On 2016-06-17 08:57, Joerg Arndt wrote:
* Dan Asimov <dasimov@earthlink.net> [Jun 17. 2016 08:06]:
In the world of newspapers, nothing the Daily Mail claims can be trusted.
I think you spelled "Daily Fail" incorrectly 8^)
They have zero journalistic ethics.
So am not at all surprised that they're spouting nonsense here.
I seem to recall that a few years ago they printed a story about someone who discovered that, contrary to what all mathematicians had erroneously believed, you actually *can* divide by zero in ordinary arithmetic.
That one went into several newspapers with non-zero reputation as well. Now consider that (at least here in Krautistan) one can study "technical journalism", look at the science/technology articles in the well-established newspapers, and silently weep.
Btw. the German version (mostly translation, but some added material) of the "Scientific American" banned formulas altogether (I heard there's one exception: you may say E = m c^2, once, and get away with it). [Is the same true for the original?]
They *must* have allowed Gardner's column a few formulas. But it got completely ridiculous with their Ramanujan article. Their solution was to print *photographs* of his equations with "explanatory" captions! I ran afoul of this when the editors of More Mathematical People read Hawking's remark that each printed formula reduces your book sales by 50%, so they yanked all my formulas (and fractal diagrams). All I could do was tell them where to go when they wanted my permission for a Japanese edition. --rwg
They once had a piece about what's in the (lovely) article Michael Kleber: Goldbug Variations, http://arxiv.org/abs/math/0501497 ... their "popularized" version was completely incomprehensible.
Best regards, jj
—Dan
On Jun 16, 2016, at 4:57 PM, Henry Baker <hbaker1@pipeline.com> wrote:
FYI -- Better fire that math teacher and Professor Puzzler; maxima
trivially solves this puzzle (follow link to jpeg of the equation set) and it has a unique answer.
"Brain-splitting equation that even a MATHS TEACHER can't solve has
the entire Internet baffled... So do YOU know the answer?"
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2016/06/16/07/3555F68A00000578-0-image-a-6_14...
"A simple logic and maths puzzle has sparked debate on Facebook after
thousands of people have debated over the answer. The puzzle, which replaces numbers with flowers, has caught thousands of people out. A maths teacher who solves logic puzzles online and goes by the name of 'Professor Puzzler' even refused to solve it, saying the problem had no answer."