Both Sides Now

16/09/2025

Listen "Both Sides Now"

Episode Synopsis

On a glass door in the mathematics department at the University of Erlangen–Nürnberg in Germany, this determinant is printed: Sure enough, X · I – IV · II = II. Pass through the door and regard it from the other side and you see a different equation: But this too is true: II = VI · II – X · I. (Burkard Polster, “Mathemagical Ambigrams,” Proceedings of the Mathematics and Art Conference, 2000.)

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