93: Unsolved Math Problems & Video Game Controllers w/ Ellen Weatherford

Episode notes

Wait… ELLA is doing a math topic?? Not only that but she finds the beauty in searching for answers among the toughest math problems. Then, friend of the show Ellen Weatherford takes us through a tour of video game controllers. My favorite is the- wait how did we end up talking about World War 2??

Images we Talk About:
Tesseract Gif
Tennis for Two Controllers
Magnavox Odyssey
Game.com

Timestamps:
(00:00:00) Intro
(00:03:05) Unsolved Math Problems
(00:54:47) Video Game Controllers
(01:46:42) Outro

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We also learn about:

Today Caroline is played by Tom and Tom is played by Ellen, I’ll fall on the bad british accent sword for our guests, Ellen speed runs failing math, famous bad lawyer Fermat, I’m learning about math?? from Ella??? Ellen’s Last Theorem: lentil’s cure cancer, “mathematics like any science requires advancements and research and discovery”, basic math starts as early as mesopotamia, a brief history of mathematics, I gotta make math to describe this apple, math begets math, new ways to solve old problems, is this problem hard or will it take thousands of years to solve, the oldest unsolved math problem is 2000 years old, you’re scientifically wrong that all numbers are perfect, we know of 52 perfect numbers, merseene primes and perfect numbers, we don’t know if odd perfect numbers exist, Hilbert’s 23 unsolved math problems, it’s not the answers to the questions – its the tools built to solve them, new list just dropped – the millenium prize problems, the million dollar prize doesn’t account for inflation, the power of an interesting question, multidimensional play-doh, bumblebee – the tesseract! the poincare conjecture had only not been solved in the third dimension, perelman turns down the fields medal, they can offer a million cause if you solve it you’re only thinking about play-doh and 10 dimensions, is the mellenium prize problematic? eh, after researching a lot… the Riemann hypothesis actually probably won’t break cryptography, pure mathematics deserves the benefit of the doubt for its purpose, go forth with Ella’s blessing, new Ella loves math and libertarianism, I don’t know if the convergent evolution argument for controllers holds up in court, Ellen’s radical definition of a game, I don’t think the gate should be closed but don’t push me through it, the murky search for the first video game, Birdy the Brain – the Tic Tac Toe machine, controllers transmit human intention into a computer, some of the first controllers used dials, I was going to say the manhattan project as a joke, a brief and unexpected nuclear disarment detour, Higinbotham doesn’t like being remembered for tennis for two, Space War! the Magnavox Odyssey, some controllers were tabletop not handheld, Atari stole pong, the anatomy of a controller, stolen valor for logitech controllers piloting submarines, kids and parents learning to use controllers, Ella thought RT and RB meant top and bottom, rumble is purely for experience not input, the game.com had the first touch screen, a urinal controlled driving game, interviewing resident elderly expert Donna Jones.

Sources:
MacTutor: Pierre Fermat Biography
Wiki: Fermat’s Last Theorem
MacTutor: History of Mathematics
Simon Fraser University: A Brief History of Mathematics
Medium:The Oldest Unsolved Problem in Math
Pillars Taylor University: Odd Perfect Numbers
Royal Society: David Hilbert
Simons Foundation: Hilbert’s Problems
Clay Institute: The Millennium Prize Problems
Nature News: Maths ‘Nobel’ Prize Declined By Russian recluse
Anatoly Vershik: Thoughts on the Clay Millennium Prizes
BBC In Our Time: The Poincare Conjecture
Medium: The Poincaré Conjecture
[BBC News: Russian Maths Genius Perelman Urged to Take $1m Prize](BBC News – Russian maths genius Perelman urged to take $1m prize)
Clay Mathematics Institute: Riemann Hypothesis
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Probably the Oldest Interactive Electronic Game – Jeremy Norman’s History of Information
“Bertie the Brain Still Lives” – Popular Mechanics
“Tennis for Two – A Pioneer in the Video Game Industry” – GameSpeak Mag
“Who was Willy Higinbotham?” – Federation of American Scientists
“Spacewar!” – Museum of Play
“The Magnavox Odyssey: The Forgotten Pioneer of Gaming Consoles” – Slashgear
Bad Game Hall of Fame
“Place to pee: new Belgian urinal-based video game” – Ars Technica
“Sega Begins Sales of Urine-Powered ‘Toylet’ Videogame” – Wired
Perifit Care, Original Kegel Exerciser