World’s best known and best loved irrational number
Here’s a brief publicity bio:
pi is known to be irrational (Lambert 1761; Legendre 1794; Hermite 1873; Nagell 1951; Niven 1956; Struik 1969; Königsberger 1990; Schröder 1993; Stevens 1999; Borwein and Bailey 2003, pp. 139-140). In 1794, Legendre also proved that pi^2 is irrational (Wells 1986, p. 76). pi is also transcendental (Lindemann 1882). An immediate consequence of Lindemann’s proof of the transcendence of pi also proved that the geometric problem of antiquity known as circle squaring is impossible. A simplified, but still difficult, version of Lindemann’s proof is given by Klein (1955).
and a million digits of pi
The only checkout counter mag scandal associated with pi’s career was the huge scene in a restaurant last year, with the square root of minus one – overheard by at least dozen witnesses:
Square Root: Get rational!
Pi: Get real!
It was then the pi got thrown.
Pi also starred in the Carl Sagan novel Contact, which was made into the film:
There, see, we got a film in too, nitey nite.