Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Islamic Artisans Constructed Exotic Nonrepeating Pattern 500 Years Before Mathematicians

As early as the 15th century, elaborate symmetrical tile work on medieval Islamic buildings contained patterns straight out of modern math
Scientific American

tile work ELABORATE SYMMETRICAL tile work on medieval Islamic buildings, such as this 15th-century Turkish mosque, seem to have been constructed from sets of decorated tiles.

Medieval Islamic artisans seem to have developed a procedure for creating jigsawlike mosaics that ultimately led them to an exotic pattern that mathematicians would discover nearly half a millennium later. Researchers report that 15th-century buildings in Iran feature tiles arranged in a so-called quasicrystal, which is symmetric but does not repeat itself regularly.

"Here is evidence it [the pattern] was being used, if not understood, 500 years ahead of when we had any idea what was going on with [it] in the West," says physics graduate student Peter J. Lu of Harvard University. Lu began poring over photos from Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Afghanistan after seeing hints of the pattern while traveling in Uzbekistan. The Islamic artisans seem to have spun a wide variety of symmetric traceries from a set of five shapes, according to a report Lu co-authored, published online February 22 in Science.

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8 comments:

  1. Nobel Prize in Chemistry for dogged work on 'impossible' quasicrystals

    Daniel Shechtman, who has won the chemistry Nobel for discovering quasicrystals, was initially lambasted for 'bringing disgrace' on his research group

    Daniel Shechtman, 70, a researcher at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, received the award for discovering seemingly impossible crystal structures in frozen gobbets of metal that resembled the beautiful patterns seen in Islamic mosaics.
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/oct/05/nobel-prize-chemistry-work-quasicrystals

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  2. Above is me

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  3. What makes you think so racist filth?

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  4. "Nothing happens nowadays in islam."
    No, they have to buy their guns, bombs, electronic instruments of torture and surveillance from the more civilised Franks.
    Has fleming morphed?

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  5. No not fleming. Some genius from Bangalore, India.

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  6. Dear probably well intentioned but less than perfectly informed asdf [saying this with love and respect]:

    How do you explain the Turkish economic miracle?
    How do you explain the Malaysian economic miracle?
    How do you explain rapid growth in Indonesia?
    How do you explain Dubai?
    How do you explain why muslim Americans are so much richer and better educated than nonmuslim Americans?
    How do you explain Azerbaijan?

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  7. Forgive them TGIA, for they know not what they do.

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  8. TGIA, some of the exhibits at the metropolitan museum in New York are amazing. It is difficult to imagine.

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