Floor e?

by Brian Hayes

Published 7 January 2011

On what floor was this sign placed?

At most conferences, the sign above might provoke a moment of puzzlement. But this is the JMM, the Joint Mathematics Meetings, being held this year in New Orleans. As far as I can tell, the 5,400 mathematicians gathered here are quite untroubled by these instructions. And after all, they know perfectly well that a whole uncountable continuum lies between floors 2 and 3.

Onward and upward, indeed. And downward. And everything in between.

 

 

Responses from readers:

  • A comment from Frank Ch. Eigler, 7 January 2011 at 4:21 pm

    The typeface and the slogan reminded me of IBM corporate meetings.

  • A comment from Sam Hobbs, 15 January 2011 at 1:39 pm

    I hate to be on the practical side (especially since Brian has always commented on the continuum), but the sign might have been on a mezzanine floor between floors 2 and 3.

Please note: The bit-player website is no longer equipped to accept and publish comments from readers, but the author is still eager to hear from you. Send comments, criticism, compliments, or corrections to brian@bit-player.org.

Tags for this article: mathematics.

Publication history

First publication: 7 January 2011

Converted to Eleventy framework: 22 April 2025

More to read...

A Double Flip

How'd you like to be in charge of flipping mattresses in the Hilbert Hotel, which has infinitely many beds?

The Ormat Game

Fun and games with permutation matrices. What a hoot!

Pretirement

As I kid I believed that retirement is wasted on the old, who no longer have the spunk needed to enjoy it. My views have changed as I’ve aged. So have demographic trends in employment.

Prime After Prime

The prime numers have been under the mathematical microscope for more than 2,000 years, and yet there’s a pattern in them no one noticed until just now.