Re: [Phys-l] Inscrutable words, etc. - not physics

["Laurent Hodges" <lhodges@iastate.edu>]

I once came across a forum of Bible enthusiasts asking all sorts of questions of
each other.  So, as a parody, I went to my KJV digital text to find the smallest
integer NOT used in the Bible and asked if anyone knew it.  They didn't but one
figured it out (26, I believe).  One wrote me that was the most original Bible
question he'd encountered in years.

Herodotus in one of his histories wrote about the Persians defeating the Greeks
in a battle because of "superior numbers," and I naturally wondered what those
numbers were: were they the primes, or perfect numbers, or some more
sophisticated types of numbers?  (Aha, you western heathen, do you know the
smallest odd Carmichael number?)


> Headlines are often inscrutable.
>
> I once knew a mathematician who collected headlines about
> numbers.  Many of them were quite scandalous:
>   "2 charged with child abuse"
>   "3 arrested in bribery sting"
>   "4 caught smuggling pot"
> .... and so on for quite a large collection of numbers.
>
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Laurent Hodges
Professor Emeritus of Physics, Iowa State University
12 Physics Hall, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011-3160
http://AmesIowa.US