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125th anniversary of Srinivasa Ramanujan's birth

posted 12 years ago by jamesjones01-1
2 replies | jump to latest

Today is the 125th anniversary of the birth of Amita's namesake, Srinivasa Ramanujan. I hope you will all join me in toasting his memory at 5:29 p.m. local time, wherever you are. (Why 5:29 p.m.? Well, that's 1729 in 24-hour notation. What's special about 1729? Ah, there's a story behind that...)

[–] rysteffen07 12 years ago

I don't even think the Hardy boys could figure out what is special about 1729

[–] Flick_Slick 12 years ago

I had to look it up:

It is the smallest number expressible as the sum of two (positive) cubes in two different ways:
1729 = 1**3 + 12**3, and
= 9**3 + 10**3

It's actually got some interesting properties, & a colorful history to boot (Ramanujan's there, of course!). I'll remember 1729 on my next cab ride!