Pimetheus
A Mathematical Myth
This story takes place a long time ago, in a world not too different from our own - the World of Numbers. It's very easy to get to, and some people even get paid for vacationing there. Most visitors, however, get bored before even getting in the front gates. This is because most people have lousy travel agents - but that's another story.
The World of Numbers is a wonderful, structured place. Everything is as straight as can be. Everything that has a place is in that place. Everything that doesn't have a place simply doesn't exist. Messiness is the worst crime possible in the World of Numbers, and everybody obeys the law.
There is a hierarchy in the World of Numbers. A hierarchy is a way of organizing people from best to worst. The best people are on top. In the World of Numbers, the best numbers are the longest numbers. The longer the number, the more powerful and well-liked that number is.
The king, an honest, if rather helpless number, was the longest of them all. He was so long, in fact, that he had to live in a special castle, 400 feet long and quite thin. It looked very much like a long hallway. Inside, the king hosted many wonderful parties, and all the longest numbers of the kingdom would attend. They danced wonderful number dances, spinning, dividing, twirling and, after the party, multiplying. It truly was wonderful.
Outside, of course, was not quite so wonderful. The shorter numbers, and there were a lot of them, worked instead of danced. But they did not mind because, next to working, not minding was what they did best.
High above the World of Numbers sat the number gods. They also had a king, and he was very long indeed, although you couldn't tell by looking at him. In fact, he was the longest a number could be. A very famous number tried counting him once. He counted for over a hundred years, then lost his place and died. That's how some people get famous.
The number gods were not quite as tidy as the numbers down on earth. They broke all sorts of rules, and were always fighting with each other. Believe it or not, some of them even didn't like their king. They would say to each other, "He looks like an '8' that tripped and fell!" Then they would laugh, because that's the kind of mean joke that the number gods liked. The king had a hard time appreciating these jokes, so he was often out of earshot when they were told.
The king was often cross. He didn't like the other gods much either. They were so messy and wild. Trying to talk to them was exhausting. He even suspected that they made jokes about him. He much preferred the real numbers down on earth. They were so neat, so straight! And the worst they ever did was try to count him.
One day a very tricky number god decided to play a trick on the king of the gods. He got some old spare parts from a couple of '4's and '7's and made an entirely new number. It was the oddest number he'd ever seen. He whispered some nonsense into its ear and sent it down through the clouds.
In a very humble hut back on earth a '2' and a '6', husband and wife, were eating dinner. "Oh!" said the 6 suddenly. "That felt funny!" Her husband asked what was wrong. "I felt something go into my stomach!" He reminded her that they were, in fact, eating dinner, and food was going into his stomach too. She felt very silly for forgetting this and went back to eating. Nine months later she was giving birth.
The baby was, to be perfectly frank, the ugliest thing they had ever seen. Its angles were all wrong, and what's that curvy bit on the end? The 2 and the 6 could hardly stand to look at it. So, in the middle of the night, they rode out into the desert and left the baby where nobody would see it. They vowed to return every night with food and water, and even toys when they could afford them. The baby, being a baby, seemed okay with the idea.
The next day, however, a traveling circus came through the desert and found the baby. All of the circus numbers, even the lions, wanted to leave it where it was. It was so ugly, and besides, what kind of equations could it possibly do with those stumpy little arms? They were about to leave the baby when the circus chef, an 11 that had lost a leg in the war, picked him up. "I'll take care of it," said the 11. "Sometimes even ugly things are useful."
The baby grew up as only babies can. Soon it was a young boy. The 11, it turns out, was wrong. Not only was the boy ugly, but he seemed uncoordinated and supremely useless. Worse yet, he refused to speak a single word. Still, the 11 was fond of him and kept him around the kitchen.
One day, to keep the boy busy, the 11 gave him a big block of dough to play with. When he turned around to check on him some minutes later, his jaw dropped - the boy had made something amazing! The 11 tried to count the number of sides on the boy's creation but could only find one - it defied mathematical logic!
He called the other circus numbers into the kitchen. They were all amazed at what the boy had done. One of them piped up, "What's it taste like?" So they divided the boy's creation into equal wedges and tried it. It was delicious! Unlike anything they'd ever tasted! A giraffe looked down and said, "Whatcha call it, boy?" The boy smiled and said simply, "Pie!" Everyone cheered, and from that day on the boy was called Pi.
Pi's pies were a huge hit. They put the circus on the map. Soon he was creating new foods faster than they could sell them - lollipops, donuts, pizzas - his ideas never stopped!
