Happy Pi Day!

Today is Pi Day, marked worldwide in celebration of one of the most important mathematical and physical constants. The discovery and unceasing exploration of pi's properties is one of the greatest achievements in human history, indispensible in engineering, chemistry, architecture, civil and space aeronautics and all of the basic sciences.

Pi Day dates from its creation in 1988 by Larry Shaw, a now-retired physicist at the San Francisco Exploratorium. But the Greek letter for pi, TT, adopted for the number for the Greek word for perimeter, was first used in 1707 by Welsh mathematician William Jones.

Pi Day is marked on March 14, taken from the first three digits of pi (3.14). Pi Minute, March 14 at 1:59 a.m. and 1:59 p.m., is derived from pi's first five digits (3.14159). And Pi Second, March 14 at 1:59.26 p.m., from pi's first seven digits.

Pi, crucial in countless fundamental math calculations, notably height and circumference, is an irrational number. This means its value cannot be expressed exactly as a fraction. And that its decimal representation never ends or repeats.

On Pi Day 2004, Daniel Tammet recited pi to 22,514 decimal points. In March 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resoluton making March 14 National Pi Day.

Worldwide, Pi Day is celebrated with the consumption and throwing of pies. (Though not to make political statements, as protesters now commonly do). One such event, at the University of Waterloo, one of the world's leading universities for math and other pure-science studies, is shown below. The photo was taken on the third floor of the university's Math and Computing Building.

Brainfreeze Puzzles is conducting a 2010 Pi Day Sudoku Contest. The pi-tailored Sudoku grid appears below. For the contest rules, click here.

And edHelper.com has a 41-question pi quiz here, a brain teaser of calculations for determining surface area and volumes of circles, cones, wedges and other geometric forms. 

Comments

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The circumference of a circle is equal to the sum of: She loves you + ya, ya, ya
Here is a longer-winded way to express the same equation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez82yEocIG0#t=3m36s

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It's March 14th, 3/14 (in American notation), the day to celebrate the wonders of mathematician's favorite number. Often rounded to 3.14, the mysterious number - which of course denotes the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter - is irrational, its decimal digits extending to infinity.

On the main site, we offered up five tasty facts about the famous ratio. One of them was about Pilish - a form of poetry writing in which the number of letters in each word corresponds to each digit of Pi. Writer Mike Keith, who specializes in "constrained writing" forms, composed an extraordinary poem in Pilish, which you can read here.

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you are so so so cruel, you don't know that in the moment that I found this site I was totally starving, and you put pie apple picture, dude you almost kill me, jjajaja jsut kidding, the concept is interesting, combine food with study was a excellent idea.

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One of them was about Pilish - a form of poetry writing in which the number of letters in each word corresponds to each digit of Pi. Writer Mike Keith, who specializes in "constrained writing" forms, composed an extraordinary poem in Pilish, which you can read here.

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The discovery and unceasing exploration of pi's properties is one of the greatest achievements in human history, indispensible in engineering, chemistry, architecture, civil and space aeronautics and all of the basic sciences.

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Pi Day is celebrated with the consumption and throwing of pies. (Though not to make political statements, as protesters now commonly do). One such event, at the University of Waterloo, one of the world's leading universities for math and other pure-science studies, is shown below.

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crucial in countless fundamental math calculations, notably height and circumference, is an irrational number. This means its value cannot be expressed exactly as a fraction. And that its decimal representation never ends or repeats.

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we offered up five tasty facts about the famous ratio. One of them was about Pilish - a form of poetry writing in which the number of letters in each word corresponds to each digit of Pi. Writer Mike Keith, who specializes in "constrained writing" forms, composed an extraordinary poem in Pilish, which you can read here.

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If you think of it, whoever the first person was that thought of God must've been a Genius in his time to think of such glorious a concept.

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I would have thought PI day would have a much more tasty connotation. It's amazing they recited the number to 22,514 figures in front of Congress. No wonder nothing gets done in that building.

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wow, i didn't know that exist the Pi day...
I was born in march 21, just a week after pi day, amazing thanks

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