From mstueben@pen.k12.va.us Tue May  2 03:41:08 1995
Newsgroups: rec.humor.funny
From: mstueben@pen.k12.va.us (Michael A. Stueben)
Subject: Math humor
Keywords: chuckle, original, math
Approved: funny@clarinet.com
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Message-ID: <S817.1ba7@clarinet.com>
Date: Wed, 19 Apr 95 4:30:01 EDT
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   ---------------------------------------------------------
                   THIRTEEN MISUNDERSTANDINGS
                            IN THE
                     HISTORY OF MATHEMATICS

  In the interest of historical accuracy let it be known that
....

  1) Fibonacci's daughter was not named "Bunny."

  2) Michael Rolle was not Danish, and did not call his
     daughter "Tootsie."

  3) William Horner was not called "Little-Jack" by his
     friends.

  4) The "G" in G. Peano does not stand for "grand."

  5) Rene Descartes' middle name is not "push."

  6) Isaac Barrow's middle name is not "wheel."

  7) There is no such place as the University of Wis-cosine,
     and if there was, the motto of their mathematics
     department would not be "Secant ye shall find."

  8) Although Euler is pronounced oil-er, it does not follow
     that Euclid is pronounced oi-clid.

  9) Franklin D. Roosevelt never said "The only thing we have
     to sphere is sphere itself."

10) Fibonacci is not a shortened form of the Italian name that
    is actually spelled: F i bb ooo nnnnn aaaaaaaa
    ccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc
    iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii.

11) It is true that August Mobius was a difficult and
    opinionated man. But he was not so rigid that he could
    only see one side to every question.

12) It is true that Johannes Kepler had an uphill struggle
    in explaining his theory of elliptical orbits to the
    other astronomers of his time. And it is also true that
    his first attempt was a failure. But it is not true that
    after his lecture the first three questions he was asked
    were "What is elliptical?" What is an orbit?" and "What
    is a planet?

13) It is true that primitive societies use only rough
    approximations for the known constants of mathematics.
    For example, the northern tribes of Alaska consider the
    ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle to
    be 3. But it is not true that the value of 3 is called
    Eskimo pi. Incidentally, the survival of these tribes is
    dependent upon government assistance, which is not always
    forthcoming. For example, the Canadian firm of Tait and
    Sons sold a stock of defective compasses to the government
    at half-price, and the government passed them onto the
    northern natives. Hence the saying among these peoples:
    "He who has a Tait's is lost."

---

               --From Michael Stueben: high school math/C.S. teacher    
                 E-mail address: mstueben@pen.k12.va.us                



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