Math, anyone?

And yeah that equation is ok, but I hate when I had to use it

in reality, the sphere will have some form of compression on the surface area in contact with the surface, which will bend it out of shape from a perfect sphere.
however, if we assume it is 100% incompressible, and we account for gravity and frictional force at a limiting equilibrium, then it comes to rest because it would require a force to get it moving, and that force would not be sufficiely great enough, if the friction coefficient of the surface is great enough

=p

In "space", geometric objects have no weight. The sphere rests on the plane on exactly one point, so the plane is tangent to the sphere. A point has no length, width or depth, so it just indicates position. A dot isn't a point, but a rough representation of it.

Hard to imagine, but it's the truth (in geometry at least).

I went cross eyed trying to understand any of this!

Originally posted by NotTooHappy
I went cross eyed trying to understand any of this!

It's okay, math is very diffucult to comprehend sometimes, expecially when you start learning it. I remember when I took it over the summer. I borrowed a few books from the library and taught myself!

I guess it takes alot of interest to be able to understand math well.

Originally posted by Saucerat
In "space", geometric objects have no weight. The sphere rests on the plane on exactly one point, so the plane is tangent to the sphere. A point has no length, width or depth, so it just indicates position. A dot isn't a point, but a rough representation of it.

Hard to imagine, but it's the truth (in geometry at least).

Right, in space however the sphere and flat plane would have MASS. That MASS would have some small amount of GRAVITY which would result in some small attraction between them.

This kind of problem(in the REAL WORLD) could never be exact either though cause we could never create a sphere so perfect that it wouldn't have some kind of flat spot. Since a point on the spear has no width or size like you said we have no way of measuring down to that exactness to find out either. Just as an idea though I would guess that a single point would be attracted and joined to another single point on the plain. It would only move if acted upon a different source as there would already be perfect balance resting on just that one point.

Well, in geometry, we don't really take in consideration of any factors the might affect objects like in the real world.

It's hard to imagine because there is no such thing as something that has no length width or depth in reality. And there isn't anything that's a plane as well, because a plane has infinite length and width, but has no depth. So assuming that a sphere has mass, which implies weight, it would probably tear a hole in the plane.

I couldn't have been the first to visualize the sphere/plane idea... I was just curious if anyone heard of this, or know if it has a theory name.

It is rather interesting, though, isn't it? I wrote Scientific America to find the answer, but no response yet...

I'm a math freak and proud of it.

long live the math freaks!

Hey! I just thought of something that everybody on this thread might enjoy.

I'm a member of Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honor society, and therefore get a copy of The Bent twice a year (or three times, I can't remember!). ANYWAY, it has brainteaser math problems in it.

Would you like me to post one occasionally? Hey, we might even form teams and see who can solve first!!!

woohoo!

Yep, I'm a math freak.

Originally posted by Gazrok
Yep, as 0 has the unique property of...

0-0=0
0+0=0
0x0=0
0/0=0

uhhh, I was with you G-man, until that last part 0/0 does not =0

While I would support that any positive number, even the most infinitesimal one, cannot be divided by zero because the result must be infinity, I am inclined to agree that 0/0 = 0.

If 0/0 does not = 0, what does 0/0 = ?

If your answer is 1 (I hope not), I think we should ask saucerat to prove it.

It is a indeterminate form. Just as infinity/infinity is an indeterminate and 0/infinity is indeterminate and infinity/0 is indeterminate.

It's indeterminate.

I agree.

But it is technical, staid, and lacking in the awestruck wonder that maths freaks seem to bathe in.

How will Gazrok accept the news that he has made such an indeterminate mistake?

He will probably say it's nothing.

In that case he will have made an immense mathematical funny which will tickle all us math-freak's funny bones!

good one, MA

I will prove the indeterminate nature of both

infinity/infinity and 0/0

let us look at infinity/infinity first

infinity = 1/0

infinity/infinity = (1/0)/(1/0)

infinity/infinity = (1/0)*(0/1)

infinity/infinity = 0/0

in order for 0/0 to be = 0, infinity must be 1,

and, in order for infinity/infinity = 1, 0=rational

therefore, infinity/infinity is an indeterminate and

0/0 is an indeterminate.

Well, the reason why 0/0 causes so much confusion is that it's undefined. What does that mean? It means that whenever we see that, we should walk away from it and ignore it.

Vahall, you do have a point there. The only problem with your proof is "infinity=1/0". You first have to prove that statement. Even if it was true, you have two undefined operations which doesn't work.

I think I already proved in a earlier post why division by zero doesn't work.

Yes, I believe you have, should I incorporate that into my proof?

I think not. This thread isn't for those who do NOT understand why 1/0 equals infinity.

A new proof:

(5010/10000) > (1/2)

The Mathematicans would say that 0/0 is an undefined operation. You cannot perfrom such an operation. This is why must of these suprious proofs look like they work, you perform a division by 0 which is undefined. The correct way of defining the operation would be:

lim(0/X) > Y : X => 0 where Y is an abritrary real number.

In short the results gets arbitarily large as X gets smaller