Can you make a hole in a thing bigger than the thing?

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  • čas přidán 30. 10. 2021
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Komentáře • 929

  • @Project_Kritical
    @Project_Kritical Před 2 lety +771

    A Problem Squared is a great podcast, I’m glad it’s been giving you so many ideas!
    PS. if anyone hasn’t listened to it yet, I’d highly recommend it!

    • @gregdesouza17
      @gregdesouza17 Před 2 lety +1

      It's the funniest podcast I listen to I think.

    • @thelastcube.
      @thelastcube. Před 2 lety +2

      DING!

    • @LeoStaley
      @LeoStaley Před 2 lety +1

      I still very much prefer a Podcast of Unnecessary Detail. Also has Steve Mould and their friend, and live show collaborator, Helen Arney. But Steve Mould is heckin busy, I reckon, so it's less frequent. Or maybe it's Matt who's too busy because of A Problem Squared, in which case ooooooh, Bec Hill, i am sooo going to turn the volume down a little when you're talking, out of spite. I'll still listen and laugh though so there's that.

    • @SaveSoilSaveSoil
      @SaveSoilSaveSoil Před 2 lety +1

      Awesome! I have just exhausted the numberphile podcast and am thinking "what's next". This recommendation is very timely. The universe is a strange place. When I am sleepy, a pillow just falls right into my lap.

    • @andyinannarbor
      @andyinannarbor Před 2 lety +1

      True, but A Problem Squirrel is much more dramatic.

  • @NatePrawdzik
    @NatePrawdzik Před 2 lety +2868

    Do that with a sphere and I'll really be impressed.

    • @veggiet2009
      @veggiet2009 Před 2 lety +207

      This reminds me about the 4 circle Venn diagram problem, where the circles symmetry makes it impossible to connect 4 rings together in the correct Venn pattern, yet an ellipse or other shapes is perfectly able to create a correct 4 category diagram

    • @vipsylar6370
      @vipsylar6370 Před 2 lety +107

      A Parker Sphere Hole would be nice.

    • @GEM4sta
      @GEM4sta Před 2 lety +329

      Start by assuming that a cube is a close approximation of a sphere

    • @pedrofellipe8028
      @pedrofellipe8028 Před 2 lety +19

      I bet you could do it in higher dimensions

    • @Robert_McGarry_Poems
      @Robert_McGarry_Poems Před 2 lety +25

      @@vipsylar6370 They are called good enough spheroids.

  • @darcipeeps
    @darcipeeps Před 2 lety +888

    Like cutting a sideways 2x4 slot out of a 2x4 plank then shoving it through. Or taking a door off it’s hinges and bringing it through a doorway

    • @matthewhubka6350
      @matthewhubka6350 Před 2 lety +170

      Yeah, honestly, this concept becomes a whole lot simpler when you think of shapes with less symmetrical geometries

    • @mmseng2
      @mmseng2 Před 2 lety +52

      Indeed. The doorway makes a lot of sense and is much more tangible for the average joe like myself. In my head I originally went with cutting an 8.5" slit in a (US) standard 8.5"x11" sheet of paper, and then just sliding another sheet of paper through it. To make it slightly more theoretically tangible then do it instead with two stacks of like 50 sheets. But at that point, the doorway is an equally good visual.

    • @matthewhubka6350
      @matthewhubka6350 Před 2 lety +6

      @@mmseng2 I’m a big nerd, so my first visualization was literally just 2 identical rectangular prism

    • @errorlooo8124
      @errorlooo8124 Před 2 lety +40

      @@matthewhubka6350 Actually that's an interesting point, i wonder if you could measure the "symmetry-ness" of an object by measuring the maximum give/tolerance that a hole which is big enough to fit itself through it would have. For example a sphere would have a give of 0 so very symmetrical where as a cube would have a give of (1-3/4*sqrt(2)) so not as symmetrical.

    • @terenzohugel2293
      @terenzohugel2293 Před 2 lety +8

      @@errorlooo8124 That is a cool concept, I'd like to calculate it for a few bodies. Wonder if it's of any use for anything

  • @1996Pinocchio
    @1996Pinocchio Před 2 lety +1166

    Depends on how you define "the thing", "hole", and "size".

    • @DavidGuild
      @DavidGuild Před 2 lety +118

      Yeah this isn't so much a mind-blowing trick as it is a matter of definition.

    • @Quantris
      @Quantris Před 2 lety +27

      Also "can", "you", and "make"

    • @chitlitlah
      @chitlitlah Před 2 lety +14

      Okay, Bill Clinton.

    • @ryleighs9575
      @ryleighs9575 Před 2 lety +23

      @@chitlitlah It's 100% true and fair though, and I personally don't interpret the question the way Matt answered it. From my comment above about how I interpreted things:
      "It's not really about 'a thing being bigger than it started', it's more about the geometric relationship between shapes based on orientation. That's what I take away from the actual information in the video."
      Don't those seem like completely distinct concepts to you? Because they do to me, which is why the ambiguity the OP is talking about can actually be an issue. To me, the "thing", the "it" in question would be A cross-section, so what Matt showed would be two different "things", and showing that two different things are different is less mind-blowing than that one thing can be somehow made different enough to have different properties while still being the same "thing". THAT sounds impossible to me, and as far as I know it is - Matt didn't address that question.

