I've been in plenty of Monopoly games that dragged on for hours, with one or two bankrupt players sitting on the sidelines, bored to death. But a few intrepid gamers decided to figure out the shortest theoretically possible Monopoly game. Their solution is explained here and depicted in the video below. While extremely unlikely, it's theoretically possible that it could happen. It takes only nine rolls of the dice. But what's more interesting is this comment thread in which several other Monopoly... READ ON

Two weeks ago I wrote about The Story of Pi, a semi-educational retro video that visually explains Pi. One commenter (lynn) pointed out a song I hadn't heard before, The Pi Song by Antoni Chan and Ken Ferrier. I present it below for your weekend edutainment. Set to the tune of the classic Don McLean song "American Pie," this is kind of a hoot. (NOTE: the video below is just the first part; for the whole thing check out this video.) Complete lyrics after the... READ ON

In 1971, astronaut David Scott conducted Galileo's famous hammer/feather drop experiment on the moon, during the Apollo 15 mission. Galileo had concluded that all objects, regardless of mass, fall at the same speed -- however, the resistance caused by the air (as in the case of the feather in Earth's atmosphere) can cause the feather to drop slower. Well, on the moon there is no atmosphere (a vacuum), so the objects should drop at the same speed. See for yourself how the experiment turned out in the... READ ON

If you enjoyed yesterday's post Richard Feynman Explains Trains, here are some more clips from the same interview -- from a 1983 BBC program called Fun to Imagine. First up, Feynman explains why mirrors only reflect left-to-right, not top-to-bottom. This clip occurs before yesterday's train explanation; it starts with Feynman talking about his fraternity at MIT. Next, Feynman explains magnets and challenges "'why' questions." Actually, he doesn't really get into the magnet thing so much, but... READ ON