On Tue, 26 Mar 1996, David K. Merriman wrote:
Yes, and some years ago a State legislature (I forget which) passed a resolution setting the value of pi at exactly 3.
Well, this one has a grain of truth in it, but has drifted a bit in the telling.
From <alt.folklore.urban>'s FAQ:
T. *Indiana House Bill #246 of 1897 would've set pi=3.2. Killed in state Senate. Fb. Some state (e.g., KS, OK, etc.) once considered a bill setting pi = 3 (or some other arbitrary, non-transcendental number). Key to Listed FAQs: T = 100% scientific truth Tb = believed true, but not conclusively proven F = 100% falsehood Ft = A legend, mostly untrue, but with a true occurrence or known origin. Fb = believed false, but not conclusively proven There is a comment, "*", on certain lines in the FAQ. This indicates that there is further information on this point available via anonymous ftp. See the AFU anonymous ftp sites noted in Part I of the FAQ for more information. The four part FAQ for alt.folklore.urban is also available via anonymous ftp at rtfm.mit.edu. You can retrieve them by grabbing the following files: /pub/usenet/news.answers/folklore-faq/part1 /pub/usenet/news.answers/folklore-faq/part2 /pub/usenet/news.answers/folklore-faq/part3 /pub/usenet/news.answers/folklore-faq/part4 /pub/usenet/news.answers/folklore-faq/part5 Or heck, just do: /pub/usenet/news.answers/folklore-faq/part* Rollo Silver | e-mail: rollo@artvark.com | Artvark | Home page: http://www.artvark.com/artvark/ | PO Box 219 | Voice: 505-586-0197 | San Cristobal, NM 87564 USA | Compuserve 71174,1453 | =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=