What is the use of knowing more than 20 digits of pi?

I thought about it a lot last night and came up with some possible applications:

1) You can check your arbitrary precision integration software.  The integral of Sqrt(1-x^2) from x=-1 to x=1 should be pi/2.  The more digits of pi you know, the more precisely you can check your integration algorithm.

2) Similarly, you can check an arbitrary precision ODE solver.  If you get a numeric solution to y''+y=0 with y(0)=0 and y'(0)=1, then the solution at t=pi should be 0.  The more digits of pi you know, the more precisely you can check your solution.

3) You might conjecture that exp(i pi) = -1.  The more digits of pi that you know, the more precisely you can check your conjectures.


 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

History of Math Links

Research in the original Master of Orion Game