Happy Monday! Mondays are seldom happy coming as they tend to after wonderful weekends. So to help make Monday better, I have a book to give away.
Remember The Solitude of Prime Numbers? The publisher has generously sent me a finished copy to give away. But wait! That’s not all! It is also signed by the author, Paolo Giordano.
If you would like a chance to win the book, leave a comment that includes your favorite prime number. If you need a little reminder, a prime number can only be evenly divided by one and itself. And if you need more help than that, here’s a list.
Keeping with the math, have any of you heard of Wolfram Alpha and spent any time playing with it? In case you don’t know what it is, it is a “computational knowledge engine.” So, for instance, I entered my birthdate and find that I have been alive for 15, 047 days. On the day of my birth, the sun rose at 5:48 a.m. and set at 6:45 p.m.
Enter my first name, and I discover that one in 7937 people as of 2001 were named “Stefanie.” There are currently about 33,192 people named Stefanie alive today. And it turns out, my mom was way ahead of the popularity curve when it came to my name, as most people named Stefanie were born in the 1980s which means most people with the name are in their mid to late 20s.
It’s a fun tool and potentially quite useful Oh, and in case you want to know what the meaning of life is, it has an answer for that.
Don’t forget to comment with your favorite prime number for a chance to win a signed copy of The Solitude of Prime Numbers! Drawing on Thursday.
Thank you for this contest, Stefanie! Seems like it would be quite an interesting read!
Rosie
Sorry, my favorite prime number is 9
Eleven, can’t me in.
Eleven, count me in.
How fun! My favourite prime is 7.
My favourtie prime number – 7
I’m from Poland, can I take part in this competition as well?
Thanks for the link to Wolfram Alpha, I love checking out such useless but fun things.
correction: There is something very useful about Wolfram – if you eneter city/town/village, you get to know what is the temperature there right now. Ideal for holiday season
My favorite prime number is 2. It seems like it would be compatible with something else (for example, if you have 2 people there is no odd one out) but it’s not. I love Wolfram Alpha too. I can’t believe they’re still in development stages. It’s very exciting to discover.
Oo I am a massive dork as I squealed (under breath squealage takes a lot of work but is very useful in the work place) when I saw the meaning of life bit.
This book sounds great – please enter me!
My favorite prime number is 317, because it’s my wedding anniversary
My favorite prime number is 17… also my wedding day.
(well, 5/17).
My favorite prime number is 3… I have three lovely boys, have lived in three countries and love the idea that good things come in threes.
Thanks for a terrific blog!
My favorite prime number is 15. Love your blog!
Ooooo, a wonderful, math-y, number-y post. I had not heard of Wolfram Alpha, so thanks for the introduction. I’d like to enter the contest, and my favorite prime number is 11, because the digit is repeated, and all other double-digit-repeated numbers can be divided by it. Does that sound too geeky?
43! (that’s an exclamation mark, not factorial!)
(because it’s 42 — the answer — + 1)
I tried messing with Wolfram a couple weeks ago, trying to force a 42, but I guess my wording was slightly off. (Or it’s learned something since then.)
I’ll go with 2 because it is the only prime that is an even number.
An odd thought hit me… if the quality of being prime is called primality, then what do we call the quality of being primal?
Oh my gosh. That website is amazing. My name was hugely popular when I was born, and now is almost dropped out of sight. No wonder I never hear of any young person called by my name. By the way, I love (and for some reason has always loved) the number 5.
Or, maybe I should go with how old I sometimes feel…101.
109. The largest prime atomic number of an IUPAC-named chemical element, Meitnerium, which is a synthetic element with a half-life of 30 minutes, first isolated in 1982, and named for Austrian physicist Lise Meitner, who worked with Otto Hahn to initiate nuclear fission. Meitner was not initially credited for her role in the discovery, since, as an Austrian Jew, she was in political exile when the work was published, and Hahn took advantage of the fact to take full credit for the discovery, slighting more than one colleague in the process.
And, apparently, based on the historical distribution of my first name, I’m supposed to be 55.
Oooh, I should never have learned of that site. Much fun.
My favorite prime number (now, after cheating by scrolling the list) is 919. It just calls to me.
My favorite prime number is 1009 in honor of my sister’s birthday (October 9th) shared by John Lennon and brilliant actors Brian Blessed and Alastair Sims.
Prime number? I’m so not mathemtical. How about 79? I love the link. One in 682 people have my name and the most common age is 23. You always share the most interesting links. Where do you find them?
I’m going to bow out of the contest, having won a wonderfully large number of books from you already, but I will say that my favorite prime number (as of reading this post, that is) is 13 because I feel a little sorry for the number since so many people think it’s unlucky.
Wolfram Alpha is fun, isn’t it? I like 7 & 17, but they’re already taken, so I’ll go with 71.
I’m not in the contest for this one, but thank you for the nod to Wolfram Alpha, which I will introduce to my son at the first opportunity – he’s going to just love it!
I loved that web site! I had to check out my name and it was practically non-existent when I was born. Quite a sharp increase in the late 80s-90s. How cool.
Favorite prime number… I’ll go with 41 for now as I just turned it
[...] if you haven’t already, be sure to enter the book giveaway for The Solitude of Prime Numbers. Everyone is welcome to enter no matter where you reside. And [...]
7507. . . because it’s part of my SS number.
WolframAlpha was pointed out to me a few months ago and I gave it an unfavorable review. I just entered my birthday and was disappointed to find nothing under “observances” even though it is Flag Day in America.