The Artistry of Math

In the East, the concept of all things being a circle appears in Zen and Daoist texts, concerning everything from battle strategy to the metaphor of all things having a season and returning to the scale of polarity. mathematically, the circle is the focal point of everything. As I stated in a previous writing, 0 = infinite, nothing, 1-1, etc., but it happens to be an object that has no starting point, no ending point; no part of the circle holds any more weight than any other part. A circle is 360 degrees. Now what’s neat about our number system is that there is no number above 9 that isn’t made up of a combination of numbers in between 0-9. Now to me, what I find even more interesting is some of the neat things that result because of this. Take 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 and add them up together and you get 45. Add 4+5 and you get 9. Take an equilateral triangle, what are the degree of the inner angles? each of 3 points of a triangles angles are 60 degrees, and 60 times 3 or 60+60+60=180. And 1+8= 9. Take a square. The angles of each of the 4 points are 90 degrees, or 90 four times; 90+90+90+90=360, and 3+6=9. Let’s move onto a pentagon with 5 angles of 108 degrees, or 108+108+108+108+108=540. And 5+4 is 9. Moving onto a hexagon whose points angles are 120 six times, or 120 + 120 + 120 +120 +120 + 120= 720. And 7+2= 9. Any closed or self contained object will break down to a 9. So let’s say you take the entirety of the multiverse, and add it together, regardless it’s shape or size, if self contained, (which it should if it’s the entirety of everything) should break down to a 9. Another interesting thing is that you can take any number, multiply it by , and it will always breakdown to a 9. Since I can’t exactly ask anyone reading this to pick numbers since I have to write it before you can read it, I'll come up with a few random numbers I’ll have to take my word for it that they were random(plus you can test this out yourself once you get to this part of the post) I’ll choose 357, 273, 177. Let’s do 357 first. 357 times 9 = 3,213. 3+2=5 and 1+3=4.5+4=9. Let’s try 273 times 9, which equals 2,457. 2+4=6 and 5+7=12. And 6+1+2=9. 177 next, which is 1,593. 1+5=6 and 9+3= 12. 6 +12 =18, and 18 =9. Try it yourself. And my favorite piece of math is this little do-dad:

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We love art because of it’s colors, shading, contrast, and shapes, but we also love it because it makes us feel alive; something deeper than can be interpreted on the surface alone. All of that beauty and enchantment is constructed by numbers. It’s due to this (often unknown) connection to numbers that our day to day reality is formed, yet remains in obscurity; in abstract. The way math is taught in school often takes all of the enchantment and beauty out of it and it’s lowest common denominator (sorry had to :D ) and use (which often lacks in interesting characteristics to your average student) remains. If we could at an early age, show the artistry of math, I think people would fall in love with it. We are basically frequency interpreting machines; our collective senses make us like an oddly shaped television screen, interpreting all of the mathematical data and translating it into our perception and world we experience. Let's take the concept of time. Time moves outward from the moment of "now"(the past no longer exists and the future hasn't happened. but that's also a trick statement, because outside of time/space which is limited by the speed of light, the frequency underlying the material world is simultaneously happening eternally) in a spiral motion known as the Fibonacci sequence(also known as "the divine spiral")

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They've done various studies. one of these they tested the ability of a Euclidean algorithm to predict attraction to potential mates—a relatively upstream domain in the temporal sequence of the mating process. Participants in two studies reported their ideal mate preferences using a 23-item preference instrument. Separately, they rated their attraction to profiles of potential mates that varied on those 23 dimensions. Study 1 (N=522) found that Euclidean distances predicted attraction to potential mates both in terms of (1) overall mate value and (2) unique mate value. Study 2 (N=411) replicated these effects and further found that Euclidean mate values discriminatively predict between short- and long-term attraction. Across both studies, a Euclidean model outperformed a variety of alternative models for predicting attraction to potential mates. These results suggest that a Euclidean algorithm is a good model for how multiple preferences are integrated in mate choice. and so it is with Art. Whether we notice or not, we appreciate the math that underlies our reality in our art.

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And One of my favorite (if not my absolute favorite) representation of math as art. is fractals. An infinite pattern represented artistically, captures the whole "as above, so below" concept so magically.

I hope this opens up a whole new world for you, and an appreciation of math and it's underlying presence in everything inside and around us. Art is math; we are math.

I leave you with this as my final thought: Nature is relationships in space. Math defines relationships in space. Art creates relationships in space.