Re: Carl Sagan's Contact (was: My Review A.I. the Movie (total sp oiler I hope))

From: Damien Broderick (d.broderick@english.unimelb.edu.au)
Date: Sat Mar 09 2002 - 00:23:10 MST


At 09:26 PM 3/8/02 -0800, Spike wrote:

>ratio of circumference of a circle to its diameter. This is controlled by
>the specific and tweakable geometry of spacetime, no?
     
> Since arctan x = x - x**3/3 + x**5/5 - x**7/7 - ...
>
> pi/4 = 1 - 1/3 + 1/5 - 1/7 ...

In our world. But if 2 pi radians is defined = 360 degrees, what happens
when a circle has more or fewer than 360 degrees, due to space curvature? I
have the feeling that by invoking the arctan function you're being, as it
were, circular here.

Damien Broderick
[not any kind of mathematician]



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