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Pi Collisions

A strange physics trick where mass ratios encode pi.

What is this?

A simulation of the famous pi-by-collisions setup. Two blocks collide elastically with each other and with a wall; the total number of collisions can spell digits of pi.

How it works

Choosing a mass ratio of powers of 100 maps the collision dynamics to circular motion in phase space. Counting wall and block collisions gives 3, 31, 314 and beyond.

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