Monday, September 13, 2010

God's Eyes and A Can of Math: A Semi-Memoir


So, I got a lot of feedback from my few fans and my parents--who aren't fans, but I force them to read this, anyway.  Basically, what I heard was, "Why in the HELL are you writing about math?  Why?  I will now stab your eyes out with non-mathematical objects just to show you how much I hate using math."

So, that went well.

I have decided to respond to these complaints... WITH EVEN MORE MATH.

But, simple math.  Math for fun.  Mom just shouted at me, "Fun and math do not occur in the same sentence." I tend to disagree as she just proved herself wrong in that last sentence.

We have now...

A comic book explanation of that function I tried showing you before.

YAY!

(Don't all applaud me at once.)

Mom just said, "Don't worry."

I'm not gonna.

Because I'm awesome like that.

The function, F(x) =1/X, is like an Unhealthy Relationship


Remember what it looked like?  No?  Doesn't matter.  Just imagine a God's Eye pattern you were forced to make in intersession camp because your public school is system is wacked and lacking funding and you're on a year-round schedule, unlike every other school system so you end up being the weird kid at the family reunion with one too many homemade crafts presents to give at Christmas.

....

Anyway, the function:





So, however far out that function F(x) = 1/X [or Y = 1/X] continues, it STILL won't be enough for the function to break even and cross the X-axis.  X will go to infinity before it will let Y finally touch that line.  That's right, folks.  Infinity.  IN-FIN-IT-TY (I felt like it warranted a second T just to get the point across.) 

That's like saying Y is pining for the X-axis at 0 and that classic love story We All Have Gone Through starts to unfold...

Y: "I love you, please be with me so we can make variable babies" 

X:  "I don't love you but I'll never really say no or yes to you kthnxbyeeeettylG2G."  

(Exit X).

Y:  "Sweet!  I have a chance!  I just have to wait... forever?"


Unrequited love = a burden even functions have to bear.

But, more importantly, what is up with that weird open space in the middle?  

You know, the part where the function keels away like something smells bad in the middle of the graph, shooting up and down to get away from said smell?

Let us go back to our halfhazard metaphor that Y is desperately trying to get with X, who couldn't give a flying fundamental theorem either way:   when Y no longer attempts to get with X, and instead gets furthest away from that seductive, tantalizing, alluring, enticing-to-no-end X, the function (i.e., the relationship between the two)...falls apart.

*dramatic pause to let words sink in*

That's why your function is spinning wildly off your graph paper in a frenzy to keep up with it's unrelenting path to smallness.

When you think about it, it makes sense.  The function is 1/____ <-- insert some number here.   

If that number gets bigger and bigger, that fraction gets smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller andyou get the pictureand One Day, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, the fraction will be so infintesimally small it will be almost like zero, but not zero.  However, if you were to divide it by zero... oh boy.  

You just opened up a can of Math Drama.





With that, I  leave you.  I hope this helped explain why it is so important to disagree with my choice of subjects.  


UPDATE:
As per request, proof of my awkward childhood:

Not one.



But, two.


In the same pattern, no less.

Apparently, when I was a child I sustained the same level of creativity as an infant Jackson Polluck, puking up his first art piece on his bib.

To quote Mom, "Well God has two eyes, right?" 

-Beryl