“Mathematical Genius”

The Cincinnati Gazette says that ‘William Marcy, a colored boy from Kentucky, who was in that city lately, can add up columns of figures of any length, divide any given sum, multiply millions by thousands within five minutes from the time the figures are given to him, and with such exactness as to render it truly wonderful. Recently, in the presence of a party of gentlemen, he added a column of figures, eight in a line, and one hundred and eighty lines, making the sum total of several millions, within six minutes. The feat was so astounding, and apparently incredible, that several of the party took off their coats, and, dividing the sum, went to work, and in two hours after they commenced produced identically the same answers. The boy is not quite seventeen years of age; he cannot read nor write, and in every other branch of an English education is entirely deficient.’

— The National Magazine, December 1853

| Oddities

Every Little Thing

hoover doodle

Herbert Hoover drew this doodle while being interviewed. When he tossed it in a White House wastebasket, a guest retrieved it and asked him to sign it. The guest then sold it to collector Thomas Madigan … who resold it for a substantial sum.

Thereupon the doodle was published in newspapers across the country, often with expert interpretations. “Generally this man is highly efficient, a man who figures things out and who is at his best tackling difficult tasks,” opined one for the Chicago Tribune. Another objected: “It is the normal thing for a man to do — to occupy himself scribbling with a pencil when talking over the telephone or listening to someone. It would be significant if the president did not do this.”

Before it was over, the doodle had been converted into a fabric pattern for children’s rompers, which even Hoover’s granddaughter was said to have worn. If the president had an opinion about all this, he kept it to himself.

| History

A Well-Tempered Cartwheel

http://books.google.com/books?id=TbUvAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&vq=circular+canon#v=onepage&q=circular%20canon&f=false

From Strand, August 1906:

A circular canon is so named not because of its circular form, but because it completes the circle of fifths–i.e., it goes through all the keys, each a perfect fifth above the other, until it returns to the original key. The one under notice is written in triple counterpoint, any part sounding equally well in the top, middle, or lowest voice, and each bar is in three different keys at once, all harmonizing.

This rendering is a bit indistinct, I’m afraid — if I can find a clearer version I’ll post it.

| Art · Oddities

“Truly Eerie Wordplay”

In the November 2010 Word Ways, Mike Keith notes a striking coincidence:

Bible’s Machine and Welding
6499 Blue Springs Pkwy
Mosheim, TN 37818

That’s the address of a machine shop in eastern Tennessee, presumably owned by a family named Bible. Enter the zip code in a calculator and turn it upside down.

| Language

The Grey Town Noises

In Nature, May 12, 1870, captain Charles Dennehy of the R.M.S. Shannon noted “a very curious phenomenon” observed by the occupants of iron vessels off the port of Grey Town, Nicaragua.

“[W]hile at anchor in this situation, we hear, commencing with a marvellous punctuality at about midnight, a peculiar metallic vibratory sound, of sufficient loudness to awaken a great majority of the ship’s crew, however tired they may be after a hard day’s work.”

The sound, Dennehy said, converted the ship into “a great musical sounding board.” “It is musical, metallic, with a certain cadence, and a one-two-three time tendency of beat. It is heard most distinctly over open hatchways, over the engine-room, through the coal-shoots [sic], and close round the outside of the ship. It cannot be fixed at any one place, always appearing to recede from the observer. On applying the ear to the side of an open bunker, one fancies that it is proceeding from the very bottom of the hold.” It continued for about two hours, was heard only aboard iron vessels, and was unknown to the inhabitants on shore.

Denney’s letter brought responses from readers who referred to similar sounds in Trinidad, India, and Chile. They postulated a “musical fish” or gas rising from vegetation on the seabed but offered no conclusive explanation.

