Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Make the symbol wavy and you may get away with it...


Learned a new word today: congruent;
It means “Identical in form; coinciding exactly when superimposed.” I recall this symbol from my primary-maths classes – I memorised it as being the combination of the ‘approximate’ and ‘equal’ signs.

I was prompted to look up this new word following my husband reading through my blog-posts and questioning my ramblings over the scales (as in ‘drawing scales’);
I was so amused by the randomness of the numbers that totally ignored what they supposed to mean, or to quote Graham:

“There is more to these numbers than randomness...”
So he examined the ratios between them...
350
0.538462
0.666667
525
0.538462
0.666667
650
975

How much mileage should one squeeze out from a set of numbers representing scales on a single drawing picked from a pile of a thousand?
When it comes from fulfilling the self exposed daily quota of one’s blog, one should make the most even of little morsels.

Is this not highly symptomatic of this industry?
Scientifically looking data to take us away from real issues?

I do wish things were more clear cut, like in maths learned at primary.
Equals means equals. Equivalent, exactly the same.
Approximately equal is approximately same, near, within the ballpark.

Why not then say ‘whatever’?
Not meant to scale, just use a figured dimension and that’s it.
Or use the wavy symbol!


3 comments:

  1. I stumbled upon this nifty post while searching for the best word to describe the unique relationships found in nature.

    space and time, matter and energy, gravity and whatever.

    I enjoyed it so much, I read it twice.

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