Mathematics & Economics

Sep.8,2012

The Birth of the Centimetre

One of the most well-known and much-loved units of length in the metric system, the centimetre was first proposed simultaneously in 1710 by Italian mathematician Luciano Carelli and Norwegian physicist Bernhard Boger. A bitter authorship debate ensued, with the central issue being the question of which physical phenomenon should be used as the basis of measurement. Carelli was adamant that a centimetre should be defined as “the width of the smallest finger on my leftmost hand, at the point directly between the finger nail and the upper knuckle”, but Boger dismissed this idea as absurd, arguing that the width of Carelli’s fingers was liable to change if he were to put on excessive weight, or to die and slowly decay. He instead proposed that a much more reliable definition would be the size of the gap between his writing desk and the wall of his study, pointing out that …

Collateral Damage: Derek Osprey and the World Debt Crisis

On August 13th 2007, taxi driver Derek Osprey dropped off a fare at the Prestige Inn in Boston, Massachusetts and was instructed to wait while his passenger, a handkerchief salesman named Hamish Dolt, ran inside to fetch his suitcase. Three days later, Dolt emerged from the hotel after a sudden bout of illness and boarded a plane for Dubai. He failed to notice on leaving that Osprey was still parked outside, the meter still running. Dolt’s business trip was unsuccessful and he returned to his home in Pittsburgh soon after to work as a realtor. It was several months before he returned to Boston on business, and he stayed once more at the Prestige. After stepping outside to hail a taxi on the morning of June 12th 2008 he was surprised to find Osprey still waiting in the same spot. A heated discourse followed when Osprey demanded he pay …

Speculator Speculators

Financial speculators have existed for centuries, men who made their fortunes by gambling on the troughs and peaks of the stock market. Though an integral part of the financial system they were largely ignored as personalities until the early 21st century, when a financial recession led to a public backlash against individuals who exploited the market for their own gain.

This increased visibility led to the formation of a group known as ‘speculator speculators’ who began to bet on the fortunes of these speculators, exchanging tips about their speculating habits and publishing information on their personal lives in order to get a better picture of their prospects. Often an unusual day at the stock market would result in speculators receiving a raft of abusive e-mails and phone calls from people who had speculated on them, and the weight of this pressure culminated in an unprecedented number of suicides among …

Organisation for an Alternative Time System (OATS)

Group of intellectuals dedicated to overhauling our current “archaic” time system in order to replace it with something less arbitrary than the 24-hour clock. Each member champions, and indeed lives by, a different system, and to date they have had no meetings due to their inability to turn up to the agreed venues at the same time.