A factor of 2 is not a good enough reason to change an entire fucking institution. Keep pi and multiply by 2 when necessary. It's not exactly difficult to do that.

Rashta

Australia46 Posts

July 02 2011 03:47 GMT

#65

I memorized 120 digits of Pi out of sheer boredom, don't make me do it all over again.

Meta

United States6225 Posts

July 02 2011 03:48 GMT

#66

I wholeheartedly agree that pi should be changed for the sake of mathematical clarity. Humanity got a lot of things wrong two millennia ago, and pi is one of them.

Edit: The people that disagree either haven't looked into it enough and are basing their opinion on their whims, or have never taken math higher than calculus. A = tau/2 * r^2 is mathematically elegant because the derivative is just dA/dr = C = tau * r, as opposed to C = 2*pi*r.

Edit 2: Think of how radians would be redefined! Pi = 180 degrees seems ridiculous. To go the full circle you need to go 2Pi radians. Seriously, who would possibly be against this shift? The only arguments I see are "fuck it, it's too hard." Well fuck that, mathematics should be as elegant as possible and if you disagree you clearly don't care for mathematics. Future students would see trigonometry more clearly with the redefinition and it would probably save them some grief. If clarity and elegance aren't enough reasons to merit the shift for their own sake, think of the future students.

shifty

United States280 Posts

July 02 2011 03:51 GMT

#67

There are a lot of formulas that just use pi and not 2pi

nttea

Sweden4353 Posts

July 02 2011 03:51 GMT

#68

ehhh..... care :p

champignones

Panama160 Posts

July 02 2011 03:53 GMT

#69

i like pi, not tau so that makes me pro-pi

RezChi

Canada2368 Posts

July 02 2011 03:57 GMT

#70

Keep pi as it is... it's going to be a huge hassle re-writing textbooks and changing peoples knowledge of pi to "tau" ~_~

doffe

Sweden636 Posts

July 02 2011 03:57 GMT

#71

1337% of Pi = 42 (more or less).

I rest my case

Actually no, I dont. This whole debate is so utterly pointless.. if there really is such a debate people should stop immediatly. Switching from being "forced" to do Pi*2 sometimes to instead using Tau/2 seems like an extremly unimportant thing for a mathematician to consider. I mean really... is it really worth the trouble of changing a buttload of formulas in every mathbook ever realesed? I mean, who cares... really?

Chimpalimp

United States1135 Posts

July 02 2011 03:59 GMT

#72

I personally prefer pi. I study electrical engineering, and tau comes up quiet a bit. I am sure we could use other symbols instead of tau for stuff, but I'd rather leave the confusion of changing variables to mean different things, just for the sake of convenience of 2*pi. I'm sure people who do rotational dynamics would dislike the use of tau for a "new" pi too. I always liked pi because regardless of what mathematical subject I had studied, the symbol for pi always meant pi and nothing else. You may think that isn't a big deal, just wait until you look at a semiconductors book, every 2 chapters half the symbols mean a totally different thing.

wswordsmen

United States987 Posts

July 02 2011 04:00 GMT

#73

On July 02 2011 12:57 doffe wrote:
1337% of Pi = 42 (more or less).

I rest my case

Discussion over Pi wins.

Zirith

Canada403 Posts

July 02 2011 04:03 GMT

#74

As some one who has to use trig way too much not having to type 2pi every time would make it a lil nicer. However not many people actually care about the circles so it would only really help people in grade school learning trig. Honestly though, I would love this change.

Edit: ya don't call it tau though, use that shit in elec. >.<

semantics

10040 Posts

July 02 2011 04:07 GMT

#75

who cares?
you can use tau if you want you could call it bob for all i care just start off all your shit by declaring that bob = 2pi
As long as it make sense it makes sense w.e is easier for you to visualize that's fine all this is is a constant so if it's 2pi or tau or bob i'm treating it like a constant. This is just nit picking something imo.

garbanzo

United States4046 Posts

July 02 2011 04:08 GMT

#76

I've had this thought a long time ago when taking quantum mechanics because I got annoyed at having to constantly carry around 2*\pi all the time. I think it's a fairly good idea, but I don't think it's worth all the hassle of trying to everyone to convert. Also doing it by way of introducing a new variable, e.g. \tau, is a terrible idea. I already have a hard time coming up with a variable in physics, I don't think they need to add the confusion of removing another possible variable. Especially \tau, it comes up way too often as some sort of time related variable.

No_Roo

United States905 Posts

July 02 2011 04:10 GMT

#77

Where's the movement to ditch base 10? There's the real travesty. Base 8 would be a tremendous improvement.

Arccotangent

519 Posts

July 02 2011 04:11 GMT

#78

My main concern would be with Euler's identity, but I generally do feel that 2pi may be more fundamental than pi. Overall, I don't really feel too strongly either way.