gds@mit-eddie.UUCP (Greg Skinner) (01/10/86)
> From: ccs020@ucdavis.UUCP (Kevin Chu) > Trivial Pursuit has many incorrect answers in it. Most of them are wrong > because they were worded incorrectly, like the example above. > Here is a good example, the question reads: > "What surface area do you get when you slice a solid sphere?" > The answer given is "a circle" which is incorrect for several reasons. > How many can you name? I believe the question itself is incorrectly worded. It should read "What geometric shape do you get when you slice a solid sphere?" As I recall, if you slice a cone with a plane parallel to the base of the cone, you get a circle. However if you slice it at an angle to the base of the cone, you'll get an ellipse, parabola, or hyperbola (or intersecting lines) depending on the angle. If you slice a solid sphere you'll get a circle. However, the "surface area" is the area of the circle, not the circle itself. If there are any mathemagicians out there please help us out! -- It's like a jungle sometimes, it makes me wonder how I keep from goin' under. Greg Skinner (gregbo) {decvax!genrad, allegra, ihnp4}!mit-eddie!gds gds@mit-eddie.mit.edu
ins_apmj@jhunix.UUCP (Patrick M Juola) (01/12/86)
In article <911@mit-eddie.UUCP> gds@mit-eddie.UUCP (Greg Skinner) writes: >> From: ccs020@ucdavis.UUCP (Kevin Chu) >> Trivial Pursuit has many incorrect answers in it. Most of them are wrong >> because they were worded incorrectly, like the example above. > >> Here is a good example, the question reads: > >> "What surface area do you get when you slice a solid sphere?" > >> The answer given is "a circle" which is incorrect for several reasons. >> How many can you name? > (Explanation that "surface area" is the wrong term.) Another reason -- a circle is, by definition, the "locus of points EQUIDISTANT" et cetera. In other words, it does not include its interior. What was meant was a circle plus its interior. A more fundamental reason -- No one specified that we had to make only one slice or that the slice(s) had to be in a plane. I could describe several bizarre things I've done to oranges (which approximate spheres) in the kitchen that came out nothing like a circle. Pat Juola Hopkins Maths
gwyn@brl-tgr.ARPA (Doug Gwyn <gwyn>) (01/13/86)
> What was meant was a circle plus its interior.
I.e., a disk, more precisely a circular disk.
(disc for you foreigners)alan@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Alan Algustyniak) (01/14/86)
In article <1501@jhunix.UUCP> ins_apmj@jhunix.ARPA (Patrick M Juola) writes: > I could describe > several bizarre things I've done to oranges (which approximate > spheres) in the kitchen that came out nothing like a circle. > > Pat Juola > Hopkins Maths Sounds exciting! Tell us more.