Jim Simons @jimsimons@mathstodon.xyz

Word of the day, from Andrew Motte's English translation of Isaac Newton's Principia: fupendulous, meaning hanging from a rope.

I was asked to "digitally sign" a document. This didn't mean digitally sign in the cryptographic sense, nor did it mean attach a scan of my signature. It meant click a button which attached a computer-generated version of my name in a handwriting font. What is that about?

What app should I be using on my android phone? I've installed mastodon, which offers me a huge list of "community"s, which does not include mathstodon, so I think I've gone wrong or misunderstood something.

When the 2020 conference of the Mathematical Association was cancelled, I made my talk into videos. I've made several more, very amateurish, videos since. If you are young enough not to have used log tables in earnest, you might be interested in this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D3Rp3oiMVQ . It includes solving some old "O" level questions. Mostly I imagine myself talking to other people who teach maths A level. If you do that, you might be interested in my channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnYszOhEIIdIMYyNx2yjwfg .

You can tell you are in the company of mathematicians when someone asks "Which is the nearest planet to the Earth?", someone else says "The Earth", and everyone else just nods.

Here's my #introduction. I have retired from a mathematical career, not in academia, so used to having other mathematicians to chat to, and I'm looking for other places to have such conversations. Outside maths itself, I'm interested in #astronomy, #history of maths, and teaching maths. I tutor A level.

I've nothing particular to say at the moment, so I'll just celebrate being able to post in latex, or at least to attempt to do so:
\[
P(X<x)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi}\sigma}\int_{-\infty}^x e^{-\frac{(y-\mu)^2}{2\sigma^2}}dy
\]