James Propp

@JimPropp

I'm a professor at UMass Lowell. I write a monthly blog called Mathematical Enchantments (). Sometimes I’m facetious w/o using smileys.

Vrijeme pridruživanja: prosinac 2015.
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  1. 3. velj

    I told my kid (who’d asked about absolute value signs) “They’re just like parentheses so there’s never any ambiguity,” but then I realized that things are more complicated; for instance |-1|-2|-3| could be 5 or -5. Has anyone encountered ambiguities like this in the wild?

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  2. 1. velj

    Just realized that the “replicants” in Blade Runner should be called “replicates” (active vs. passive Latin participles) and am worried I’ll never be able to enjoy the movie again.

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  3. 29. sij

    There used to be plastic cup lids marked “12/16/20” (referring to ounces). Do those still exist? It might be fun to have some on 12/16/20.

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  4. 29. sij

    Mathologer has made a very nice video about Don Zagier’s proof of Fermat's two squares theorem. Has anyone made an animation showing how a windmill mutates as you alternate between the two involutions? via

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  5. 24. sij

    Does every mathematical truth have a single "best" proof? My new Mathematical Enchantments essay asks "What Proof Is Best?":

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  6. 20. sij

    15% = .15, which looked like π/20 to me.

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  7. 20. sij

    Today for the heck of it I tipped a restaurant 5π percent (rounded to the nearest penny). This made the whole bill come to exactly $34.00, which I think proves that this was the right amount to tip.

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  8. 17. sij

    Once again I’m going to have to miss my self-imposed 17th-of-the-month deadline. My new essay, “What Proof Is Best?”, should be available in a week or so. (It’s about Erdős and THE BOOK, and echoes of “The Office” are intentional.)

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  9. 13. sij

    Someone should make a YouTube channel called MathWithPuppies where the host answers questions about math while playing with puppies. Because ... Oooh, puppies!

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  10. 10. sij

    Any tips for a Boston-area place that digitizes old VHS tapes? I’ve got a 30-year-old tape called “The Institute for Pi Research” that I’d like to digitize for posterity (and for myself; I haven’t viewed it in 20 years). I’m worried it’ll break if it’s not handled carefully.

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  11. 10. sij

    Has verb-omission extended beyond the “Because [noun]” construct? E.g., “Ancient people fed wolves scraps, which is how dogs,” or “It’s impractical to carry around lots of gold, and that’s why money”? (If not yet, then probably soon, because that’s the way language.)

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  12. 3. sij

    Tritophiles (or would that be “trientophiles”?), rejoice! Tomorrow is 1/3, the first anniversary of the first Thirdsday.

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  13. 1. sij

    Someone pointed out this relevant xkcd:

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  14. 1. sij

    When do the Twenty-Twenties start?

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  15. 29. pro 2019.

    In math, there's (usually) exactly one way to do nothing! Read my latest Mathematical Enchantment and learn about the null salad, the empty word, the tiling with no tiles, and the path with no steps.

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  16. 28. pro 2019.

    Maybe Spock said “... 10 to the 7th power, meaning 10 followed by 7 zeros.”

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  17. 28. pro 2019.

    Can anyone remind me of the episode of Star Trek: The Original Series in which Spock misuses exponentiation? (He says something like “We’ll amplify the signal by a factor of 1 to the 7th power, meaning 1 followed by 7 zeros.”)

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  18. 26. pro 2019.

    For the full Ben Orlin piece on Evelyn Lamb’s math calendar, see

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  19. 26. pro 2019.

    Because mathematics could be defined as the one field of intellectual endeavor in which paranoia is nearly always right.

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  20. 26. pro 2019.

    Reading this exchange betw Ben Orlin & Eveyn Lamb re her new calendar gave me a great idea for senior projects: mathematical conspiracy walls! E.g. a wall with trig facts on one side, log/exponential facts on the other, “COMPLEX NUMBERS?” in magic marker, and lots of red string.

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