Monday, March 14, 2016

I can see Uranus from here!

Have you ever wondered where the the name Uranus comes from. Will I did and found a very cool article about the man who discovered the eighth planet and why the unusual name finally stuck.  The butt of many a joke, I give you our second largest (behind Jupiter) planet.

Happy Pi Day - 3-14.  One of the cool things about living in the Silicon Valley is how nerdy it can be.  I was out sailing a few Pi days ago on a sunny, blue sky afternoon.  As we approached the Golden Gate Bridge we noticed five planes flying high above us in perfect wing to wing formation.  They let out streams of white and created a string of numbers across the sky in a very large format.
They kept going from horizon to horizon. Here were some of the numbers:
83279502884197169399375105820974944592307816406286 

These are a fraction of the numbers of Pi which has no decimal ending due to being an irrational number.  As we know, Pi is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. 3.14 to infinity.  How cool.  Well they happen to call this display of numbers in the sky, "Pi in the Sky Day".  

Check it out. 




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