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Propositiones Ad Acuendos Juvenes
The medieval Latin language, Latin manuscript ''Propositiones ad Acuendos Juvenes'' ( en, Problems to Sharpen the Young) is one of the earliest known collections of recreational mathematics problems. David Darling, ''The Internet Encyclopedia of Science''. Accessed on line February 7, 2008. The oldest known copy of the manuscript dates from the late 9th century. The text is attributed to Alcuin of York (died 804.) Some editions of the text contain 53 problems, others 56. It has been translated into English by John Hadley, with annotations by John Hadley and David Singmaster.Problems to Sharpen the Young John Hadley and David Singmaster, ''The Mathematical Gazette'', 76, #475 (Ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latin Language
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the Roman Republic it became the dominant language in the Italy (geographical region), Italian region and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire. Even after the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, fall of Western Rome, Latin remained the common language of international communication, science, scholarship and academia in Europe until well into the 18th century, when other regional vernaculars (including its own descendants, the Romance languages) supplanted it in common academic and political usage, and it eventually became a dead language in the modern linguistic definition. Latin is a fusional language, highly inflected language, with three distinct grammatical gender, genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), six or seven ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Recreational Mathematics
Recreational mathematics is mathematics carried out for recreation (entertainment) rather than as a strictly research and application-based professional activity or as a part of a student's formal education. Although it is not necessarily limited to being an endeavor for amateurs, many topics in this field require no knowledge of advanced mathematics. Recreational mathematics involves mathematical puzzles and games, often appealing to children and untrained adults, inspiring their further study of the subject. The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) includes recreational mathematics as one of its seventeen Special Interest Groups, commenting: Mathematical competitions (such as those sponsored by mathematical associations) are also categorized under recreational mathematics. Topics Some of the more well-known topics in recreational mathematics are Rubik's Cubes, magic squares, fractals, logic puzzles and mathematical chess problems, but this area of mathematics incl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alcuin Of York
Alcuin of York (; la, Flaccus Albinus Alcuinus; 735 – 19 May 804) – also called Ealhwine, Alhwin, or Alchoin – was a scholar, clergyman, poet, and teacher from York, Northumbria. He was born around 735 and became the student of Ecgbert of York, Archbishop Ecgbert at York. At the invitation of Charlemagne, he became a leading scholar and teacher at the Carolingian dynasty, Carolingian court, where he remained a figure in the 780s and 790s. Before that, he was also a court chancellor in Aachen. "The most learned man anywhere to be found", according to Einhard's ''Vita Karoli Magni, Life of Charlemagne'' (–833), he is considered among the most important intellectual architects of the Carolingian Renaissance. Among his pupils were many of the dominant intellectuals of the Carolingian era. During this period, he perfected Carolingian minuscule, an easily read manuscript hand using a mixture of upper- and lower-case letters. Latin paleography in the eighth centur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
David Singmaster
David Breyer Singmaster (born 1938) is an emeritus professor of mathematics at London South Bank University, England. A self-described metagrobologist, he has a huge personal collection of mechanical puzzles and books of brain teasers. He is most famous for being an early adopter and enthusiastic promoter of the Rubik's Cube. His ''Notes on Rubik's "Magic Cube"'' which he began compiling in 1979 provided the first mathematical analysis of the Cube as well as providing one of the first published solutions. The book contained his cube notation which allowed the recording of Rubik's Cube moves, and which quickly became the standard. He is both a puzzle historian and a composer of puzzles, and many of his puzzles have been published in newspapers and magazines. In combinatorial number theory, Singmaster's conjecture states that there is an upper bound on the number of times a number other than 1 can appear in Pascal's triangle. Career David Singmaster was a student at the Californi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
River-crossing Problems
A river crossing puzzle is a type of puzzle in which the object is to carry items from one river bank to another, usually in the fewest trips. The difficulty of the puzzle may arise from restrictions on which or how many items can be transported at the same time, or which or how many items may be safely left together.. The setting may vary cosmetically, for example, by replacing the river by a bridge. The earliest known river-crossing problems occur in the manuscript ''Propositiones ad Acuendos Juvenes'' ( en, Problems to sharpen the young), traditionally said to be written by Alcuin. The earliest copies of this manuscript date from the 9th century; it contains three river-crossing problems, including the fox, goose and bag of beans puzzle and the jealous husbands problem. Well-known river-crossing puzzles include: * The fox, goose and bag of beans puzzle, in which a farmer must transport a fox, goose and bag of beans from one side of a river to another using a boat which can ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jealous Husbands Problem
