Anorak

Anorak News | The Perfect Formula

The Perfect Formula

by | 6th, October 2004

‘ANORAK Towers is awash with newspapers and magazines from around the world, all of which we digest every morning to bring you the best of the day’s news.

Or does it?

But there is one magazine whose arrival every month is guaranteed to produce the most unseemly scramble among the hacks of this revered institution.

Even Old Mr Anorak himself has been known to throw himself into the melee that ensues when our copy of Physics World drops onto the doormat.

The same state of affairs seems to exist at the Guardian, which this morning divulges the eagerly awaited results of the magazine’s poll to find the greatest equation of all time.

We have been on tenterhooks for the past couple of weeks wondering which formula would carry off the ultimate accolade, ranked by the readers of the magazine according to elegance, explanatory power and importance to the development of its discipline.

And – drum roll – we can now reveal the winners.

In joint first place are…Euler’s equation (called by one reader “the most profound mathematical statement ever written”) and Maxwell’s equations on electromagnetism.

e=mc^2 limped in eighth place, while 1+1=2 only scraped in to the top ten by the skin of its teeth.

Anorak’s favourite, the formula for perfect happiness – P + (5 x E) + (3 x H) – did not get a mention.’



Posted: 6th, October 2004 | In: Uncategorized Comment | TrackBack | Permalink