Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Pizzas and Math

The following is an example of how you use math in situations which you probably didn't think math was an important factor. If you went to a pizza place, say like 'Little Caesars'...my favorite because the pizza is good and just as important to me--cheap...to purchase pizza and they offered 2-12inch pizzas for the same price as 1-18inch pizza, which would you choose. Most people would choose the 2-12inch pizzas, thinking that 12 inches plus 12 inches totals 24 inches, which is more than 18 inches. This reasoning would be fine if you just ate the diameter (a line that indicates length (which has no area). But, in reality, you are eating the total area of the circle which becomes 4 times greater each time you double the diameter of that circle. Therefore, as the following illustration shows, you would get approximately 28 sq. inches less pizza purchasing the 2-12 inch pizzas than by purchasing the 1-18 inch pizza.