Student Recites 8,784 Digits of Pi

[penpen]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060316/ap_on_sc/pi_prodigy

Wed Mar 15, 10:02 PM ET

SALEM, Va. - A high school student Tuesday recited 8,784 digits of Pi — the non-repeating and non-terminating decimal — likely placing him among the top Pi-reciters in the world.

Gaurav Rajav, 15, had hoped to recite 10,790 digits and set a new record in the United States and North America. But he remembered enough to potentially place third in national and North American Pi recitation and 12th in the world.

His ranking should be verified by the Pi World Ranking List within two months.

"I'm kind of disappointed, but I guess I did OK," said Gaurav, a junior at Salem High School.

But his mathematical feat won the praise of others, including the math and computer science teacher who got Gaurav interested in it.

"I'm still stunned," said Linda Gooding, one of three contest judges. She then joked, "That's a couple more than I can do."

Gaurav began memorizing Pi while a student in Gooding's class. Gooding holds the competition every year, and said she expected students to learn about 40 digits. Gaurav recited nearly 2,990 the first time.

Gaurav's parents promised him an Xbox 360 video game console if he had reached his goal. His father, Jogesh Rajav, jokingly offered to get him "an Xbox, but no game."

But Gaurav ultimately turned town his mother Seema's offer to buy him the game system anyway because of their deal.

He will try for the record again in May.

 

[WadeTheWise]

Happy belated pi day to everyone. Did anyone else do anything interesting for pi day? I ate a piece of pie with a friend of mine in the airport before I flew home, not very exciting, but I at least got to eat a piece of pie

 

[jamun1]

So this is what a pi party looks like....

Party On

 

[gr8nrg]

What a bunch of looser geeks! Don't they have anything better to do than memorizing completely useless junk? They should get a life and do something better with their time................like browsing spoofee.com :tongue: :spoofee: :zip:

 

[Faerieglamour]

Have you ever seen Harold and Kumar go to White Castle? We have no idea what goes on at these Pi functions...LOL

 

[penpen]

So this is what a pi party looks like....

Party On

thanks for showing us what a pi party looks like

hope you had a fun time

 

[WadeTheWise]

That's nothing like a pi party. If you notice, there are two obvious girls in this picture, and one that I can't really tell one way or the other. so we'll say 2.5 girls out of 13 people. That's a population of girls over 19%! No pi party anywhere has there ever been a higher population of girls than 10%. This is just a bunch of wannabe geeks wearing shirts that they probably stole from real geeks.

 

[LiveSquid]

I too was thinking, A pi party would be all dudes.. But hey, girls can be geeks too!

Who do you get confused by? I cant tell on a couple of them..

 

[penpen]

Who do you get confused by? I cant tell on a couple of them..

which ones? like the one in the white shirt?

 

[LiveSquid]

The one seated rightmost at the table, and the one wearing the blue and white lanyard or necklace..

The white shirt looks like a guy. A very feminine guy, but a guy. Unless she's the famous Bearded Lady.

 

[tigger_too_wooh]

How do you even begin memorizing that many digits in a row? :34:

Wow. I'd be impressed if you could recite pi past 3.14!

 

[gr8nrg]

How do you even begin memorizing that many digits in a row? :34:

the better question is why

 

[penpen]

a little pi

... and the power of pi