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Piphilology

Piphilology comprises the creation and use of mnemonic techniques to remember a span of digits of the mathematical constant π. The word is a play on Pi itself and the linguistic field of philology.

The most common mnemonic technique is to memorize a sentence in which the number of letters in each word in turn is equal to the corresponding digit of π. The most famous example takes a number of variations, including:

How I want a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics!
How I need a drink, alcoholic in nature, after the tough chapters involving quantum mechanics!

The number of letters in each respective word is 3, 1, 4, 1, 5, 9, 2, 6, 5, 3, 5, 8, 9, 7, 9. These are the first 15 digits of the decimal expansion of π. If less accuracy is required an easy one is also:

How I wish I could recollect pi easily today!

Though longer ones following the same concept, as this example created by Peter M. Brigham, can be useful when say twenty-one or fewer digits are required:

How I wish I could enumerate pi easily, since all these (censored) mnemonics prevent recalling any of pi's sequence more simply.

Part of the school cheer of MIT is: "Cosine, secant, tangent, sine! 3 point 1 4 1 5 9!"

There are piphilologists who have written poems encoding hundreds of digits. This is an example of constrained writing.

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Last updated: 10-24-2004 05:10:45