What Use is a Quadratic Equation?

4 quick answers

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Quadratic equations have become a staple part of most high school maths. From factorisation, sketching, completing the square to the quadratic formula – there’s always something to keep the class busy.

And it’s fairly relentless. And boring. Particularly if you’ve no idea why you’re doing it in the first place.

So, in a desperate effort to salvage some meaning from our fractured, out of date and irrelevant educational system – or knowledge based learning (depending on which side of the fence you sit on) – here’s 4 reasons to choose a quadratic equation.

You wouldn’t have an action movie

Back in the 1990’s, it wasn’t possible to use CGI in space movies. Actors ‘floated’ around in weightless conditions, fighting aliens, zapping the bad guys – by hanging on a wire dangling from a rig.

That was until the blockbuster film Apollo 13, directed by the brilliant Ron Howard. He needed high quality footage to convince the audience. So, to create lifelike and realistic scenes, real weightlessness was created by an aeroplane flying a parabolic course (a quadratic!).

You can even book the experience today. Not sure of the cost, but you get 22 seconds floating around in the cabin like Neil Armstrong.