Pi Calculated To Record 2.5 Trillion Digits 432
Joshua writes "Researchers from Japan have calculated Pi to over 2.5 trillion decimals using the T2K Open Supercomputer (which is currently ranked 47th in the world according to a June, 2009 report from Top500.org). This new number more than doubles the previous record of about 1.2 trillion decimals set in 2002 by another Japanese research team. Unfortunately, there still seems to be no pattern."
No one needs more than 50 digits (Score:5, Informative)
A nice little article on why it's useless to know pi to more than 50 digits in this universe.
http://everything2.com/title/Too%2520small%2520a%2520Universe%2520to%2520memorize%2520Pi
Re:No pattern = a very good thing (Score:2, Informative)
Cryptography has nothing to do with a prime "not being a prime". It's to do with quick factorization of primes.
Besides, I don't see why pi having any sort of repeating pattern would disrupt any theorems. I honestly can't think of any theorem that requires such a thing. Irrational and transcendental yes, but no repeating decimal pattern?
Maybe you can enlighten me to such a theorem.
Re:Congratulations! (Score:5, Informative)
We know without a doubt that it never repeats - if it did it would be a rational number, it has been proven to be an irrational number, moreso it is transcendental. We also know the exact pattern, take the taylor series of sin about pi/4, you get an elegant and simple series solution for pi.
That is not the point. The point is and exercise in computing, everything we do in computing involves rational numbers only (floats) and there is substantial error involved with this. It is computationally difficult to deal with large numbers, hence any method to do this more effectively is a gain for science.
Re:Question about Pi and circles. . . (Score:5, Informative)
Pi was shown to be irrational in 1768 and transcendental in 1882, finally putting to rest the ancient problem of "squaring the circle".
Re:Question about Pi and circles. . . (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Question about Pi and circles. . . (Score:5, Informative)
I believe you are confusing rational numbers and real numbers. rational numbers are those that can be expressed as p/q where p and q are prime integers. The existence of real numbers that are not rational follows from cantor's diagonal argument : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantor's_diagonal_argument [wikipedia.org]
Proofs of the irrationality of pi can be found on wikipedia : proof [wikipedia.org]
The sqr root of a negative is not defined in the real set but only in the complex set. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_numbers [wikipedia.org]
Re:Well... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I've got an even more simple pattern (Score:2, Informative)
Actually, the program itself is a perfectly fine way of representing pi. See: computable numbers [wikipedia.org]. Note that almost all [wikipedia.org] real numbers are not computable, so it is a non-trivial property.
It also takes an infinite amount of time to write out the decimal expansion of 1/9, but that can be written very concisely as a rational number. Also note that pi is irrational [wikipedia.org] so its decimal expansion is infinite in all bases [wikipedia.org].
Re:To all those who think pi may have a pattern (Score:2, Informative)
There is no doubt pi is irrational, but your definition of irrational numbers is dead wrong. Try clicking the link to the definition of irrational numbers in your own link and study up a bit.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but being an irrational number does not not mean it can't have pattern. It just means that the decimal goes on forever without repeating (i.e. no repeating pattern).
Case in point: Champernowne's constant, an irrational number:
0.12345678910111213141516...
Note that for this irrational number the decimal goes on forever without repeating; however, there is a clear pattern.
Now a simple pattern for pi expressed in base 10 may never be found (such a pattern may not even exist), but your statement that it is "impossible" for an irrational number to have a pattern is simply untrue.
Re:Question about Pi and circles. . . (Score:5, Informative)
Not necessarily. We can't really know about anything smaller than the Planck length, so in practical terms your paradox probably fails. The universe may be discrete on those scales.
Mod parent up - AC or not... I had to scroll a LONG way before seeing this argument and was going to post it myself if no-one else had. There's a lot of "weird" points about the universe that just don't seem to make sense. Posts such as the GP saying, "Clearly this definition of reality is flawed: stop using it." (with regard to travelling through an infinite number of points in a finite time) are all well and good, but don't go anywhere towards explaining WHY this definition is flawed. By defining the universe as discrete rather than continuous, it is no longer flawed, as with many other oddities and apparent paradoxes.
This would also potentially have an interesting effect on Pi in that if the number itself is truly irrational, then it's also wrong for every case we're using it - we actually should HAVE TO round it off somewhere to be correct when using it in models of the physical universe.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:No pattern in base 10 (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Congratulations! (Score:2, Informative)
Re:I've got an even more simple pattern (Score:3, Informative)
Wikipedia has pretty good article(s) on everything PI - how to calculate it in different ways, history, and all those quirks you don't even imagine to think about, before you read about them :-)
Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)
There are, however, irrational--indeed, transcendental--numbers that follow a discernible decimal pattern, like the Liouville constant [wikipedia.org].
Re:Well... (Score:4, Informative)
0.123456789012345678901234567890... = 1234567890 / 9999999999
Any recurring decimal can trivially be written as a fraction.
Re:Well... (Score:3, Informative)
In the example you give, perhaps you're thinking of Champernowne's number, 0.123456789101112....
This is an irrational number, and was the first number proven to be normal [wikipedia.org].
12345678910 (Score:3, Informative)
0.123456789101112131415161718192021....
Re:Question about Pi and circles. . . (Score:3, Informative)
rational numbers are those that can be expressed as p/q where p and q are prime integers.
Under your definition of "rational", 4/5 (0.8) is an irrational number. In order for a number to be rational, p and q need only be integers. Whether they are prime is irrelevant.