Pi
The history of Pi
Pi, denoted by the symbol π, is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. It is an irrational number, meaning that it cannot be expressed exactly as a simple fraction and its decimal representation goes on indefinitely without repeating. The digits of pi, starting with 3.14, go on seemingly at random, but in fact they follow a very specific pattern.
The concept of pi has been known for almost 4,000 years, dating back to ancient civilizations in Egypt, Babylonia, and Greece. It is likely that the ancient Egyptians were the first to approximate the value of pi, as they used it in the construction of the Great Pyramid of Giza and other pyramids. The ancient Babylonians, who lived in modern-day Iraq, also used pi in their geometric calculations, and the ancient Greeks were the first to give pi its current symbol, the Greek letter π.
One of the first known calculations of pi was by the ancient Greek mathematician Archimedes of Syracuse, who lived in the 3rd century BC. Archimedes used a clever method known as the “method of exhaustion” to approximate the value of pi. He began by drawing a circle and inscribing a regular hexagon inside it. He then drew a larger regular hexagon around the circle and calculated the lengths of its sides. He repeated this process with larger and larger regular hexagons, each time calculating the lengths of their sides…