    • @PromptCriticalJello
      @PromptCriticalJello Před 2 lety

      How many cubic inches is the surface of 2 inch radius circle.

  • @QuantumHistorian
    @QuantumHistorian Před 2 lety +977

    And there I was thinking this would involve some topological trick and cutting out a funky spiral that unfolds (without stretching) to be much larger than itself.

    • @olmostgudinaf8100
      @olmostgudinaf8100 Před 2 lety +78

      Or even a topological trickery such as the one that says that a balloon has -1 holes.

    • @omerd602
      @omerd602 Před 2 lety +31

      @@olmostgudinaf8100 A balloon has 0 holes, because the knot at the end still has a hole through it, however small it may be :)

    • @piteoswaldo
      @piteoswaldo Před 2 lety +17

      Like how you can peel an orange in a spiral and make it into an infinitely long piece.

    • @arborrhys9162
      @arborrhys9162 Před 2 lety +36

      yeah, like the trick i learned as a kid to climb through an a4 sheet of paper

    • @ShootLiegh
      @ShootLiegh Před 2 lety +10

      You can do something like that with a sheet of paper. Its fun to bet people you can cut a hole in the paper that you can fit your whole body through.

  • @randorandom
    @randorandom Před 2 lety +297

    2021: Discovery of the Parker Pumpkin - A pumpkin that can be proven to be able to have a hole cut in it larger than itself, but not really because it can only be proven by putting another completely different pumpkin through it.

  • @rustymustard7798
    @rustymustard7798 Před 2 lety +155

    That settles it, I'm putting pumpkin scraps on my front porch and calling it the 'Parker Pumpkin' AKA Matt-O-Lantern.

  • @QuantumHistorian
    @QuantumHistorian Před 2 lety +320

    Rather than 3d printing one solid cube and one cut-out cube, you should print two cut out cubes and show that either fits through the other. That would be a cool party trick!

    • @ThisIsTheBestAnime
      @ThisIsTheBestAnime Před 2 lety +53

      I think it would be neat to have two metal cubes, one a metal box without a lid, the other a slightly smaller cube with a hole the box can fit through. That way you could pull the holed cube out of a box and then pass the box through the holed cube. It feels like a slightly more dramatic party trick. It might be tough to achieve the tolerances and have still have relatively sturdy cubes, but I think it'd look really cool.

    • @idontwantahandlethough
      @idontwantahandlethough Před 2 lety +3

      @@ThisIsTheBestAnime Perfect. If only I hung out with the kind of people who would appreciate neat math tricks. All my friends are morons. Kind morons, but still morons.

  • @NoNameAtAll2
    @NoNameAtAll2 Před 2 lety +64

    4:18 you missed an opportunity to say "with the power of buying two" and connect with Technology Connection channel

    • @wiseSYW
      @wiseSYW Před 2 lety +13

      through the magic of buying two!

    • @skippy9214
      @skippy9214 Před 2 lety +16

      “And, through the magic of buying two of them, I have an already taken apart one for us to examine!”

    • @SimonBuchanNz
      @SimonBuchanNz Před 2 lety +5

      Since it's "a problem squared" surely it's "to the power of two of them"

  • @DaveBermanKeys
    @DaveBermanKeys Před 2 lety +337

    I’ve always heard this is why man-hole covers are circles instead of squares. Otherwise, the cover could fall into the hole.

    • @kkobayashi1
      @kkobayashi1 Před 2 lety +53

      But not all manhole covers are circles. I believe the boring truth is that manhole covers are usually circular because most manholes are round.

    • @ryleighs9575
      @ryleighs9575 Před 2 lety +12

      Don't they just have a lip?

    • @Coloneljesus
      @Coloneljesus Před 2 lety +50

      @@ryleighs9575 Yes. Point is a square hole, even with a lip, is big enough for the square cover to fall into.

    • @Vasharan
      @Vasharan Před 2 lety +28

      @@Coloneljesus However, most drainage grates are rectangular.
      Sure, they can probably be manipulated to fall into the hole. But they're square/rectangular because it's easier and cheaper to make a square plate with grates and bars than a round one.
      Similarly, manholes and manhole covers are probably round because it's the cheapest and easiest shape to make (think how much easier it is to drill or bore a round hole in the road than a square one). The fact that this makes it harder for the covers to fall into the holes is just a fortunate side effect.

    • @RFC-3514
      @RFC-3514 Před 2 lety +46

      @@Vasharan - The actual holes for manholes aren't made with a _drill._ In fact, they usually start out as a "trench", which is then filled after the shaft has been placed. So making a square hole would be just as easy. The advantage of round lids is that a) they won't fall into the hole, and b) the lid (which is typically thick cast iron and quite heavy) can be rolled by the maintenance crew, instead of dragged.
      Square manhole covers are sometimes attached to the hole (frame) itself by hinges, so they won't fall into the hole either. Not always, though, some can indeed fall in.
      Drainage grates tend to stay in place for a long time, and they're not meant to work as "doors" for humans. They're usually rectangular because the narrower they are, the less cars will run directly over them, so making them 60x15 cm is preferable to making them a 34 cm diameter circle (which would have the same total area, but less support in the middle, and would take up more of the road's width).

