MathGroup Archive 1993

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Re: Derivatives

  • To: mathgroup at yoda.physics.unc.edu
  • Subject: Re: Derivatives
  • From: hubbard at picard.urich.edu (john r hubbard)
  • Date: Mon, 29 Nov 1993 14:21:13 -0500

> The Wall Street Journal
> Tuesday, November 23, 1993
> Page C 1
> 

> "Congress is Getting Serious About Rules for Derivatives"
> 

> written by Kenneth H. Bacon
> 

> 

> It was really there. I would guess that they weren't too happy with the
> simplicity of the differentiation rules yet the seemingly intractable 

> problem of integration. I really hope they do something about it, because
> I for one, am tired of this situation.
> 

> Paul Wellin, editor
> Mathematica in Education
> TELOS/Springer-Verlag
> 3600 Pruneridge Ave., Suite 200
> Santa Clara, CA 95051 USA
> 

> email: wellin at groucho.sonoma.edu (NeXT mail accepted)
> fax:   408-249-2595
> 


This reminds me of House Bill No. 246 which was passed, unanimously,
by the Indiana House of Representatives on January 18, 1897:

    A bill for an act introducing a new mathematical truth
    and offered as a contribution to education to be used 

    only by the State of Indiana free of cost by paying any
    royalties whatever on the same, provided that it is 

    accepted and adopted by the official action of the 

    legislature of 1897.

The bill, which was rejected by the state senate after advice
from a Purdue mathematics professor, would have established a
legal numerical value for pi.  The author of the bill was a
physician who believed he had squared the circle.  From this
work, he had computed pi to equal 16/Sqrt[3], which is about
9.2376.

It was based upon 

 provided a legal definition for pi





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