On Mon, Jul 07, 2003 at 04:14:06AM -0400, Dan Hoey wrote:
Well, that is even more startling, because it's a solution to a different problem! Your calculation is of a disc supported by three perpendicular lines; mine is of a disc supported by three perpendicular planes. Does this mean what I suspect it means--that if you support the disc on three perpendicular planes, the lines from the points of tangency to the origin must be mutually perpendicular? I'm becoming motivated to make sure I get this solved, just to verify that conjecture.
No, that's not right: the three lines from the points of tangency will have angles strictly less than 90 degrees. These are different problems, and it's a little surprising that the distance to the center is the same in the two cases. Peace, Dylan