  • @Viniter
    @Viniter Před 2 lety +233

    I object to this use of the word "bigger". Surely a hole in a 3D object is also a 3D space, bigness of which should be characterized by it's volume, not by an area of any of it's projections. By the same definition you could take a piece of paper and argue that it's "bigger" than some lamppost, because you found a projection with a smaller area. This stunt with a pumpkin only seems interesting because pumpkin is a pretty close to a spheroid, if you did this with something more irregular, like a book for example, there would be nothing impressive about it, and you would hardly convince somebody that the hole is bigger than the book because you can fit another book of the same size through it.

    • @idontwantahandlethough
      @idontwantahandlethough Před 2 lety +18

      That's... not a bad point!
      Edit: if it was a perfect sphere, this wouldn't work, right? Are there any other shapes it wouldn't work for, or just spheres? I'm guessing it's just spheres, anything else can be oriented to pass through another orientation of itself, I think (or I guess it isn't specifically spheres, just N-spheres of any dimension. Or at least any dimension up to 3, but I imagine it probably follows for higher, although many things don't so I'm not at all confident in that conclusion).

    • @Graknorke
      @Graknorke Před 2 lety +5

      I agree, I feel swindled

    • @hank1318
      @hank1318 Před 2 lety +5

      I Think The Same, It Feels Unintentional Clickbaity

    • @arucane8635
      @arucane8635 Před 2 lety

      @@idontwantahandlethough what you saying sounds intuitively correct to me but I was thinking. Shape dilations from speeds that are a significant portion of c could allow for a sphere to pass through a sphere right?

    • @GummieI
      @GummieI Před 2 lety +2

      Yeah, kinda disappointed with this, had expected some messing around with topology. Instead what was shown here seems more like a semantic solution in fact, rather than a mathematical one to me, as such I would rather have expected this maybe from someone like Tom Scott instead.

  • @PheelsGoodman
    @PheelsGoodman Před 2 lety +28

    Matt proves in math, that a couch, can fit through a door way. Essentially

    • @superscatboy
      @superscatboy Před 2 lety +7

      Or that a door can fit through a doorway.

  • @stapler942
    @stapler942 Před 2 lety +44

    This is like the adult version of those kid "puzzle" toys where you have to fit the shape through the right hole.

    • @adamx9065
      @adamx9065 Před 2 lety +5

      This explains how everything is able to fit in the square hole

    • @stapler942
      @stapler942 Před 2 lety +4

      @@adamx9065 The...the arch! The arch! *face of absolute betrayal*

  • @stephentomsky9576
    @stephentomsky9576 Před 2 lety +63

    This reminds me of the manhole problem, "why is a manhole cover a circle?" it's because that's the only flat shape you wouldn't be able to drop through it's cross-scetional hole.

    • @vsm1456
      @vsm1456 Před 2 lety +18

      nah, it's not the only shape. there's a family of shapes called curves of constant width

    • @salerio61
      @salerio61 Před 2 lety +1

      They aren't circles

    • @simonfox_8559
      @simonfox_8559 Před 2 lety +11

      It's the easiest shape to manufacture that can't fall thru itself, although others exist

  • @EUPThatsMe
    @EUPThatsMe Před 2 lety +11

    This reminds me of a story my granddad told: As the machinist at Rice U in the '50s he would machine parts according to blueprints given to him by students. One time he handed the student a pile of metal shavings noting that the Outer diameter and Inner diameter measurements on the drawing for a metal ring were reversed. He started with a metal disk with a hole in it and increased the inner diameter until the whole disk was gone.

  • @K-o-R
    @K-o-R Před 2 lety +3

    I'm loving all the remixes of the theme song recently.

  • @Mister_Ben
    @Mister_Ben Před 2 lety +51

    Well, the first five minutes were definitely a parker square of an answer.

    • @Felixr2
      @Felixr2 Před 2 lety +4

      So it's a Parker answer. I do'n't know what else you'd expect.

    • @MisterUnlikely
      @MisterUnlikely Před 2 lety +5

      Well the "duplicate pumpkin" was certainly a Parker duplicate in every sense of the term.

  • @MegaJohnny74
    @MegaJohnny74 Před 2 lety +122

    cutting a hole in a sphere wouldn't work , correct?
    because it's projection is the same no matter the angle.

    • @Airblader
      @Airblader Před 2 lety +5

      @@PeppoMusic A sphere is already by definition the ("zero thickness") surface of a ball.

    • @thyrical
      @thyrical Před 2 lety +4

      even if it had zero height and thickness though, every point it occupied would also be occupied by the sphere exactly half-way through insertion, and if the objects occupy the same space wouldnt that count as intersection?

    • @georgelionon9050
      @georgelionon9050 Před 2 lety +2

      Yes, but the question is, is the sphere the only body it doesn't work?

    • @neiljf1089
      @neiljf1089 Před 2 lety +3

      @@PeppoMusic not sure it would work with a spheroid either. For an oblate, the maximum width is the same from any perspective. For a prolate, the same is true of the minimum width

    • @neiljf1089
      @neiljf1089 Před 2 lety +2

      @@PeppoMusic I'm fact i don't think its possible on any shape with an axis of symmetry.

