Old Islamic Tile Patterns Show Modern Math Insight 538
arbitraryaardvark writes "Reuters reports that medieval Muslims made a mega math marvel. Tile patterns on middle eastern mosques display a kind of quasicrystalline effect that was unknown in the west until rediscovered by Penrose in the 1970s. 'Quasicrystalline patterns comprise a set of interlocking units whose pattern never repeats, even when extended infinitely in all directions, and possess a special form of symmetry.' It isn't known if the mosque designers understood the math behind the patterns or not."
headline (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Tasty thoughts (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Not Surprising (Score:5, Funny)
Nah, that was just one of the first examples of outsourcing.
A more interesting link [wikipedia.org].
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Tasty thoughts (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:4, Funny)
Ah, I see. Proof by explosion.
Re:Giving rise to the question: what don't *we* kn (Score:5, Funny)
Nobody knows, but the step after that will be Profit!
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Tasty thoughts (Score:5, Funny)
Youssef Abu Sufah, a British scholar of 12th century Muslim architecture and amateur mathematician summed up the almost unanimous response of the scientific, mathematical, and historical communities with the following observation:
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Why wouldn't they? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:The Catholic Church happened. (Score:4, Funny)
Oh, please... (Score:3, Funny)