* Note to TSA, in case they’re reading: Not really.
Found via Ian Bremmer, via Lisa Goldman.
* Note to TSA, in case they’re reading: Not really.
Found via Ian Bremmer, via Lisa Goldman.
Happy 2017!
Rather than write about whether or not 2016 was a terrible year (John Oliver summed it up far better than I could; note that there’s swearing) or a great one (hey, I landed a great new job featuring a significant pay raise and took Anitra to both the Philippines and the United Kingdom), I spent an hour this morning putting together a set of mini-programs that explore some of the interesting properties of the number 2017.
That’s right: I spent the morning after a pleasantly boozy New Year’s Eve doing programming and math. Because that’s how I roll.
I was inspired by TJ Wei, who posted an article titled 2017 is not just another prime number, in which he states the following about the number 2017:
In case you’d forgotten your math, a prime number is a whole number that is:
2, 3, 5, and 7 are primes; 4, 6, 8, and 9 are not.
Prime numbers have always been interesting to mathematicians, and they have all sort of interesting uses, including cryptography, which is useful for keeping things like your files, communications, and your e-commerce transactions secure:
Rather than take Wei’s word on his fun facts about 2017, I decided to test a few of his statements using SageMath. The “Sage” in SageMath is short for “System for Algebra and Geometry Experimentation) and it’s an online system that lets you perform calculations and share your results.
For the statements about the number 2017 that I tested, Wei is correct! Perhaps I’ll test the others later and update my post.
As for me, it’s time to head off to the gym. Happy new year, everybody!
Here’s funny math guy Matt Parker, the Standup Mathematician, sharing 17 facts about the number 2017 in 2 minutes, 17 seconds: