Thanks for the link to the paper, Roger, it was a good read. What appealed to me about it was not so much the advantages of using Tau in place of Pi in various situations but the way it challenged orthodox views.
I think APL and J have this quality as well, for example the design of Grade to return a set of sort indices rather than perform the sort directly. This can open up new ways of thinking and lead to insights that might not have happened otherwise. Original thinking is a rare commodity and something I appreciate when I come across it. Simon -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Roger Hui Sent: 28 June 2011 15:54 To: Chat forum Subject: Re: [Jchat] Has anyone come across Tau before? Another colleague sent http://tauday.com to me earlier today, and after skimming I replied as follows: 0. I have not seen it before, or even heard of the idea before. On skimming it looks like the author did a thorough job of it. 1. My first reaction is, "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet". 2. Having seen the usefulness of the "trivial" function j. in J, I think I'd be cautious about dismissing the idea offhand. I think to evaluate the idea one'd have to try using it in lots of places and see how it feels. (Look's like that's what the author has done in his paper.) ----- Original Message ----- From: Simon Barker <[email protected]> Date: Tuesday, June 28, 2011 5:07 Subject: [Jchat] Has anyone come across Tau before? To: [email protected] > I read with interest the following link today: > > > > http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13906169 > > > > It describes a constant, Tau, which has twice the value of Pi > and it is > claimed its usage makes more sense than Pi in a lot of > situations and > simplifies calculations. > > > > Perhaps the GPL version of J could include it as an experimental > function:Tau Times. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
