Today, author Simon Singh took part in a Twitter-based webchat for the BBC News website, taking questions about his new book on Maths in the Simpsons, and mathematics in general. Here’s how it all went down.
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All Squared, Number 9: Miscellanea with CP and Cushing
We have an unusual All Squared podcast for you this time. My good friend David Cushing has been asking to do a podcast for absolutely ages. We couldn’t decide on a single topic to talk about, so instead I suggested we just sit down and chat about maths in general, like we do when there isn’t a microphone in front of us.
We talked for about an hour and a half, but because I’m completely stupid we lost a big chunk of it when the microphone switched off. To make things even worse, we recorded in a room with a ridiculously loud fan, so there’s that to contend with. Anyway, we talked about some fun stuff, so I think it’s worth listening to.
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Bart The Genius
Amusing to hear John Humphrys incredulous at something I felt was well-known & obvious: The Simpsons has maths jokes http://t.co/jSJO7Or0yp
— Peter Rowlett (@peterrowlett) October 2, 2013
Not Mentioned on the Aperiodical this month, 6th October
Here’s a roundup of some news stories that slipped past our highly trained news snipers.
All Squared, Number 8: Martin Gardner (Colm Mulcahy part 2)
This is the second and final part of our interview with Colm Mulcahy. Last week we talked about card magic; in this part we moved on to the subject of Martin Gardner and the gatherings of interesting people associated with his name.
We’ve tacked on some blather we recorded about the British Science Festival in Newcastle to the end of this podcast. Listen in to hear what we think about maths! (We’re broadly in favour of it.)
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More Or Less integer sequence solution revealed (spoilers!)
Radio 4 maths police More or Less took time off from calling out journalists and deputy prime ministers for their misuse of statistics this series to sneak a hidden maths puzzle into their show. The first five episodes were “brought to us by” the numbers, respectively, 1, 49, 100, 784 and 1444. Listeners were invited to work out what number would bring us the final episode.
Integer sequence puzzle in More or Less
More or Less, the BBC’s maths and statistics radio show, has been sneakily doing a puzzle on us for the last few weeks. The episodes in the series so far have each been ‘brought to you’, Sesame Street-style, by a different number. But what will the final episode be? Can you crack the integer code and solve the puzzle?
The puzzle was announced in the programme broadcast on the 27th of September; you can listen to it on the Radio 4 site or as a podcast (the puzzle bit is at 27:05). If you think you’ve solved the riddle, email More or Less through their website.
The episodes so far have been brought to you by the numbers 1, 49, 100, 784 and 1444. (It’s not in the OEIS; we’ve checked). You can find out if you’re right when the final episode in the series goes out, on BBC Radio 4 at 4.30pm on Friday 4th October.