23 Jun
2004
23 Jun
'04
11:05 a.m.
There's also a method I learnt long ago
that is laid out in the same way as
a long division. I've forgotten it
Exactly! (that was the point of my cube root
query).
because it seemed moderately pointless!
Well, no more pointless than long division, etc. :>
I've forgotten it so thoroughly that I've
even forgotten whether it had a name or not.
In elementary school, it was called "finding
the square root" :> I never could understand
why "long division" got such an "important"
name... while *this* procedure (considerably
LONGer) was given such an ambiguous name!
(ambiguous to a pre-teen, that is!)
I expect that there may well be a similar
method for the cube root.
Yes. And, if you throw out all the (ahem)
"trivial" cases for roots that can be
formed by "factoring" (that's GOT to be the
wrong term, here... <:-( out other "easy"
roots (i.e. 4th is sqrt(sqrt), 6th is sqrt(3rd),
etc.), the method can be extended to other
"higher roots".
You'd be better served to lobotomize yourself
beforehand :-(
I have these written up someplace. I should
ferret them out...
--don