What do mathematicians nosh on when they get hungry?
A Möbius bagel, of course:
At least, George Hart does, because he figured out how to do a two-twist Möbius cut into a bagel. Not bad. But I don’t think it would satisfy my hunger. You can only schmeer one side!
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The original BA site (with the Moon Hoax debunking, movie reviews, and all that) can be found here.
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December 11th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
If it’s a Möbius bagel, wouldn’t you end up schmeering the whole bagel, kind of eternally?
December 11th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
Gee, I thought for sure the answer would be…pi!
December 11th, 2009 at 12:22 pm
There is someone with more time onhis hands them me.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
It’s not a Möbius bagel. It’s a bagel with two linked halves. He left the Möbius bagel as a problem for the student at the end.
I feel cheated!
December 11th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
If you dropped a Mobius Bagel, would it land butter side up?
December 11th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
Good question, John #5.
No, a Möbius bagel will always land butter side down. But this is in no way distinguishable from a non-Möbius bagel.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
BA – If you read the original article, you will see that there is a larger surface area for cream cheese when you cut it this way…
“It is much more fun to put cream cheese on these bagels than on an ordinary bagel. In additional to the intellectual stimulation, you get more cream cheese, because there is slightly more surface area.”
December 11th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
John #5
The question should be : If you dropped a Mobius Bagel, would it land butter side up or down?
The answer would be: Yes!
December 11th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
Not enough Cream Cheese on that bagle, and where is the Lox (as opposed to LOX)?
December 11th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Tomorrow: A Klein bottle orange.
December 11th, 2009 at 1:34 pm
Cool as heck. I’m gonna have to try that. Then how can I make bagels look like p,d, and f orbitals for the chemists here?
December 11th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
Garh… math.
December 11th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
I can see the lure of a Möbius spread.
But I prefer my bread in an infinite series.
December 11th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
This is the exact opposite of a Sierpinsky Bagel: Despite having length and width, there is zero area for cream cheese…
December 11th, 2009 at 3:05 pm
That reminds me of this joke:
An engineer, a physicist and a mathematician are each locked in a cell with a closed can of food.
A few days later the cells are opened. The engineer survived easily, he just threw the can at the wall and ate the food. The physicist survived as well. He has written down a lot of formulas on the wall and finally found a way to crack the can. The mathematician is dead. There is just one note on the wall: Assume the can is open….
December 11th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Two-twist Möbius bands have two sides. Stick to astronomy and ranting, and leave the math to the experts, Phil.
December 11th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
@ Dr Flimmer:
You forgot the updated version.
Last week they threw in a computer scientist too. Like the engineer and the physicist she survived the ordeal. But the other survivors were astounded to find an unopened but empty can in her cell.
They asked her how that was possible.
She shrugged:
“- Anyone with a byte can del^H^H^Hete spam.”
December 11th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
@ 2. bubba Says:
Gee, I thought for sure the answer would be…pi!
No, you’d never finish it & be on eating it forever … or at least until you burst!
December 12th, 2009 at 7:18 am
They also eat coffe mugs, being identical to donuts.
9. Larian LeQuella I’ve been thinking about Lox & cream cheese on a bagel all morning. Mmmmmm. 3 hours to go.
December 12th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Where’s my Möbius toaster?
December 14th, 2009 at 3:31 am
Moon Shark (11) said:
I think bagels are no good for representing atomic orbitals – they can’t contain the zero electron density at the nucleus. You need balloon animals.
Well, actually, I guess you can use scones for the p-orbitals (the jam will have to stand in for the zero electron density); balloon animals will do the dx2-y2, the dxy, dxz and dyz orbitals; and for the dz2 orbital you’d need at least one ring doughnut and … erm … a couple of floating fairy cakes?
As for the f-orbitals – well, they’re just freaky and bizarre anyway, so why would you want to eat them?
December 14th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
Here is another photo of the mobius bagel passed on through UVA Listserv Land. I enjoy the markups because you see the true beauty in the work!
http://www.astro.virginia.edu/~rlb9n/bagel.bmp
February 4th, 2010 at 7:44 am
“John Armstrong Says:
December 11th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Two-twist Möbius bands have two sides. Stick to astronomy and ranting, and leave the math to the experts, Phil.”
How unbelievably rude and unwarranted.
Armstrong: a self-advertised, ostensible expert at math, perhaps; certainly a confirmed expert at arrogance and incivility.
February 4th, 2010 at 8:11 am
Jacob, I missed that comment the first time around, and thanks for calling him out on it. But I’ll add:
Yes, John Armstrong, but it’s a joke. Stick to math, and leave things involving a sense of humor to people who have one.