Do ghosts enjoy Boo-lean algebra?
Remember my post on John Napier awhile back?
Well check out the Genaille-Lucas rulers, a variant of Napier’s bones. They’re used to carry out multiplication and have a really snazzy way of visually representing the “carry” part of multiplication.
Check out this example on Wikipedia.
I’m totally printing out that PDF of the rulers at the bottom of the Wiki page. Snazzy!
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I should just change my (semi-)weekly science blogs to “In This Blog Claudia Blah Blahs about a Mathematician” because that’s pretty much what I do weekly anyway.
(It’s ‘cause of that damn birthdays site, man.)
Today’s feature: John Napier of Scotland!
Yeah, he was a cool dude. Did some stuff, you know, just a few small things like DISCOVERING LOGARITHMS.
Napier studied math as a hobby (his main focus was theology) but, wisely, turned more towards math upon discovering logarithms and subsequently publishing a book about them in 1614. He created tons of calculating tables that were used to make calculations involving e much easier. He also invented an abacus-like device that could be used to quickly calculate products and quotients of numbers. This tool was called Napier’s bones because it involved the use of 10 long rods printed with numbers. The rods, back in the day, were made of ivory and thus looked like long bones.
He also did work with decimal notation, refining previous notational standards set in place by Simon Stevin.
Despite natural logs being my natural enemy (HA GET IT no seriously my brain cannot handle them), I’ve gotta admit that discovering freaking logarithms is pretty damn snazzy.
Not “discovering calculus” snazzy, but snazzy nonetheless.
END!
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