On 7 Mar 2004 02:06:47 -0800, (Cliff Huprich) wrote:

Johm
Not the date of the papers from the later apologists (I presume)

No, not apologists. This is not a theological paper.
The subject is math.

and numerologists but the date of the decimal system and zero, as
contrasted to the presumed date of the original writings.

As that paper points out, the decimal system is not necessary for the
calculation. The ancients had 1/2 figured out long before it became
0.5 and for some things fractions are more accurate anyway. 1/3 is
better than 0.33333

Also, as it was not crossposted, you may not have seen this
post:

In which newsgroup?

But you're missing the real important points Cliff.

1) IF the hebrew god created this and can't get PI accurate beyond 5
decimals, then why do so many worship him as omnipotent.

But it would appear that the value of Pi was stated to that accuracy
according to that paper.

2) IF all this stuff was invented by men who were so clever that the
word meant the number accurate to 5 decimal places, then why do
so many worship their invented god as an omnipotent being?

At that time, math was in the province of astronomers (astrologers)
and regarded as a magical, arcane wisdom closely associated with gods
and superstitious nonsense like gematrics.

Just a thought from a born only once (that I can remember) agnostic.

Well I'm an unbeliever too, but I have never taken up that Pi = 3
passage as a cugel to beat the devout with. I think it's a weak
argument.

I suppose I should ask why their "diety" did not know of
the Pythagorean Theorem, Quantum Theory, the real numbers, or,
really, much about the universe at all.

Maybe you should be asking why his followers thought the earth is
round and flat like a plate. Makes for a more cogent argument than
this Pi business.