The search for pi

Today March 14 is so-called ‘pi day’ where in the month/day format in the US for the date gives 3/14. The number pi (the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle) is a source of endless fascination because it is so basic and yet so ubiquitous in all areas of science and mathematics and everyday life. Here is a fascinating article by Xiaojing Ye on the search for obtaining increasingly precise values of pi. It contained many nuggets of information that were quite new to me.
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Film Review: Macbeth (2015)

I had been really looking forward to seeing this film because of the strong reviews it had received, such as this one. Macbeth is my favorite of all the plays of William Shakespeare and because it had excellent actors in Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard in the lead roles, I expected a lot. I tend to like his tragedies and histories a lot more than his comedies and this story is a timeless morality tale of a once-honorable man whose ‘vaulting ambition’ turns him into a ruthless and disturbed monster, egged on by an even more ambitious wife and led astray by deceptive promises of success and invincibility.
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Trump has changed the rules about money in politics

Predicting the results of American politics was once quite simple: The candidate with the most money won almost all the time. The logic behind that was that running a political campaign, especially at the congressional and presidential level, cost a lot of money because of ad buys, consultants, staff, and the like and only those who could depend upon big money backers were the ones who could afford to do so. It was only if you had big money backing that the media treated you as a credible candidate and gave you respectful coverage while those who did not have money were ignored and marginalized or even ridiculed.
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What did Trump think and when did he think it?

There is a question on my mind that is something that can perhaps only be answered by Donald Trump when he writes his memoirs many years from now or by his closest confidantes and that is the following: When he decided to enter the race last June, did he really think he would do so well and get this far and throw the Republican party into chaos? Or did he just do it for the laughs, thinking that he would make a big splash initially by making outrageous statements and insulting others, grab some newspaper headlines, and then go back to his regular life when the effort fizzled?
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“No milkshake for you!” What happens at the Bohemian Grove

When people refer to the ‘old boys network’, they usually think of gatherings in boardrooms, country clubs, and the like. But there is a weird variation of it that is less well known and that is the Bohemian Club that takes place for two weeks annually at a place called the Bohemian Grove. A sociological study of the club suggests that at these gatherings very little plotting and scheming takes place. In fact, such things are actively discouraged. What is encouraged is drinking and playfulness bordering on the downright gross and ridiculous. What that does is build social cohesion among the movers and shakers in society, because when men (and it is open only to men) let their hair down and act silly in a group, it apparently creates bonds among them.
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