Marcus's Musings

Just for once, these are nothing to do with web development in any shape or form...!!

First, some mathematics-related articles from the excellent +plus magazine...

• Maths and art: the whistlestop tour
  An easily digestible, fascinating introduction into the mathematics of art, and by the same token, the art of maths. Escher is mentioned, and is one of my favourite artists - his works never cease to stimulate and intrigue, even the 100th time. The Escher Museum in Den Haag is a must see if you're ever over there, as I was recently. Fractals are also endlessly fascinating, and you can download a fantastic freeware fractal zoomer called Xaos which will let you explore the Mandelbrot set (and other popular fractals) in realtime (in years gone by, each frame took many minutes - if not seconds - to render). It also includes an enjoyable tutorial/presentation on fractal theory.
  
  
• All about averages
  Unfortunately it's all too often that we see misleading statistics presented to us by a supposedly reliable source (newspapers, TV news bulletins, government), so understanding what pitfalls lie behind something (supposedly) simple as an average figure is essential if we are to make sense of the information that we encounter. Sadly, your average man in the street knows little about things, and simply takes such "facts" at face value. Make sure you know better!!
  
  
• Why is the violin so hard to play?
  Or alternatively, "Why do beginners make such an awful racket"?! All is revealed within...

If you enjoyed those, check the archive page for more!


And finally, as a reward for all that cognitive exercise, here's something to make you laugh... The Parents Television Council of America regularly takes offence at various TV programmes, and tries to raise awareness of unacceptable content. All very well and good, you might think. However, rather puzzlingly they seem to think that it's a great idea to post the most offensive clips online, calling the page "Worst TV Clips Of The Week"!! Like a red rag to a bull, one could say... check them out here:

http://www.parentstv.org/PTC/clips/main.asp