Every year, the calendars of those of us lucky enough to live in a place in the world where the month is written before the day (month/day/year) are graced with a happy amalgam of numbers: 3/14. What does this mean, you ask? Any numberphile, math nerd, school teacher, or your smart, well-meaning, but humor-impaired friends will tell you it’s:
π Day!
“Huh?!” Well, think of it as an annual guilt-free flaunting of bad math jokes, painful puns, and an excuse to play with Dynamo. We celebrate the irrationally delectable ratio between a circle’s circumference and its diameter. #SeeWhatIDidThere
In shock, perhaps you are asking yourself “Who would write their dates like this?” Well, we’re a small but mighty coalition, according to Wikipedia, basically the U.S. and Belize with some others who put up with the format when they must.
But it should be noted that the more common day/month/year format doesn’t have a π day, because 31/4 doesn’t exist… so there.
This year’s π Day is special, since we have also had a π second! 3/14/15 9:26:54. You’ll have to wait around for 2115 for the next one.
On π Day, some drink special brews*, give gifts*, sing about π, and, of course, bake pies.
*Disclaimer: Dynamo does not endorse or promote Pi Day tchotchkes. Also, I may or may not personally own a π ice cube tray.
Calculating Pi
There are a wealth of formulas for finding a decimal expansion of π. Pi is an irrational number, so it is both infinitely long and non-repeating. In most cases, you only need the first few digits, though someone has apparently calculated the first 12.1×1012 or so.
Using a rather elementary technique, I tried one way to narrow down an answer. Machin’s Formula relates π to some cotangents and leads to the numerically-calculable:
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We’d say that this series converges slowly. After 60 terms, it has found that π ≈ 3.125. To me, that makes a trillion digits of pi even more impressive.
Using Pi
Enough with math class! Here are some scripts submitted on the forum I’d like to share. Ilay submitted this undulating design.
He dubs it: “Slightly horrible and silly wavy voxel grid :)”
Drawing Pi
Marcello (@marcellosgamb) straight-up drew π:
Points awarded for creative interpretation of the prompt!
Showing Off!
Finally, hats off and a bow to Dimiter, who used Dynamo to explore planetary systems.
His words are best:
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The number PI has definitely enabled us to do some amazing things. Our knowledge of astronomy and astrophysics, at least in their early days, was enabled by our comprehension of PI. You could say that PI opened our eyes to the stars and cracked open the door to understanding the universe.
I wanted to make a very basic solar system generator. The end product is a bit buggy, slow and probably very wrong due to my limited knowledge of Newtonian physics and Kepler’s laws, but heck at least it looks cool. For some reason Dynamo’s random number generator really likes crashing my planets into the sun… |
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You all rock. Happy π Day!!