The missionaries and cannibals problem, and the closely related jealous husbands problem, are classic river-crossing problems, river-crossing logic puzzles. The missionaries and cannibals problem is a well-known toy problem in artificial intelligence, where it was used by Saul Amarel as an example of problem representation. The problem In the missionaries and cannibals problem, three missionaries and three cannibals must cross a river using a boat which can carry at most two people, under the constraint that, for both banks, if there are missionaries present on the bank, they cannot be outnumbered by cannibals (if they were, the cannibals would eat the missionaries). The boat cannot cross the river by itself with no people on board. And, in some variations, one of the cannibals has only one arm and cannot row. In the jealous husbands problem, the missionaries and cannibals become three married couples, with the constraint that no woman can be in the presence of another man unle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fox, Goose And Bag Of Beans Puzzle
The wolf, goat and cabbage problem is a river crossing puzzle. It dates back to at least the 9th century, and has entered the folklore of several cultures. The story A farmer with a wolf, a goat, and a cabbage must cross a river by boat. The boat can carry only the farmer and a single item. If left unattended together, the wolf would eat the goat, or the goat would eat the cabbage. How can they cross the river without anything being eaten? Solution The first step that must be taken is to let the goat go across the river, as any other actions will result in the goat or the cabbage being eaten. When the farmer returns to the original side, he has the choice of taking either the wolf or the cabbage across next. If he takes the wolf across, he would have to return to get the cabbage, resulting in the wolf eating the goat. If he takes the cabbage across second, he will need to return to get the wolf, resulting in the cabbage being eaten by the goat. The dilemma is solved by taking ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alcuin's Sequence
In mathematics, Alcuin's sequence, named after Alcuin of York, is the sequence of coefficients of the power-series expansion of: : \frac = x^3 + x^5 + x^6 + 2x^7 + x^8 + 3x^9 + \cdots. The sequence begins with these integers: : 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 1, 2, 1, 3, 2, 4, 3, 5, 4, 7, 5, 8, 7, 10, 8, 12, 10, 14, 12, 16, 14, 19, 16, 21 The ''n''th term is the number of triangles with integer sides and perimeter ''n''. It is also the number of triangles with ''distinct'' integer sides and perimeter ''n'' + 6, i.e. number of triples (''a'', ''b'', ''c'') such that 1 ≤ ''a'' < ''b'' < ''c'' < ''a'' + ''b'', ''a'' + ''b'' + ''c'' = ''n'' + 6. If one deletes the three leading zeros, then it is the number of ways in which ''n'' empty casks, ''n'' casks half-full of wine and ''n'' full casks can be distributed to three persons in such a way that each one gets the same number ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jeep Problem
The jeep problem, desert crossing problem or exploration problem"Exploration problems. Another common question is concerned with the maximum distance into a desert which could be reached from a frontier settlement by an explorer capable of carrying provisions that would last him for ''a'' days." W. W. Rouse Ball and H.S.M. Coxeter (1987). ''Mathematical Recreations and Essays'', Thirteenth Edition, Dover, p32. . is a mathematics problem in which a Willys MB, jeep must maximize the distance it can travel into a desert with a given quantity of fuel. The jeep can only carry a fixed and limited amount of fuel, but it can leave fuel and collect fuel at fuel dumps anywhere in the desert. The problem first appeared in the 9th-century collection ''Propositiones ad Acuendos Juvenes'' (''Problems to Sharpen the Young''), attributed to Alcuin, with the puzzle being about a travelling camel eating grain. \mathrm(n)=1/15+1/3+1, no solution exists for this problem; * If m\leq \mathrm(n)-\mathrm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Packing Problems
Packing problems are a class of optimization problems in mathematics that involve attempting to pack objects together into containers. The goal is to either pack a single container as densely as possible or pack all objects using as few containers as possible. Many of these problems can be related to real-life packaging, storage and transportation issues. Each packing problem has a dual covering problem, which asks how many of the same objects are required to completely cover every region of the container, where objects are allowed to overlap. In a bin packing problem, you are given: * A ''container'', usually a two- or three-dimensional convex region, possibly of infinite size. Multiple containers may be given depending on the problem. * A set of ''objects'', some or all of which must be packed into one or more containers. The set may contain different objects with their sizes specified, or a single object of a fixed dimension that can be used repeatedly. Usually the packing ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and borders fourteen countries by land, the most of any country in the world, tied with Russia. Covering an area of approximately , it is the world's third largest country by total land area. The country consists of 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities, and two Special Administrative Regions (Hong Kong and Macau). The national capital is Beijing, and the most populous city and financial center is Shanghai. Modern Chinese trace their origins to a cradle of civilization in the fertile basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. The semi-legendary Xia dynasty in the 21st century BCE and the well-attested Shang and Zhou dynasties developed a bureaucratic political system to serve hereditary monarchies, or dyna ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast, it shares land borders with Pakistan to the west; China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the north; and Bangladesh and Myanmar to the east. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives; its Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand, Myanmar, and Indonesia. Modern humans arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa no later than 55,000 years ago., "Y-Chromosome and Mt-DNA data support the colonization of South Asia by modern humans originating in Africa. ... Coalescence dates for most non-European populations average to between 73–55 ka.", "Modern human beings—''Homo sapiens''—originated in Africa. Then, int ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
