/lit/ - Literature

>>5261625
Omg all of Shakespear is in Pi :-)

Literature exalts the soul

>>5261633

Your maymay smiley doesn't make that statement any less true (if you assign each letter of the Latin alphabet a distinct number)

>>5261671

It's not necessarily true. Just because pi has infinite digits does not mean it contains all possible combinations of digits.

For instance, there are an infinite number of numbers between 1 and 2, but none of those is 5.

>>5261625
mah nigga

>>5261684
YOOOO

about as moronic as the pale blue dot speech

>>5261677
>>5261677
If pi is normal (which hasn't been proven but is widely believed) then it does contain all possible sequences. "Normal" just means a number's digits are essentially random, meaning that all sequences are equally likely.

>>5261707

What does it mean to be "essentially" random? I'm not disputing, but pi is well-defined, it is not a random sequence of numbers.

>>5261721
It means that the digits 0-9 (in base 10, or equivalently 0 and 1 in binary) are uniformly distributed. Of course pi is well defined, but its digits taken as a sequence appear to be random.

>>5261691
>wishes he could write something as inspiring

>>5261625
Idiot. It's a continuous series of narramemes. >>5257963

>>5261707
>>5261677
>>5261671
>>5261633

In what sense would Shakespeare truly "exist" within pi even if pi is normal?

Pi doesn't really exist as a complete base-10 decimal expansion floating out in space somewhere. We have to generate its digits ourselves to discover it to more precision. So pi isn't a number at all but really an algorithm for generating a decimal expansion that represents a certain idealization of a geometric ratio. A geometric ratio that does not actually exist because perfect circles do not exist.

The best you can say is this algorithm would, if performed for long enough, generate this certain sequence of numbers. But so what? It has not been performed and could not be performed in the lifetime of a hundred hundred hundred million billion trillion universes.

>>5262103
"Exist" is a loaded term when it comes to mathematical objects. But what you're saying is basically the mathematical equivalent of the falling tree not making a sound unless someone is there to hear it. It's possible to argue, but it's just not very interesting.

Still *if* we accept that irrational numbers exist in some meaningful sense, then the statement

> If pi is normal, then the complete works of Shakespeare are contained in its decimal expansion

is provably true. If you're going to deny that kind of proof because it's not pointing to some physical object in the world, then you're denying almost all of higher mathematics.

>>5262236
Why Rorty?

>>5261625
>tfw you realize all literature is just a continuous series of letter combos
>tfw you still enjoy it

>>5262236
>But what you're saying is basically the mathematical equivalent of the falling tree not making a sound unless someone is there to hear it.

Not at all. Unless you go in for some discredited philosophy like solipsism, then the tree exists independent of your perceptions, and so do the perturbations of the air caused by its falling. But the base-10 representation of pi -- which is itself a wholly fictitious idealization of geometry -- does not "exist" until humans represent it. There is no 10^10^10^10^10th digit of pi in nature because circles perfect to that precision aren't real (and space itself probably has a quantum before you could possibly reach that precision).

So my assertion that pi is not a number with infinite digits, but an algorithm for generating a number with theoretically infinite digits, stands.

>>5261625
Wrong realization. Remove the "just" and you're almost right.

>>5262308
Mathematical objects aren't physical entities, their properties aren't constrained by what is in "nature". Instead they are constrained by axioms and the rules of logic. "The decimal expansion of pi" is a mathematical object in itself that we can make statements about, independent of whether or not a physical representation of it is possible.

>>5262473

I don't think we disagree. See my first post:

>The best you can say is this algorithm would, if performed for long enough, generate this certain sequence of numbers.

But that is different, in my mind, from Shakespeare being "really" encoded in pi because that encoding hasn't actually be constructed yet. It's as if you said that, because there's an algorithm for building a house, a house already exists on the vacant plot of land you intend to build upon.