Meanwhile, far away in his castle, the king had a problem. He had fallen in love with the beautiful queen of a neighboring kingdom, a number even longer than he was. This was not the problem, because she loved him too. His problem was that his castle was only long enough to fit himself! It would never fit his would-be wife, let alone their children. The solution seemed simple enough - build a longer castle! His engineers, however, poo-pooed the idea. His current castle was already so long that it constantly threatened to collapse in on itself. Make it any bigger and it would certainly cave in. After the engineers had been fired, the king gave a call to the entire kingdom for a number clever enough to solve his problem.
News soon reached the circus of the king's problem. Pi immediately began to pack his bags. "Don't leave us!" cried the circus numbers. "Your food is so good! We can't live without it!" The owner of the circus cried the loudest, for he was now very popular and rich thanks to Pi. "Pie!" chirped Pi. It was the only word he knew. Everyone wailed and gnashed their teeth when he left. Everyone but 11, who knew that Pi was a well-rounded young number who didn't belong in a circus.
Pi walked for many miles. The World of Numbers was a confusing place - he had never seen so many strange numbers before. Curvy ones, angled ones, short ones and long ones. Some were even as long as a train! Everywhere he went people thought he was ugly, but Pi just thought they were shy.
He soon came upon a little 3 crying in the middle of the road. She was sitting next to a large pile of equation signs and decimal places. "Pie?" asked Pi. The girl didn't know what that meant, but she liked to talk and eagerly wanted someone to listen, even someone that was ugly. "I'm crying here because I'm a very lazy girl! I was told to bring these spare parts to the factory, because that's what they pay me to do. But today they needed twice as many parts, so I had to carry them all! It was such a hard job that I fell asleep right in the middle of the road. When I woke up I was crying. Now I will be late to work and I shall be fired, like a lazy girl should be!" And she cried some more.
Pi did not like the sound girls make when they cry. Not knowing what to do, he decided to think. He thought for a moment, then had an idea. He went to the girl's pile of spare equation signs and decimal points and, with a bit of tinkering, created something. The girl stopped crying. "That's a very odd chair you've created," she said. "A fine chair for a lazy girl to sit in!" And she started crying again.
Pi grabbed an equation sign and tore it in half, so that he had two sticks. He then took one and did something very curious to it - he huffed and puffed and with all his strength bent it into a loop. He did the same with the other stick. He then took his two loops and fastened them to the chair he had made. The girl stopped crying as Pi rode round and round her on his contraption. "Wow, that's swell!" she said. Pi stopped and offered it to her. She jumped on it and had a great laugh. Pi began to help gather her dropped parts. She looked at them, laughed and said "Sucks to that business!" She then rode away down the road, leaving a very puzzled Pi.
Pi continued on towards the castle, taking a couple equation signs for good measure. Along the way he met many fine numbers that seemed quite impressed with his loops. One particularly bright little boy took one and shimmied it around his waist. Soon everyone was doing the same. In another town Pi made a very small loop and, with one of the sticks from an equation sign, showed a group of children how to play a game of ball. They were very pleased. Everywhere Pi went people laughed and played. This made Pi very pleased as well.
Finally, Pi came to the king's castle. He went inside and, after waiting in a very long line, got to talk to the king. By this time the king was quite cross, because the ideas the other numbers had suggested were all bad ones. Pi nervously unrolled his plan for the king's castle - a simple circle. The king looked at it, stroked his beard, then looked at it again. He tilted his head from one side to the other. Pi jumped suddenly - he was holding it upside down! He quickly turned it around. "Oh!" cried the king, "Oh my! That's brilliant! My boy you are a genius!" Pi, not knowing what a genius was, grinned a wide grin. The king called for his engineers, who were happy to have their jobs back, and told them to get to work on the new design.
Meanwhile, back up in the clouds, the king of the gods had heard a particularly funny joke and was feeling bad. He decided to look down at his fond creations. That always cheered him up! He first looked in the factories, where they usually were. But the factories were empty! He checked the warehouses, the laboratories, the schools and the offices - all were empty! He began to get worried. He decided to go down and see for himself what was going on.
He disguised himself as an 8 by flipping on his side, then jumped down to earth. He soon ran into two small 4s, a brother and sister, kicking one of Pi's loops back and forth. They were laughing. "Tell me," said the king of the gods, "What kind of work is this kicking business?"
