Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site sunybcs.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!seismo!rochester!rocksvax!sunybcs!colonel From: colonel@sunybcs.UUCP (George Sicherman) Newsgroups: net.religion,net.math Subject: Re: pi = 3 Message-ID: <1359@sunybcs.UUCP> Date: Wed, 28-Mar-84 16:22:00 EST Article-I.D.: sunybcs.1359 Posted: Wed Mar 28 16:22:00 1984 Date-Received: Sun, 1-Apr-84 07:44:10 EST References: <896@hao.UUCP> Organization: SUNY/Buffalo Computer Science Lines: 21 [Should Kentucky Fried Fox be eaten with the fingers?] This story has been around almost as long as the Bathtub Hoax. If I remember right, it needs 4 corrections: 1. The state was Illinois, not Arkansas. 2. The bill was not passed by both houses. 3. It would have made pi = 4, not 3. 4. It did not really mandate that pi=4. It required that the public schools use a new geometry textbook by an Illinoisan. The book contained a circle-squaring construction. The construction was of course fallacious, and somebody demonstrated that pi=4 followed from it as a corollary. Can any apostle of Martin Gardner confirm this? Col. George Sicherman ...seismo!rochester!rocksvax!sunybcs!colonel