theory as a logic (or internal language) for abstract homotopy theory and higher category theory; the development of mathematics within a type-theoretic foundation (including both previously existing mathematics and new mathematics that homotopical types make possible); and the formalization of each of these in computer proof assistants.
There is a large overlap between the work referred to as homotopy type theory, and as the univalent foundations project. Although neither is precisely delineated, and the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, the choice of usage also sometimes corresponds to differences in viewpoint and emphasis. As such, this article may not represent the views of all researchers in the fields equally. This kind of variability is unavoidable when a field is in rapid flux.
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- "Homotopy Type Theory" | 2021-06-22 | 64 Upvotes 22 Comments
π Luhn Algorithm for validating credit cards
The Luhn algorithm or Luhn formula, also known as the "modulus 10" or "mod 10" algorithm, named after its creator, IBM scientist Hans Peter Luhn, is a simple checksum formula used to validate a variety of identification numbers, such as credit card numbers, IMEI numbers, National Provider Identifier numbers in the United States, Canadian Social Insurance Numbers, Israel ID Numbers, South African ID Numbers, Greek Social Security Numbers (ΞΞΞΞ), and survey codes appearing on McDonald's, Taco Bell, and Tractor Supply Co. receipts. It is described in U.S. Patent No. 2,950,048, filed on January 6, 1954, and granted on August 23, 1960.
The algorithm is in the public domain and is in wide use today. It is specified in ISO/IEC 7812-1. It is not intended to be a cryptographically secure hash function; it was designed to protect against accidental errors, not malicious attacks. Most credit cards and many government identification numbers use the algorithm as a simple method of distinguishing valid numbers from mistyped or otherwise incorrect numbers.
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- "Luhn Algorithm for validating credit cards" | 2015-07-02 | 53 Upvotes 31 Comments