Eli5: I always thought pi is 22/7, but recently i found out that 22/7 is a number that is pretty close to pi, not pi itself. Then how do mathematicians found more “pi” ?

Question

Eli5: I always thought pi is 22/7, but recently i found out that 22/7 is a number that is pretty close to pi, not pi itself. Then how do mathematicians found more “pi” ?

In: 167

Answer 1

I’ll just add that while calculating more and more accurate approximations of pi is a neat thought experiment, it’s not actually all that useful in the real world. You only need about 40 digits to calculate the circumference of the observable universe to within the size of an atom, and NASA uses only 15 digits for literal rocket science.

22/7 is a perfectly serviceable approximation for most applications. Heck, the Babylonians approximated pi as 3 and that was plenty close enough for all of their architecture.