  • @tentenbits
    @tentenbits Před 2 lety +115

    ahh.. the ever popular.. visual demonstration on a podcast.. brilliantly done Mr Maths. Or can I call you Stand-up?

    • @JivanPal
      @JivanPal Před 2 lety +15

      I'll take "jokes that don't work on the radio" for 300, Alex.

    • @NerdWithLaptop
      @NerdWithLaptop Před 2 lety +1

      R.I.P, Alex.

  • @razielhamalakh9813
    @razielhamalakh9813 Před 2 lety +17

    Whoa. I came here from A Problem Squared to see if there's a link to the photos here somewhere, and I come to this!

  • @rothreviews2525
    @rothreviews2525 Před 2 lety +11

    Kinda neat. I thought this was going to be something like the question "Can you cut a hole in a 3x5 notecard big enough for a person to walk through?" I love showing the kids I teach how to work that one out.

  • @dereknalley
    @dereknalley Před 2 lety +7

    This reminds me of the thought experiment "Can you crawl through a sheet of paper?" Wherein one is challenged to cut, without separating, a sheet of A4 paper. The key is to fold the paper down the middle, then cut on alternating sides in a comb pattern. Then open the paper and cut down the center. You end up with a hole in the center of the paper that can be expanded to easily fit a person. Boom.

  • @girlsinredtrenchcoat1169
    @girlsinredtrenchcoat1169 Před 2 lety +14

    Me: damn how's he gonna prove this? The pumpkin's gone.
    Matt: second pumpkin
    Me, terrified: How could you do this, we trusted you. The real demon was the parker pumpkin we found along the way.

  • @TheViolaBuddy
    @TheViolaBuddy Před 2 lety +314

    That ended up being a little more interesting that I thought it would be. "Bigger" is a bit vague of a term, and I was thinking of the pumpkin as the surface (rather than the volume) because that's how you normally think about carving pumpkins, with the "size" of the hole then being the surface area of the hole. And of course you can't cut out more surface area than there is surface area - right? I thought you were going to somehow do (or redefine) the impossible.
    So when you started talking about cross-sections and what you actually meant by "bigger" I was kind of going "well, duh," at least for a spheroid-like object like a pumpkin. But those 3D printed platonic solids actually end up looking really cool and a little less intuitive than a spheroid.

    • @Ghi102
      @Ghi102 Před 2 lety +8

      I'm pretty sure you could mathematically cut out an infinite area of the pumpkin with some kind of fractal pattern.

    • @thundersheild926
      @thundersheild926 Před 2 lety +24

      @@Ghi102 you cut out a fractal with an infinitely long edge, but not an infinitely large area out of a finite 2d curve. Fractals cannot magically add space, they can only make it more complex.

    • @Felixr2
      @Felixr2 Před 2 lety +15

      @@Ghi102 Nope, that's just not how fractals work. You cannot rearrange a finite area into an infinite area, no matter what you do. That is, if you only count the outer surface of the pumpkin. If you're fine with scraping off increasingly thinner layers off of the shell, perhaps leaving a small connection so it's still one whole, then fold all of that into something flat, then yes, you can turn that finite *volume* into an infinite area. That's the magic trick behind all those fractals, they take a finite entity of some number of dimensions, and turn it into an infinite entity that has at least one dimension less (volume to area, area to line, etc.)

    • @QuantumHistorian
      @QuantumHistorian Před 2 lety +6

      @@Felixr2 Technically, what you're saying is true only for finitely many cuts. Otherwise I could invoke Banach-Tarski to turn one pumpkin into 2, thereby doubling the surface area.

    • @qwerty11111122
      @qwerty11111122 Před 2 lety

      Hi Derrick!

  • @clownsforclowningaround
    @clownsforclowningaround Před 2 lety +65

    if you define a hole as the absence of something, then you can't have a thing be more absent than completely absent, away with your math sorcery.

  • @karlkastor
    @karlkastor Před 2 lety +75

    I thought this was gonna be the trick where you cut a hole in a postcard that can fit a person through. Though that one does involve folding the paper.

    • @AFAndersen
      @AFAndersen Před 2 lety +8

      But can you cut out a human sized hole out of a human, to fit the original human through?

    • @daniellebarker7205
      @daniellebarker7205 Před 2 lety +14

      @@AFAndersen easily. smallest cross section would be top down and would easily fit through the largest cross section, facing forward. could probably fit at least 2 or 3 copies of one human through itself at the same time

    • @daniellebarker7205
      @daniellebarker7205 Před 2 lety +3

      the taller and slimmer the person, the more you'd be able to fit.

    • @58209
      @58209 Před 2 lety +5

      @@daniellebarker7205 i suppose the inherent gore of the solution is appropriate for the holiday... 😬

    • @RFC-3514
      @RFC-3514 Před 2 lety +6

      @@AFAndersen - Most humans come out of a hole in another human, so that sounds mathematically possible. Might require time travel to make it the _same_ human, though.

