Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Mathematics/2006 July 31

Oyam's Pyramid
The article Oyam's Pyramid is currently proposed for deletion. It seems to me that it would be likely to be covered by some area of mathematics rather than being a complete hoax, but I've been unable to track down any evidence for its existence with this title. Could somebody take a look and see if a) it's a valid but wrongly-titled article, b)it needs merging or redirecting to some other concept, or c) it's complete garbage. Thanks Yomangani 10:46, 31 July 2006 (UTC)


 * You should take this request to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics. -- Meni Rosenfeld (talk) 16:42, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I've copied it over there now. Yomangani 16:51, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

math
what is half of 3/4 (image removed)
 * You should use parentheses to make the expression unambiguous. The result can be either $$\frac{3}{8[[Image:Example.jpg]]}$$ or $$\frac{3[[Image:Example.jpg]]}{8}$$. -- Meni Rosenfeld (talk) 16:46, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
 * That's silly. —Keenan Pepper 21:56, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
 * What's silly about it? Image:Example.jpg is just a chunk of binary data, and can therefore be read as a (594416 bit) number, if you want to.  While I havn't worked out that number, not least because I have better things to do (not that you'd think so given that I've bothered to post this...) I can confidently say that the value of the first expression is very close to zero, and the second is stupidly large. -- AJR | Talk 13:08, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

dice problem
how many times must 2 dice be trhown to ensure that the same total score occurs at least 6 times? and how many times must n dice be thrown so that the same total score occurs at least p times?
 * Well, try figuring out how many possible totals the n dice might return in a throw. In the worst case, you'll begin a session by throwing each of these totals p - 1 times. So figure out how long that takes, then add one! Melchoir 23:42, 31 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This is a stupid question. ((Homework answer removed.)) Ohanian 00:48, 1 August 2006 (UTC)