video
Stand-up Maths: Why Is There No Equation for the Perimeter of an Ellipse?
by Matt Parker
A circle's perimeter is πd; an ellipse has no closed-form perimeter at all. Matt Parker shows why the obvious formulas fail and how mathematicians settled for approximations, then spends a week deriving two of his own, one accurate and one gloriously lazy. It's a rare video that shows what doing mathematics feels like: the trial, the error and the fudge.
About this channel
I do mathematics and stand-up. Sometimes simultaneously. Occasionally while being filmed. (It's quite the Venn diagram.) You can send business stuff to sophieclaire@miradorgroup.co.uk and maths to matt@standupmaths.com (but everything gets to me one way or another). I'm also in these places: http://standupmaths.com http://twitter.com/standupmaths https://m.bilibili.com/space/475271755