  • @coryman125
    @coryman125 Před 2 lety +8

    I used to think about this puzzle a lot. In the game Portal, the portals are vaguely elliptical and about a 2:1 ratio. This got me wondering, if you took a board with a portal on it, you can orient it to fit through a second portal. I can't quite wrap my head around what would happen if you actually did this, though

    • @loganisanerd5566
      @loganisanerd5566 Před rokem +3

      I would say that I don't think GLaDOS or Mr. Johnson would be pleased, but they'd probably be happy to watch you meet whatever bizarre geometric fate awaited you.

  • @LeoLeito.
    @LeoLeito. Před 2 lety +58

    "This is what the sun looks like in England in October"
    imagine being in October for ever

    • @merseyviking
      @merseyviking Před 2 lety +2

      That's Manchester

    • @E.T.S.
      @E.T.S. Před 2 lety +3

      I wouldn't mind. No heat waves, no extreme cold. Trees look stunningly beautiful, and interesting math videos show up. 😃

    • @ikitclaw7146
      @ikitclaw7146 Před 2 lety

      october forever, so north england/scotland

    • @_John_Sean_Walker
      @_John_Sean_Walker Před 2 lety +1

      Imagine being at the Costa del Sol forever.

    • @ikitclaw7146
      @ikitclaw7146 Před 2 lety

      @@_John_Sean_Walker ill take permanent autumn thanks lol

  • @idontwantahandlethough
    @idontwantahandlethough Před 2 lety +4

    This kinda touches on the reason that manhole covers are circular: it's the only shape that you can't fit through itself no matter what way you orient it. Non circular manhole covers would be able to fall into the hole, which would obviously be a problem.
    (To be real, they're probably circular because you don't have to rotate it to put it back in place. But the fact that it can't fall in is a nice bonus!)

    • @LaviniaEllerton
      @LaviniaEllerton Před 2 lety

      I was always told that it was so they couldn't fall in

  • @tarkus44
    @tarkus44 Před 2 lety +29

    So a sphere I guess is the worst-case scenario with zero clearance?

    • @Derael
      @Derael Před 2 lety +3

      It's impossible for a sphere. For it to fit, you need to cut the whole with the diameter of the sphere, which will remove evrrythig.

  • @ANonymous-fq5ky
    @ANonymous-fq5ky Před 2 lety +31

    This is essentially the inverse of the manhole cover problem.
    What shape can you use to never drop the lid down the hole?

    • @jpdemer5
      @jpdemer5 Před 2 lety +1

      Any polygon other than a circle has at least one orientation that can fit into the hole. With a wide enough lip, you can use many-sided polygons; the wider the lip the fewer sides you can get away with. If you go beyond polygons, a Reuleaux triangle also works, because like a circle it has constant width.
      If you allow weirder shapes, I think certain hypocycloids would work. Feel free to figure out which ones do and don't.

  • @niroopotsav
    @niroopotsav Před 2 lety +9

    They do this all the time with those pressure cookers that make me cry because I can never get the lid in or out

  • @lukostello
    @lukostello Před 2 lety +22

    I thought you might try to cut a spiral all the way down a pumpkin then use it to stretch it upward until the stretched spiral hole is big enough to fit the original

  • @titaniumtomato7247
    @titaniumtomato7247 Před 2 lety +25

    I think this was a silly interpretation of the question and I disliked the video, but I would never give a Stand-up Maths video a dislike because I respect the channel too much. Instead this negative comment exists to support you in gaining the algorithm's favor. Bless the maker and his pumpkin.

  • @garychap8384
    @garychap8384 Před rokem +1

    I once climbed right through a hole in a playing card : )
    It's pretty cool... you fold it in half, then make cuts from alternating sides as close together as you can. Finally, snipping up the centre of the fold (but leaving the very end pieces intact) it can be opened up into a large circle. I won a few bets as a kid with that one.
    On holiday I once tried to see how large I could make a hole in an A4 sheet of paper - using a craft knife and a steel ruler to get the cuts very close together. It was big enough to go right around the outside of a luxury (family size) static caravan that we were staying in at the campsite..
    I might do one later... even at 50 I'm still just a big kid : )

  • @posadist681
    @posadist681 Před 2 lety

    That second pumpkin was a parker square moment. But we love you for that

  • @YoshisaurUnderscore
    @YoshisaurUnderscore Před 2 lety +6

    What a hole-some video! I was hole-ly impressed by the amount of effort you put in. Happy Hole-oween!
    I'm just digging myself into a hole here.
    I'll see myself out.

    • @----.__
      @----.__ Před 2 lety

      Get some help while you're out.

    • @robertthompson3447
      @robertthompson3447 Před 2 lety

      His last "Hole....ly" video was about how many holes a balloon has.

  • @Erekose2023
    @Erekose2023 Před 2 lety +3

    Brought back memories of a book read long long ago, in the days of my youth (sorry Led Zep), which featured an item on how to pass a cube through another cube the same size.
    Thank you Martin Gardner for providing so many things which made me think, and aided the development of lateral and rational thinking.
    I

  • @nerdsgalore5223
    @nerdsgalore5223 Před 2 lety +1

    Always excited for Halloween episodes!

  • @crisis8v88
    @crisis8v88 Před 2 lety +1

    "What happened to Matt's pumpkin?"
    "He did maths to it."

