Re: Pi

On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 12:52:11 -0500 (EST) Loren Haarsma
<lhaarsma@calvin.edu> writes:
>
>
> On Tue, 23 Nov 2004, Wayne Shelton wrote:
>
> > Can someone recall the letter from few months
> > back discussing Mississippi's law setting pi
> > equal to three.
>
> I don't know about a specific letter, but there is a tradition
> going
> back at least six years of hoax letters, circulating around the
> internet,
> about some state legislature or other doing this. See for example:
> http://www.snopes.com/religion/pi.htm
>
> Back in 1897, a pseudo-mathematician did get some Indiana
> legislators to
> consider legislating several _other_ rational values for pi (not
> 3.0, and
> none of it motivated by biblical passages). The bill never passed.
> See
> for example:
> http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_341.html
> http://tafkac.org/legal/pi_indiana.html
>
>
> Loren Haarsma
>
>
Bill No. 246, Indiana State Legislature, 1897, was introduced January 19,
1897. It was sent to committee, First Canals then Education. The State
Superintendent of Education was all for it. It came up for second reading
February 5. Rules were unanimously suspended to allow a third reading and
immediate passage. It was read in the Senate February 11 and referred to
the Committee on Temperance. Professor C. A. Waldo (of Indiana
University, if I recall correctly) happened to come by on February 12 and
was properly shocked. As a consequence, the bill was postponed
indefinitely.

The author of the value of pi was E. J. Goodwin, M.D., of Solitude,
IN--far southwest corner of the state. I have read the bill and cannot
decide what the value of pi was supposed to be. Waldo wrote that the
value was both 4 and 3.2. His memoir is "What Might have Been,"
_Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Science_, 26:445f (1916). It seems
to be inaccurate in some places. The text of the bill is in Will E.
Edington, "House Bill No. 246, Indiana State Legislature, 1897," _ibid._
45:206-210 (1935).

An apparently more complete reference is in "Rules for Making Pi
Digestible" in the Contributors' Club, _Atlantic Monthly_, 156;118f (July
1935). I have not read it. Edward J. Goodwin's paper on one aspect of the
subject, "Quadrature of the Circle," is in _American Mathematical
Monthly_,1:246f (July 1894).

Lancelot Hogben, _Mathematics for the Millions_, (3rd ed; Norton, 1951)
p. 255, has a multiply mistaken claim.
Dave
Received on Tue Nov 23 16:31:24 2004