Mathematics of Juggling

This is an excellent, in-depth video on the mathematics of juggling, from Cornell University professor (and world-class juggler) Allen Knutson.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38rf9FLhl-8

This hour-long video covers the mathematical notation developed to classify and communicate juggling patterns, and Knutson explains how that inherent mathematical structure can be used to create new patterns.

There’s a lot of very sophisticated math here, which may surprise some people.  But as Knutson says at the beginning, “Anything that is sufficiently understood … there should be a mathematics of that thing.”

There’s also some good juggling in here, too!

An Interesting Temperature

The installation of on-board viewscreens has really made flying a lot more fun for everyone.  But while most people enjoy watching movies or playing video games, I enjoy analyzing flight data.

As I tracked the numbers for this particular flight, I started to get excited in anticipation of the external temperature hitting -40 degrees.  This is a rather special temperature, as it is the unique temperature that is the same in Fahrenheit or Celsius!  Some simple algebra tells us so.

\frac{9}{5}x + 32 = x

\frac{4}{5}x=-32

x = -40

Unfortunately, as we started to descend, the temperature was changing more rapidly than the data was updating, so I missed it.

 

But if we assume temperature is a continuous function, at least we know it had to be -40 out there at some point!

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