  • @cealvan8941
    @cealvan8941 Před 2 lety +18

    Next obvious question, does this work in higher dimensions, and does the amount you need to cut out go up or down relative to the size of the object
    I'll see what investigating I can do, and edit this comment if I find anything interesting

    • @Felixr2
      @Felixr2 Před 2 lety

      I can at least confirm that it doesn't work in lower dimensions, because there's no concept of continuous objects with holes in 2d or lower (well, in 2d you can have a hole on the inside of an object, but there's no way for outside 2d objects to pass through that hole without moving in 3d

    • @squorsh
      @squorsh Před 2 lety +1

      As a layperson it seems to check out. A 4th dimensional object has a 3d projection, and so all you would need is to have two different projections of the object where one is bigger than the other, although I'm having a kinda hard time visualizing what "bigger" means exactly

    • @metleon
      @metleon Před 2 lety +1

      @@squorsh Bigger in that case would mean one projection has a larger volume than the other. The way it works for the 3d objects is that you get two 2D projections where one of the projections has a larger area, so going up by one dimension leads to volume.

  • @TheMrJHolden
    @TheMrJHolden Před 2 lety +3

    sadly, I would've loved to see the 'bigger' pumpkin through the 'smaller' pumpkin. close approximation in size isn't the same

  • @onctaaf
    @onctaaf Před 2 lety

    So many videos lately! love it

  • @thatoneguy6868
    @thatoneguy6868 Před 2 lety +1

    The thing is though, it's really easy for the hole to be bigger than the pumpkin if you're thinking of the size of the hole being the total removed volume, and the size of the pumpkin being the resulting area of pumpkin matter.

  • @d34d10ck
    @d34d10ck Před 2 lety +36

    "Same size cube, that's actually a bit smaller, fits right through itself." Who would have thought. ;)

  • @----.__
    @----.__ Před 2 lety +34

    This really boils down to "can you fit the smallest profile of something through its largest profile" which doesn't really need investigating, it's obvious.

    • @DavidGuild
      @DavidGuild Před 2 lety +6

      Well it's not always true for all objects, but it certainly can be. And yes, it's not very interesting when stated the way you did.

    • @japanada11
      @japanada11 Před 2 lety +3

      Not entirely obvious. Just because a cross section has smaller area doesn't automatically make it fit inside of a cross section with larger area. I agree that it isn't surprising, but there's still some checking required - and there are plenty of shapes which can't be passed through themselves, even though the cross sections have different sizes.

    • @----.__
      @----.__ Před 2 lety +1

      @@japanada11 Fortunately I didn't mention area! I specifically used profile because for a profile to be larger than another it has to be larger in all dimensions meaning the answer is obvious.

    • @Felixr2
      @Felixr2 Před 2 lety +2

      @@japanada11 Pretty sure something as simple as a cylinder already makes it impossible. You can't get any orientation that isn't bounded by the diameter.

    • @E.T.S.
      @E.T.S. Před 2 lety +2

      @@japanada11 I agree. Take an egg for example. Lay it flat on the table, cut out the typical egg shaped middle section. Another egg with the same size rotated 90 degrees ("Bottom down") would get stuck. Another more diagonal cross section offers more room.
      The "problem" in this video is something I never thought about in this way, but just for practical reasons I tried to figure out a similar question while moving furniture. Like "Does this bench fit through the door while we have to make a turn to the stairs halfway through." The same happened while we were balancing the same bench on the stairs way up and needed to take a twist. We had plenty of room, we thought, but the needed rotation made the bench "bigger" than it was. We got stuck a couple of times (fingers included).

  • @trgdr777
    @trgdr777 Před 2 lety

    2 days later and I'm hooked on the podcast!

  • @DemonXeron
    @DemonXeron Před 2 lety +5

    I mean, it depends how you define "bigger than". Personally as a 3 spatial dimensional being I am under the belief that volume is size, not area. Of course you could define a hole as the cross sectional area of an enclosed through-termination of material, but I would consider a hole the volume of said termination.
    However, ignoring my pedantics, this is very interesting.

    • @chalichaligha3234
      @chalichaligha3234 Před 2 lety

      In that case hole volumes larger than container volumes are trivial - most containers/pipes enclose more volume than the material of the container/pipe. I'd argue area and length to be more interesting.

  • @nitkonigde1381
    @nitkonigde1381 Před 2 lety +5

    I was expecting a few iterations of a fractal, just enough to make the boundary of the hole be larger than the largest circumference of the pumpkin

  • @MrSaemichlaus
    @MrSaemichlaus Před 2 lety +3

    I was expecting you to cut out a quite thin band of pumpkin along a similar line as the line on a tennis ball, which would've allowed you to pass the original pumpkin through this band, if you stretched the band into a full circle, which would've been bigger than the original pumpkin.

  • @ajiwibowo8736
    @ajiwibowo8736 Před 2 lety +1

    My brain enough with prince rupert's drop, now its time for prince rupert's cube to shine

  • @oliverpackham6278
    @oliverpackham6278 Před 2 lety +2

    I just learned that a 4D cube (or any even Detentioned shape) can rotate without an axis of rotation. This is because when finding the bull space determinant (how you find the eigenvectors of which an axis if rotation is one) you're actually looking for the zeros of an n dimensional polynomial where n is the dimension if the matrix. And any polynomial where the highest degree is even, doesn't need to cross the x axis.

