Pi’s Message

The value of pi has now been calculated out to a couple craxillion digits or more (The First One Million Digits of Pi). Supercomputers churn away 24×7, pushing farther and farther into the innards of the number on a voyage to infinity. And beyond. Shoutout to Buzz.

Various algorithms have been designed which, when applied to the string of pi digits, convert the numbers into the letters of any alphabet. The strings of letters can be scanned for words in any language. Since the string of numbers is infinite and in some sense random, we can conceive of pi as a room full of monkeys at their typewriters.

For example, 3.14159265359 has been shown, using one algorithm, to be “Watson, come he…”

Professor R. Squared at UNLV has discovered, way out there, the King James Version of the Bible, up to halfway through Lamentations, where the word “poo” is suddenly encountered.

This led to a rush of searches for other sacred texts, complete ones, the discovery of which could be taken as a sign from God, or the gods. However, the first complete text of a book, fact or fiction, to be found, turned out to be “The Bourne Identity” (Robert Ludlum).

In my own modest search efforts, I’ve found a recipe for clam chowder that I rather like.