Mathematics in Iambic Pentameter

Transcription

1 110 TEN REASONS FOR NOT NAMING YOUR CAT CALCULUS Mathematics in Iambic Pentameter Have you ever noticed how poets have always avoided the subject of trigonometric functions? My own theory is that the only word that rhymes with "cosine" is "bovine" and who wants to read a poem about cows, other possibly than the Ogden Nash classic: The Cow The cow is of the bovine ilk, One end is moo, the other milk. It's safe to say there wasn't a rhyme Odgen Nash didn't like. From his brief to-the-point poem about fleas: to the practical: the man was a rhyming machine. Adam, had'em If called by a panther, don't anther Although we hope the readers of this magnum opus have a more cultivated taste in poetry than what some littérateurs refer to as poetic buffoonery, we nevertheless, offer the reader a potpourri of poetic whimsy, Odgen Nash style. And if that's not enough, they're about mathematics! Enjoy! Ode to Arthur Cayley I greatly admire Arthur Cayley, He proved a theorem almost daily.

2 Mathematics in Iambic Pentameter 111 Solution of Fermat's Last Problem An Englishman named Wiles discovered the key, To Fermat's Last Problem using geometry. By proving the sum of two powers, Is an integer to the power, If and only if the power is smaller than three. Professor Tician Behold a famous mathematician, A name known to all as Professor Tician. The Dean exclaimed No one surpasses! And put him in front of five algebra classes. One day he missed ten equations straight, He had, the students informed him later, Forgot fifteen terms and a monomial. Professor Tician could but smile, You mean, he said a binomial. The Right Triangle A right triangle, you can easily deduce, Has a right angle, two legs, and a hypotenuse. But are you aware, That the hypotenuse square, Is the sum of squares of the legs. QEDuese.

3 112 TEN REASONS FOR NOT NAMING YOUR CAT CALCULUS The Monomial The monomial has a single term, The binomial has two. Or is it the other way around? I'm never sure. Are you? Here's to Newton, Isaac Newton, Rootin tootin, Isaac Newton. A Salute to Sir Isaac Newton Tribute to Sir Isaac Newton He was most astuten, there's no disputen, So let's all give a saluten to Sir Isaac Newton. Yes, he lacked haute couture and social suavity, But he gave us optics and the Law of Gravity And yes he was moody and a little bit privative, But he balanced all that with integral calculus and the first derivative. So let's raise our glasses and give a toast, To the man who taught the world the most. For who among you will refuten, The lasting genius of Sir Isaac Newton.

4 Mathematics in Iambic Pentameter 113 Professor Snarf's Calculus Exam Professor Snarf gave a calculus exam today, He said it would be as simple as pie. But when he told us to begin, I thought that I would die. He trotted out limits, he dangled integration, He demanded the solution to Laplace's equation. A Riemann integral, the Riemann sum, There were more limits on this test than in all Christendom. Ratio tests, M-tests, pap-tests, and infinity, Followed for what I know was the Holy Trinity. And then I soiled my BVDs When he asked about vector analyses. Then he shook up my cerebral architecture, When he asked for a proof of the Riemann Conjecture. Then finally something about the Hopf bifurcation, And oh God, another Laplace's equation! But Professor Snarf said he'd scale our grades, And told us not to cry. But when he returned my test to me, I thought that I would die. He exposed my surds, he refuted my queries, He even poked holes in my infinite series. He knocked down my limits and then he would gloat, He even took umbrage with my asymptote. He said my theorems did not deduce, And blithely crossed off my hypotenuse. And once he got going he never looked back, Until my exam was covered in black. And finally he nixed my line integration, And, oh God, he even marked off my Laplace's equation.

5 114 TEN REASONS FOR NOT NAMING YOUR CAT CALCULUS The Origin of Mathematics Some say the Babylonians started it all when they realized there was more to life than growing tomatoes, cabbages, and cucumbers. So they started scratching out wedge-shaped symbols on little clay tablets, which eventually turned out to be our present-day numbers. Yes, some will argue mathematics began along the Tigris and Euphrates in old Babylonia, Although there are those who argue it began with Thales of Miletus along coastal Ionia. Now others will say mathematics began with Pythagoras, Archimedes and a few other Greeks, Although more than one Hindu will say it began with the Sikhs. But wouldn't you agree it's rather puerile. If we didn't at least consider the Nile And who would ever want to displease, Wu Wang, Huang-tese and a billion Chinese. But I think if the history of math were accurately told, Of the first man and woman who spun numbers from gold We'd have to go back past Greece and the Nile. Beyond India and China by a country mile. Past Moses, Noah, and the Queen of Sheeba, All the way back to Adam and Eva. ΓΛΧ ΕΣΨΩΘ