  • @thomascorbin5202
    @thomascorbin5202 Před 2 lety +3

    The whole time I was just waiting for Matt to discuss the napkin ring hypothesis since he was taking circumferential cross sections!

  • @stephengraves9370
    @stephengraves9370 Před 2 lety +15

    When you do the final demonstration with the octahedron, it takes you a bit to get it through even after you get the right angle because we are human and don't think or move in perfectly straight lines perpendicular to a particular cross section. Does rotating the octahedron passing through the hole change the minimum size of the hole?

    • @radeklew1
      @radeklew1 Před 2 lety +3

      Not sure about the octahedron but it definitely does for some shapes; imagine two pieces of elbow macaroni.

    • @hoorahforsnakes
      @hoorahforsnakes Před 2 lety +1

      Rotating something changing the minimum size of the hole is basically the entire principle that a screw is based off of isn't it?

  • @deepqantas
    @deepqantas Před 2 lety +1

    If you put the original pumpkin closer to you, and carve the hole further away, it's a lot easier to do because the perspective makes it smaller.

  • @Chlorate299
    @Chlorate299 Před 2 lety +2

    Matt has succeeded in using maths to make probably one of the most gruesome pumpkins.

  • @iv9753
    @iv9753 Před 2 lety +4

    The answer: depends on the thing

  • @ryleighs9575
    @ryleighs9575 Před 2 lety +5

    This IS interesting, but my issue with it is that the question is so ambiguous that the thing you ended up demonstrating was not how I would interpret the original question, mainly what "bigger" means in the question. 'Cause like, say I take your pumpkin band and try to fit an identical pumpkin through in the SAME orientation. That's more what I was thinking, because what you're actually showing is that different cross sections have different dimensions, not that you can make someTHING bigger than THAT thing started (the originally oriented pumpkin cross-section). In that way, it's kind of a bait and switch in terms of what "it" is referring to, from MY perspective on the original question at least. I think of the two cross sections as different things.
    Semantics are often underestimated - they impact conceptualization. I think the thing you're talking about IS important and significant in math, I DO get that impression as a layperson, I just think it's not quite the thing you're framing it as conceptually. It's not really about 'a thing being bigger than it started', it's more about the geometric relationship between shapes based on orientation. That's what I take away from the actual information in the video.

  • @wcndave
    @wcndave Před rokem +1

    Came here from the podcast, and whilst I think this is an excellent video/maths journey, I do agree with some posters that the definition of "bigger" is quite loose here. If you cut a small slot in a surfboard and passed another surfboard through it, would you say the slot it "bigger" than the surfboard? Not really. But it's still cool, keep up the good work on all fronts!

  • @remmadlener917
    @remmadlener917 Před 2 lety

    I never knew about a problem squared untill now, it's amazing I just binged listed most of it

  • @breakingaustin
    @breakingaustin Před 2 lety +3

    Yes, you can cut a sheet of a4 paper in such a way that it makes a big loop

  • @dunarayb
    @dunarayb Před 2 lety +3

    This is made to be much more complicated than it actually is! A square prism that measures 1x5x10 will have one profile that is 1x5 and another that is 5x10. It would be a trivial task to cut a 1x5 window into the 5x10 face, that's kinda' how windows generally work anyway... a little too much drama me thinks..

    • @cipherxen2
      @cipherxen2 Před 2 lety

      I was thinking the same thing. It would be a 10 second video.

    • @ikitclaw7146
      @ikitclaw7146 Před 2 lety

      yes because people like you dont enjoy having fun, where as the rest of us do and enjoyed the video for the seasonal bit of fun it was. Maybe you should go read a text book, it may be more your speed.

  • @catinapipe60
    @catinapipe60 Před 2 lety +1

    there's so many puns and dirty jokes that can be used here

  • @gotramen
    @gotramen Před 2 lety

    Matt I love your videos. I studied math in college but I don’t think I learned nearly as much from that than what I learn from your videos.

  • @aardvakoo1
    @aardvakoo1 Před 2 lety +4

    this is cool, you're saying i can take cube A and fit cube B which is 6% bigger inside it. Can i then take these interlocked cubes and put cube C, which is 6% bigger than cube B inside them too? What would that even look like and could i just keep putting larger cubes inside each other?

    • @Dalenthas
      @Dalenthas Před 2 lety +1

      Ooh, you could get some cool effects with nesting cubes...

  • @tristrumandrewsfisho339
    @tristrumandrewsfisho339 Před 2 lety +3

    this is so awesome. Matt, you legend, i have mental health issues and your videos have helped inspire me to go back to university. i dont care if i fail. giving it a crack mate.

    • @marley7145
      @marley7145 Před 2 lety +1

      Hell yes. If you can do it, maybe I can.

  • @cloud_appreciation_society

    I first heard this topic on the podcast, and I'm pretty amazed the 3D model I created in my mind based on Matt's explanation was exactly what the video showed! That was some impressive describing on his part.
    Very cool to see the actual pumpkin being referenced though.

  • @alveolate
    @alveolate Před 2 lety

    wait, the spooky halloween mix of the theme music is actually awesome!

