Good Morning John,
A couple of weeks ago, somebody
mentioned me in the comments
of this TikTok:
I was just doing my makeup
for work, and I just wanted to tell
you guys about how I don’t think
math is real. And I know that it’s real
because we all learn it in school or
whatever, but who came up with this
concept? And I know you’re gonna be like
Pythagoras, but like how? How did
he come up with this? How would
you even figure that out?
How would you start on the
concept of algebra?
I was immediately excited by this because
this young woman is asking all of the right
questions that don’t just lead to a greater
understanding of math, but actually
joyous understanding of math.
And I get frustrated that often the way
we teach math right now ignores these questions.
How did Pythagoras, a dude who didn’t
even have a flushable toilet, figure out an
equation that we still use and is still useful
today?
Thousands of years later!
A truth so true that it’s more true than
reality is. Every point in our universe has some bluntness.
Every line has some wiggle. But in Pythagoras'
mind, there was a perfect triangle that,
one that no matter how far in you zoomed in,
the lines were straight, the points were pointy.
One in which for every right triangle the
area of the square made by the hypotenuse was
exactly the same as the area of the squares
made by the legs of the two triangles
added together. Exactly! Exactly.
There’s the question of how he figured this out.
There are a number of thoughts about this.
We’re not sure, the one that’s most
discussed is that he was looking at a bunch
of square tiles. And he thought, “If I split
one
of those squares diagonally, then I get a
triangle.
And the legs of that triangle...well, the
squares made by them are right there.
They’re those squares there.
And the square made by the hypotenuse…
well it’s made out of triangles if I split these
other squares. But if you add those triangles
we just made up, you get the two leg squares!
And then he abstracted that not just to triangles
made by squares, but all kinds of right triangles.
The point though is that he didn’t need
any special knowledge to figure this out.
He didn’t need any special technology.
He just needed to play a game in his mind.
They say he was like visiting a palace,
I think he was pooping. I think there’s a
90% chance he was pooping.
Now, the pythagorean theorem is useful
information. Like it comes in handy for people.
It doesn’t come in handy for me. That’s not
why it’s interesting. It’s interesting
because it’s interesting!
The idea that we teach people the
pythagorean theorem without teaching
them that mathematicians build universes
in their minds that are more perfect than
the one that we live in, in some ways, that’s
wild! Sometimes it is brought up, and
sometimes the fact that Pythagoras built a
CULT promising SECRET KNOWLEDGE
about this stuff and then actually delivered
on that secret knowledge that was extremely
powerful and wild that you can create a
universe in your mind, that also is sometimes
taught but not always! I mean come on!
This young woman asks, does math exist?
I don’t know. Did Pythagoras discover his
theorem, or did he invent it? Does math
both exist and not exist? Is it an artifact
of our minds, or of reality?
No one knows the answer to that question!
But let’s let people ask it!
The most discouraging thing is that of course,
because as discussed this is an imperfect universe,
people then like mocked her! As if she was
stupid!
When she’s asking the big questions.
Math is a game. It’s a game we play in our
minds. And I don’t know how we ended up
going from like “go play! Go play!” to
like, “remember this equation! This is how we
will judge you when we're deciding whether
or not you get to go to college.”
So bless this young woman for her
questions, and bless Kyne the drag
queen for explaining mathematics on TikTok.
So I guess this universe does
have some things going for it.
John, I’ll see you on Tuesday.
Also I interviewed Bill Gates about misinformation
and internet platforms over on Hank's channel
If you want to check that out.
It's there. I liked it.
