I built NumberMuseum because I love those moments when you discover that a completely ordinary looking number has an extraordinary story behind it.
I really liked the story of 1729, the famous Hardy Ramanujan number. Hardy visited Ramanujan in hospital and mentioned that his taxi number, 1729, seemed rather dull. Ramanujan immediately replied that it was actually very interesting: it is the smallest number that can be expressed as the sum of two positive cubes in two different ways.
I realized there are thousands of stories like this hiding inside numbers.
So NumberMuseum is my attempt to collect them.
It isn't meant to be a mathematics encyclopedia. Each number is treated more like a museum exhibit, with a story to tell.
I'd especially love suggestions for numbers that deserve an exhibit. If there's a number with a great story behind it, drop it in the comments I will turn it into the next one.
putting this first — I love this concept and thank you.
and I always hate to be “that guy” but iirc the 1729 story itself has a legend to itself, and the common telling may not be wholly accurate. But again, I commend this endeavor!
Going through it & really enjoyed it.
2147483647 is a great exhibit. Funny how a number you recognise from debugging has a whole other life in mathematics. A museum for numbers is a lovely idea.
It's also known as the most common phone number on the web[0], because of programmers trying to store phone numbers as 32 bit integers, and hitting overflow.
Hey HN
I built NumberMuseum because I love those moments when you discover that a completely ordinary looking number has an extraordinary story behind it.
I really liked the story of 1729, the famous Hardy Ramanujan number. Hardy visited Ramanujan in hospital and mentioned that his taxi number, 1729, seemed rather dull. Ramanujan immediately replied that it was actually very interesting: it is the smallest number that can be expressed as the sum of two positive cubes in two different ways.
I realized there are thousands of stories like this hiding inside numbers. So NumberMuseum is my attempt to collect them. It isn't meant to be a mathematics encyclopedia. Each number is treated more like a museum exhibit, with a story to tell. I'd especially love suggestions for numbers that deserve an exhibit. If there's a number with a great story behind it, drop it in the comments I will turn it into the next one.
Hey! This was a great read with lots of cool examples and writing. Thanks
putting this first — I love this concept and thank you.
and I always hate to be “that guy” but iirc the 1729 story itself has a legend to itself, and the common telling may not be wholly accurate. But again, I commend this endeavor!
Going through it & really enjoyed it. 2147483647 is a great exhibit. Funny how a number you recognise from debugging has a whole other life in mathematics. A museum for numbers is a lovely idea.
> 2147483647
It's also known as the most common phone number on the web[0], because of programmers trying to store phone numbers as 32 bit integers, and hitting overflow.
[0]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2196421
I’d have guessed the most common number would end in 867-5309 — I guess that shows my age!