"Oh it's not work at all! It's fun!" said the smaller 4. This made him worried. It looked like messy business to him.
He continued on. Everywhere he went numbers were doing this fun! He did not see a single number doing work. He began to get very angry. The world he had created, his tidy straight world, was suddenly very messy and round. Somebody was going to be in a lot of trouble.
Meanwhile, the king's new castle was almost finished. The design was simple enough, and the engineers worked as hard as they could to build it. The king was pleased as punch. His new castle was so large and round that he could curl up inside it and have room for five hundred beautiful queens if he wanted! He decided to give Pi a grand party in his honor. All the longest numbers were invited, and the best food was to be served. "Pie!" cried Pi.
"Pie indeed!" cried the king, and the chef from the circus was called to bake hundreds of different pies for the party.
Some miles away, the king of the gods began to ask who was responsible for this wild mess. Everyone he asked simply said "Pie!" and pointed in the direction of the castle. Whatever pie was, it was going to be in a lot of trouble!
That night Pi had his party. It was the largest party the kingdom had ever seen! The new castle had much more room for dancing, and everyone liked that. When dinner was served, the king asked Pi to give a speech. "Pie," Pi began, "Pie!" The crowd cheered.
"Hear, hear!" said the king. "Now, tell me, you do not look very long - perhaps you are the shortest looking number I have ever seen - yet you are without a doubt a genius. You must be longer than you look. How long, exactly, are you?"
Suddenly Pi jumped on the table. From somewhere deep inside him, he began to recite, "3 point 141592653589..."
As Pi recited, the king of the gods, refusing to use one of those loopy bicycle contraptions, began walking towards the castle. He walked for several days without stopping. When he saw Pi's round new castle design, he almost fainted with anger. He banged on the door, demanding to be let in.
This woke everyone at the party up, except the king, who was getting too nervous to fall asleep. "...61514463204..." Pi continued. Pi seemed to be a very long number indeed. He was almost longer than the king by now, and didn't seem to want to stop. Everyone was too polite to get up and interrupt him to answer the door.
Finally the god blew up the door with a bolt of lightning - he was that mad. He stormed in and shouted "Ok, where's pie?" One of the waiters offered him a slice of blueberry. "No, you idiot!" and the god shot him with a bolt of lightning. The other waiters, rolling their eyes at such an obvious joke, pointed to Pi.
"...52563756..." Pi continued.
"So you're Pi!" cried the god, "You've ruined my beautiful world! You're going to have to be punished!" This made Pi lose his place.
"I've done nothing wrong!" said Pi, who didn't want to be shot with lightning.
"He can talk!" whispered the surprised numbers.
"Nobody is doing any work! The factories and stores are all closed! All this fun is making a huge mess!" cried the god.
"That's because they don't know how to use it yet!" said Pi, making it up as he went. "They need their fun. In fact, a happy number works even harder than a miserable one. They're enjoying it now because it's new. But they must be taught to work as well. The beauty of a circle," he said as he drew one in the air, "is its balance." Everyone was very impressed with Pi's sensible speech, especially Pi himself.
The god thought about this for a moment. "How much balance?" he asked.
"Well," said Pi, "there are seven days in a week. That makes three and a half days of work, and three and a half days of fun. Half and half." The god began to charge another lightning bolt. "What I mean, of course, is 4 days work, 3 days fun," said Pi quickly.
"5 and 2." said the god.
"5 and 2 it is!" said Pi. Everyone cheered.
The king of the numbers said "5 days of work and 2 days of fun! How marvelous! Let everyone know! Balance truly is the way!"
The god thought for a moment. "Is it not true," he said to the king, "That as the longest number in the kingdom, you are the king?"
"It is true!" said the king proudly.
"And what, as king, do you do?"
"Why, I have the grandest parties in all of the kingdom! There's food and drink and dancing!"
"That's what I thought," said the god. And he told the king that for 5 days every week he must go work in the fields with the other numbers. For 2 days every week he could return and host his parties with his new wife if he liked. The king had to admit this was only fair.
The god then made Pi the king, knowing that his ideas would make the kingdom better than any party would, even if they were a little bit messy. Pi grinned. He was okay with being the king.
Then the god returned to the sky, where he promptly fired the tricky god that had played the mean trick in the first place.
And from that day on, everyone in the Number World lived long, happy, and 28.5 percent less stressful lives. It truly was wonderful.
The moral of the story: while it may be for the betterment of mankind, playing tricks on your boss will probably get you fired.
THE END
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