Scientific Narrative

3.141592653589793……

The first 15 decimal digits of the enigmatic 𝛑.

Today is Thursday, March 14, or Pi Day! Captivating countless all across the globe, the alluring nature of the number pi is annually celebrated on Pi Days.

The concept of transcendental numbers have been puzzling and enthralling to me and, I dare say, to humanity. Recently having learned about another transcendental number “e” for the first time, mathematics has been proving itself to be full of beauties that go beyond human comprehension and into the realms of the ungraspable complexities of the universe and beyond.

This year’s Pi Day I made two memorable discoveries: first being Pi Day is also Albert Einstein’s birthday! Paying homage to one of history’s most influential physicists, I want to reflect on a second discovery I have made regarding the application of the number pi.

The reason scientists don’t need to bother including any more digits in their calculations is that the numbers they are using, even at planetary or stellar scales, are too small for additional decimal places to have any real effect on the output value, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Baker, H. (2024, March 14). Pi Day 2024: Why NASA uses only 16 of the 62 trillion digits of pi we know. LiveScience. https://www.livescience.com/physics-mathematics/mathematics/pi-day-2024-why-nasa-uses-only-16-of-the-62-trillion-digits-of-pi-we-know 

What I found very intriguing is that despite being well-known for the irregular yet continuous nature of its decimal numbers, real life application of pi for even the most meticulous and conscientious work require those information only to a certain extent. It is said that NASA usually uses only up to 15 of the decimal digits for their calculation on even their most ambitious projects such as the Voyager 1 probe. Personally having always been at least slightly disturbed by the lack of means to perfectly express the number pi, this new information changed my perspective as to firstly, how minuscule decimal digits can be and secondly, of how the application of mathematics into other disciplines, such as engineering in this scenario, requires a different approach to the nature of these numbers. Not only is the fact that numbers or concepts can be so tiny yet be existent is baffling, but also is the sentiment that sometimes, you have to forget about the baffling natures of certain things in order to confidently apply those numbers and knowledge into other areas of science and disciplines.