Timeline for Why are they called ‘pernicious’ numbers?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
9 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Nov 24, 2020 at 0:46 | history | edited | hb20007 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Made citation source more visible
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| Nov 23, 2020 at 22:40 | history | edited | hb20007 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Made question more concise
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| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:57 | comment | added | Gerry Myerson | Since "odd" gives rise to "odious", and "even" to "evil", "prime" should really give rise to something with negative connotations beginning with "pr", not just with "p". "Primitive"? "Promiscuous"? "Privileged"? "Prevaricating"? | |
| Jul 17, 2017 at 11:32 | vote | accept | hb20007 | ||
| Jul 17, 2017 at 11:32 | answer | added | hb20007 | timeline score: 3 | |
| Jan 24, 2015 at 11:42 | comment | added | Steven Landsburg | It looks like Michael Stoll posted while I was typing. | |
| Jan 24, 2015 at 11:42 | comment | added | Steven Landsburg | Let $t(n)$ be the digit sum of the binary representation of $n$. Then Google will tell you that $n$ is called odious if $t(n)$ is odd and evil if $t(n)$ is even. Thus every number is either odious or evil, and therefore the words "odious" and "evil" cannot be pejorative in this context. It seems very likely that "pernicious" was chosen in the same spirit because it starts with the letter "p". | |
| Jan 24, 2015 at 11:41 | comment | added | Michael Stoll | Maybe this is in the sprit of "odious" and "evil" numbers (those with an odd, resp. even number of ones in their binary representation)? | |
| Jan 24, 2015 at 11:21 | history | asked | hb20007 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |