[sci.math] Pentagons in squares: an admonition

mrios@ihlpg.UUCP (Michael Rios) (11/15/86)

> >Joseph McLean writes:
> >> A pentagon can't be inscribed in a square ? Absurd.Whoever said that
> >> all 5 corners of the pentagon need to touch the square ?

> >My definition of "inscribe", from Webster's, states that all vertices
> >of the inscribed polygon must touch a boundary of the polygon in
> >which it is inscribed.
> >
> >Rick

>    jml.

These people (and many others through the mails) have griped as to my
original problem of "inscribing" a pentagon inside of a square.  I feel
I must set this straight, before this group goes down in a mass of flames
and definitions. :-)

What I meant when I posted this puzzle/query was to determine the
largest regular pentagon that would fit within a given square.  If the
word "inscribe" was too rigid a definition for this, then I and my
semantics will apologize.  I'll watch it from now on.  Really, I will.



-- 
	Michael Rios		ihnp4!ihlpg!mrios

"You keep calling me Walter.  I don't like you."
				-Walter Joseph Kovacs, _Watchmen_