How did someone come up with the number “Pi”?
In: Mathematics
Well, if you think about the well known formula for the area of the circle. πr squared.
Area = mysterynumber * (radius * radius)
Someone ( your boi, Archimedes, but he no longer gets the credit) basically noticed that any time you have a circle, and you already know the radius and rough area of it, the area divided by the square of the radius equals the same thing. Every time.
Then he started pulling sick maths wheelies. If you divide both sides of the equation by (radius * radius) you get.
Area / (radius * radius) = mystery number * 1.
Then he put playing cards in his maths bike spokes and Omg, turns out mystery number is aaalways about 3… Okay 3.1.. okay 3.14… mm closer to 3.142… 3.1417…
And that narrowing down of Pi is still going on to this day.
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