Curiously, William Corliss notes that the sounds’ descriptions seem to match the Yellowstone Lake whispers.

| Oddities

Chasing Leo

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Albrecht_D%C3%BCrer_055.jpg

In 1938, the American Mathematical Monthly published an unlikely paper: “A Contribution to the Mathematical Theory of Big Game Hunting.” In it, Ralph Boas and Frank Smithies presented 16 ways to catch a lion using techniques inspired by modern math and physics. Examples:

  • “The Method of Inversive Geometry. We place a spherical cage in the desert, enter it, and lock it. We perform an inversion with respect to the cage. The lion is then in the interior of the cage, and we are outside.”
  • “A Topological Method. We observe that a lion has at least the connectivity of the torus. We transport the desert into four-space. It is then possible to carry out such a deformation that the lion can be returned to three-space in a knotted condition. He is then helpless.”
  • “The Dirac Method. We observe that wild lions are, ipso facto, not observable in the Sahara Desert. Consequently, if there are any lions in the Sahara, they are tame. The capture of a tame lion may be left as an exercise for the reader.”
  • “A Relativistic Method. We distribute about the desert lion bait containing large portions of the Companion of Sirius. When enough bait has been taken, we project a beam of light across the desert. This will bend right round the lion, who will then become so dizzy that he can be approached with impunity.”

The article has inspired a tradition of updates by other mathematicians over the years:

  • “Let Q be the operator that encloses a word in quotation marks. Its square Q2 encloses a word in double quotes. The operator clearly satisfies the law of indices, QmQn = Qm + n. Write down the word ‘lion,’ without quotation marks. Apply to it the operator Q-1. Then a lion will appear on the page. It is advisable to enclose the page in a cage before applying the operator.” (I.J. Good, 1965)
  • “Game Theoretic Method. A lion is big game. Thus, a fortiori, he is a game. Therefore there exists an optimal strategy. Follow it.” (“Otto Morphy,” 1968)
  • “Method of Analytics Mechanics. Since the lion has nonzero mass it has moments of inertia. Grab it during one of them.” (Patricia Dudley et al., 1968)
  • “Method of Natural Functions. The lion, having spent his life under the Sahara sun, will surely have a tan. Induce him to lie on his back; he can then, by virtue of his reciprocal tan, be cot.” (Dudley)
  • “Nonstandard Analysis. In a nonstandard universe (namely, the land of Oz), lions are cowardly and may be caught easily. By the transfer principle, this likewise holds in our (standard) universe.” (Houston Euler, et al., 1985)

Dudley also suggested a “method of moral philosophy”: “Construct a corral in the Sahara and wait until autumn. At that time the corral will contain a large number of lions, for it is well known that a pride cometh before the fall.”

| Science & Math

Unquote

“The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer.” — Edward R. Murrow

“To see what is in front of one’s nose requires a constant struggle.” — George Orwell

“How hard I find it to see what is right in front of my eyes!” — Wittgenstein

| Quotations

The Champion

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Charlie_Chaplin.jpg

A group of us had gone to the pier to have dinner at a little fish restaurant, and while waiting to be served, Charlie Chaplin noticed a sign across the way that read, ‘Scientific Handwriting Analysis. Ten Cents.’ Charlie decided, as a joke, to try the expert out. Aldous [Huxley] stopped him. It would be too simple for a swami to ‘read’ for Charlie because his appearance was familiar to practically everyone in the world. On the other hand no one would recognize Aldous. So Charlie wrote a few words on a scrap of paper which Aldous took to the lady. He returned from his interview in a mood of deep concentration and reported what had happened. The lady had studied the writing a moment and then looked up at Aldous suspiciously. ‘Are you trying to make fun of me, sir?’ she asked. Aldous assured her he was not and wanted to know why she asked. She paused and studied Charlie’s writing more closely. Then, still suspicious, she asked, ‘Did you write this while you were in an unnatural or cramped position?’ Aldous then admitted that the writing was not his own but he assured the lady that it had been done quite normally. ‘Then,’ said the expert, ‘I don’t know what to say, because if what you tell me is true, the man who wrote this is a God-given genius.’

— Anita Loos in Aldous Huxley: A Memorial Volume, ed. Julian Huxley, 1965

| Entertainment