Correcting Homer Simpson's Math: Citizen Mathematics
from the make-that-Homer-Fermat-Simpson dept
Here's a fun Friday post for those of you with Typepad users sitting around twiddling your thumbs with nothing to do (no wonder everything seems so peacefully quiet today). Apparently, the San Francisco Chronicle published a story a while back about some mathematicians who write for The Simpsons. They like to sneak in the odd mathematical equation every once in a while, and the article mentioned one where Homer was dreaming and wrote: "1,782 to the 12th power plus 1,841 to the 12th power equals 1,922 to the 12th power." The article claimed that this was correct -- but seeing as fact checkers aren't mathematicians, no one properly checked it. There are some SF Chron readers, however, who are mathematicians, and they protested, citing Fermat. So, the Chronicle went to run a correction... but discovered they couldn't because they didn't actually know what the correct answer was -- meaning any correction, wouldn't actually have been a correction. Luckily, they went back to one of the people who alerted them to the incorrect nature of the original equation, and had him calculate the correct one. Forget citizen journalism, we've now got citizen mathematics.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Homer Simpson's Math
The equation was as follows:
(1782^12)+(1841^12)=2.541210259E39
(1922^12)=2.541210259E39
So, who was actually wrong in this dispute? :-)
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
(1782^12)+(1841^12)=2541210258614590000000000000000000000000.00
(1922^12)=254121025931480000 0000000000000000000000.00
So, I guess you are.
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
Jeesh, I can't believe a roomful of journalists wouldn't know that. Wait, what am I saying??? oh well, anyway, the answer is the difference, which is actually the number 700,211,950,340,978,000,000,000,000,000.
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
700,211,950,340,978,000,000,000,000,000.00
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
http://www.claymath.org/millennium/P_vs_NP/
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
(1782^12)+(1841^12)=2.5412102586145892e+39
(1922^12)= 2.5412102593148014e+39
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
He just wasn't precise enough. There's a difference.
Given that he has no reason to dream in 12 significant figures, the show is correct.
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Re: Homer Simpson's Math
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Fermat vs Simpson
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No Subject Given
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Re: No Subject Given
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well just dont...
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Re: well just dont...
google calc. says...
(1 782^12) + (1 841^12) = 2.54121026 × 1039
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Re: well just dont...
google calc. says...
(1 782^12) + (1 841^12) = 2.54121026 × 10^39**
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Easily proven wrong without a computer
Look at the last digits: 1,782^12 + 1,841^12 = 1922^12
1,782 to any power is going to be an even number, 1,841 to any power is going to be odd. Even plus odd equals odd, but 1,922 to any power is even.
So the statement is wrong.
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Re: Easily proven wrong without a computer
PS: I haven't seen the Simpson's episode in question, but I assume that the writers knew full well that Homer's statement was false but close enough to being true to be a mathematical joke... for non-mathematical number crunchers. ;)
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Re: Easily proven wrong without a computer
Wasn't this in the Halloween episode when Homer went through the wall to get away from Patty and Selma and became three-dimensional?
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Good ol' bc
bc 1.06
Copyright 1991-1994, 1997, 1998, 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY.
For details type `warranty'.
1782^12
1025397835622633634807550462948226174976
1841^12
1515812422991955541481119495194202351681
1782^12+1841^12
2541210258614589176288669958142428526657
1922^12
2541210259314801410819278649643651567616
1922^12-(1782^12+1841^12)
700212234530608691501223040959
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Re: Easily proven wrong without a computer
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