Sonic Wind Sculptures by Ross Barrable
24Apr2007 06:28 AM Filed in: Geometry-Math
Thanks
to Tim A. in China (and North Carolina) for
this link with a great quote from
Galileo, inspiring text and very interesting (and
lovely) sculptures; I'd enjoy
hearing the wind through them... I 'resonate' to
the text, so I'll post a link to my blog about
them... 
A couple of minor corrections on that page:
Geometry literally means “the measure of the earth" ... adding 'sacred' just adds the meaning and significance of that word
Also, on that same page, the author/artist refers to the square root of 3 as transcendental. In mathematical terms (to be technically correct), I believe that number is just irrational. However, Pi, (the circumference/diameter proportion of any circle) which is almost always "nearby" or present whenever the square root of three is involved geometrically (either with the vesica piscis made from two circles, or the diagonal of a cube which can be perfectly inscribed or circumscribed by a sphere containing an infinity of circles) IS a transcendental number. In my presentations, I often share the metaphor that an irrational number (like the square roots of 2, 3, or 5) is not resolvable by our conscious 'rational' minds; however a transcendental number (like Pi) is not only irrational, it also transcends this 'dimension', since it can't be expressed even as a polynomial fraction (a fraction made of whole number polynomials, or numbers raised to higher powers or 'dimensions' metaphorically.)
Here's a link to the MathWorld reference on transcendental numbers. Along with Pi, Euler's number, e (the base of natural logarithms) is perhaps also commonly known to many.
A couple of minor corrections on that page:
Geometry literally means “the measure of the earth" ... adding 'sacred' just adds the meaning and significance of that word
Also, on that same page, the author/artist refers to the square root of 3 as transcendental. In mathematical terms (to be technically correct), I believe that number is just irrational. However, Pi, (the circumference/diameter proportion of any circle) which is almost always "nearby" or present whenever the square root of three is involved geometrically (either with the vesica piscis made from two circles, or the diagonal of a cube which can be perfectly inscribed or circumscribed by a sphere containing an infinity of circles) IS a transcendental number. In my presentations, I often share the metaphor that an irrational number (like the square roots of 2, 3, or 5) is not resolvable by our conscious 'rational' minds; however a transcendental number (like Pi) is not only irrational, it also transcends this 'dimension', since it can't be expressed even as a polynomial fraction (a fraction made of whole number polynomials, or numbers raised to higher powers or 'dimensions' metaphorically.)
Here's a link to the MathWorld reference on transcendental numbers. Along with Pi, Euler's number, e (the base of natural logarithms) is perhaps also commonly known to many.
|