Magic Definition and 107 Threads

Greetings, I suppose all of us have at one time or another been fascinated by "magic squares" My question is: has the relationship of numbers in a magic square been found to be useful in the mathematical sciences in any advanced analytical work? Or is is just a mathematical curiousity?

New Geometrical Polar-Ring Solution for Magic Numbered Nuclei. It is well known that if the neutron- or proton number within atomic nuclei have the following quantities (2, 8, 20, 28, 50, 82 and 126: the magic numbers), then the atoms are showing a more than average stability. As an example...

How the Right Hijacked the Magic Words By Stanley Fish, New York Times, August 13, 1995 DURHAM. N.C. When the verdict in the first Rodney King beating trial was announced many were amazed at the acquittal of the police officers, especially since their actions had been filmed by an amateur...

Does anyone know real magic? i mean physical magic. something very obvious, not just the subtle kind. Not, that subtle magic isn't as great, pagan magics i mean mostly being that's about the only magics i can think of, but I'm looking for something pretty apparent.

Open a new document, in the first row, type this : =rand(200,99) and press Enter :wink:

magic... Who here believes in magic...and if you do what do you think it is like and how it works...give it a try...

This is related to the Banach-Tarski paradox. One of the sites mentioned in that thread has a beautiful "experiment" on equidcomposability: Let A be a unit circle, and B be a unit circle with one point missing. It turns out that you can divide B into two subsets, rotate one of them, and then put...