  • @robblequoffle8456
    @robblequoffle8456 Před 2 lety +3

    🥟

  • @garyhuntress6871
    @garyhuntress6871 Před 2 lety +1

    There is far less Banach-Tarski in this video than I expected !

  • @jfp0763
    @jfp0763 Před 2 lety +1

    I don't like Halloween, but i like this

  • @CjqNslXUcM
    @CjqNslXUcM Před 2 lety

    I just listened to the podcast, just to find a video of you showing the results!

  • @thelastcube.
    @thelastcube. Před 2 lety +1

    I think for this one, you get a definitive DING!

  • @huraqan3761
    @huraqan3761 Před 2 lety

    Instant like on your video after hearing the first few notes of your theme song in a Halloween vibe 😁

  • @hancocki
    @hancocki Před rokem

    Cutting such a large hole in the pumpkin would surely leave it gourd

  • @Andorianin
    @Andorianin Před 2 lety

    Nice bonus at the end of pumpkin part))

  • @MarkVanReeth
    @MarkVanReeth Před 2 lety

    Loving the Halloween version of your theme song

  • @winkworkshop
    @winkworkshop Před 2 lety

    Oh wow, just finished a problem squared and saw this in my feed. Fun timing! Love the podcast. Nupboard by the way

  • @jamesbelshan8839
    @jamesbelshan8839 Před 2 lety

    5:18 "If the pumpkin don't fit, you must acquit."

  • @toyfabrik2993
    @toyfabrik2993 Před 2 lety +1

    Okay. So at 5:30 who else was like: "Put it on your head. Come on. Do it. Why don't you put it on your head?? PUT IT ON YOUR HEAAAAADDDDD!!!" xD

  • @joshuaentwistle960
    @joshuaentwistle960 Před 2 lety

    As always, the legend that is Matt's theme music person knocks it out the park. Is there another channel out there with so many variations of theme?

  • @matthewstout7974
    @matthewstout7974 Před 2 lety

    That he didn't refer to the 2nd pumpkin as the "stunt pumpkin" will haunt me to my grave.

  • @ruke47
    @ruke47 Před 2 lety +2

    I mean, it seems pretty intuitive that if you take something with different profiles (like the 1x4x9 monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey), and chop a 1x4 hole in the 3x9 face, it's going to fit through itself easy-peasy.

  • @AndrewTyberg
    @AndrewTyberg Před 2 lety

    I love the Halloween remix of your normal song

  • @Crunch0r
    @Crunch0r Před 2 lety

    Student: Why would you need all this complicated maths in life?
    Matt: Hold my pumpkin..

  • @DukeBG
    @DukeBG Před 2 lety +1

    I'ld wish you would also make two spiral cuts winding around the pumpkin from top to bottom and unwounded it into a giant hoop you could probably step through.

  • @pvic6959
    @pvic6959 Před 2 lety

    12:00 so THATS what the kids toy where we have to fit the square peg in the square hole was training us for!

  • @steamer1
    @steamer1 Před 2 lety +1

    "Good enough, is close enough" should be in the channel description.

  • @lucasfreire1090
    @lucasfreire1090 Před 2 lety

    Love the what we do in the shadows reference

  • @1000dots
    @1000dots Před 2 lety +2

    I'm gonna guess this can't work for an icosahedron or dodecahedron, since when you look at either from any angle some of the vertices making up the 'outline' will be behind and some in front of the centre, so any rotation will stretch some parts and shrink others, never all shrink or all stretch.

    • @cyclemath
      @cyclemath Před rokem +1

      It works for all five platonic solids. They all have the Rupert property.

  • @random6033
    @random6033 Před 2 lety +1

    -My hole is so big it can fit 2 cucumbers-

  • @grinreaperoftrolls7528
    @grinreaperoftrolls7528 Před 2 lety +1

    Holey pumpkins, batman!

  • @PaweMateuszBytner
    @PaweMateuszBytner Před 2 lety

    I think that crossection juggling is more of a stretch than stretching/distorting the pumpkin.

  • @ratgeyser
    @ratgeyser Před 2 lety

    Last time you did a hole video I ended up wearing a torus instead of trousers. I was four hours in the emergency room screaming BUT THEY'RE TOPOGRAPHICALLY EQUIVALENT

  • @darylcheshire1618
    @darylcheshire1618 Před 2 lety

    I remember a question from Professor Julius Sumner Miller who asked “why are manhole covers circular?” He quipped the correct answer is not to cover a circular hole. The answer is the circle is the only shape that won’t fall into the circular hole. For example it’s possible to pass a square manhole cover into a square manhole.

  • @thesoupin8or673
    @thesoupin8or673 Před 2 lety

    Huge fan of A Problem Squared, 10/10

  • @becomepostal
    @becomepostal Před 2 lety

    This video is crazy. Particularly the moment when the second pumpkin appears and is declared identical to the first pumpkin without any further explanation.

  • @real_michael
    @real_michael Před 2 lety

    Happy Halloween!

  • @mariafinnell8421
    @mariafinnell8421 Před 2 lety

    This was a fun maths video. Thank you.

  • @saamv8139
    @saamv8139 Před 2 lety

    very cool. feels like something that should have some physics analogues. might have some examples in condended matter or something as changing surface areas would affect forces and potentials