Showing posts with label proposition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label proposition. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Math humor

      Phyllis Diller (1917-20120), outspoken and funny, pioneering female comedian, died Monday, August 20.  Her self-deprecating humor was hugely hilarious -- and it helped the rest of us also not to take ourselves too seriously.
     In honor of Phyllis Diller and humor, I first offer a link to a "poem" from a favorite math-cartoonist -- Randall Munroe offers an amusing rhyming critique of the various majors (including math) available to undergraduates --  at xkcd.com.   And, below, I share several slightly funny math jokes adapted from ones found at Math Jokes 4 Mathy Folks and shaped into 4x4 or 5x5 syllable-square poems.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

The wealth of ambiguity

When we read these lines by Robert Burns (1759-1796),

     Oh my luv is like a red, red rose,
     That's newly sprung in June . . .
    
we don't know whether he compares a woman he loves to a flower or whether it is his own emotion he describes.  And the multiplicity of meanings is a good and pleasing thing.  Similarly, when we read the problem,

     Solve the equation, x² + 4 = 0 

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

If p, then q.

     Today's posting (as also on April 13)  presents variations of the conditional statment -- a sentence of the form "If ___, then ___" in which mathematical theorems often are expressed. (For example, "If m is an odd integer, then m² is an odd integer.")   More generally, a conditional is a statement of the form "If p, then q" -- where p and q denote statements. Poet E. C. Jarvis plays with the language of logical statements and with the idiomatic phrase "Mind your p's and q's" in his poem, "A Simple Proposition." 

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Coleridge: A Mathematical Problem

 "A Mathematical Problem" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) -- found online at Elite Skills Classics -- uses verse to describe construction of an equilateral triangle; Coleridge introduces the poem with a letter to his brother telling of his admiration of mathematics, a view rather rare among poets.