Fascinating Mathematics: Facts You Didn’t Know

Mathematics is full of intriguing facts. Some of them can be encountered in everyday life, like the absence of a 13th floor in hotels. Other mathematical curiosities have sparked debates among scientists. Here are some interesting math facts shared by online math tutors from the Mathema platform.

Interesting Mathematics

The Roman numeral system has no zero

The Romans used mathematics for simple calculations, so their numeral system has no zero. They understood the concept of “nothing” but didn’t need a separate notation for it. In more complex calculations where numbers like 2.05 appear, zero is necessary, which is why Roman numerals aren’t used.

People have been making calculations as far back as 30,000 BCE

Archaeologists have discovered animal bones with markings resembling counts, suggesting that the first mathematical records date back to 30,000 BCE. At that time, people were still leading a nomadic lifestyle.

You can shuffle a deck of cards into a unique sequence never seen before

A deck of 52 cards has 52! (factorial) possible arrangements, which is an enormous number written as 8 followed by 67 zeros. Each time you shuffle a deck, you’re likely creating a sequence that has never existed in the universe before.

What comes after a billion?

Most people don’t know the names of the large numbers that come after a billion. Here they are:

• Billion — 9 zeros
• Trillion — 12 zeros
• Quadrillion — 15 zeros
• Quintillion — 18 zeros
• Sextillion — 21 zeros
• Septillion — 24 zeros
• Octillion — 27 zeros

The name of the search engine Google has mathematical roots

The name Google is a misspelling of the mathematical term “googol,” which means a one followed by 100 zeros.

The number π is infinite

Pi is an infinite, irrational number representing the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. People compete in memorizing the digits of Pi. The current world record is held by Rajveer Meena, who recited 67,890 decimal places in 2015.

Sudoku has sextillions of variations

The Japanese puzzle Sudoku, which involves filling rows and columns with numbers from 1 to 9, has an astronomical number of variations. Mathematicians have calculated there are 6,670,903,752,021,072,936,960 ways to fill a Sudoku grid—over 6 sextillion variations.

Other Interesting Math Facts

• The Egyptians were the first to use a multiplication table.
• The number of possible combinations of a Rubik’s Cube exceeds the number of atoms in the universe.
• The most famous set of numbers in mathematics is the Fibonacci sequence, where each number is the sum of the two preceding ones: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34…
• If you multiply 111,111,111 by itself, the product is 12345678987654321.
• There is no Nobel Prize in mathematics.
• Zero is an even number because when divided by 2, it remains whole. 0/2 = 0.
• In a group of 23 people, there is a 50% chance that two people will share the same birthday. In a group of 75 people, the chance increases to 99%.
• There is a number called googolplex, which equals 10 to the power of googol. There’s not enough space in the observable universe to write this number on paper.