The origins of the meter go back to at least the 18th century. At that time, there were two competing approaches to the definition of a standard unit of length. Some suggested defining the meter as ... Continue reading
A circle is what you get if you take a straight line and bend it around so that its ends touch. You can demonstrate this by taking a piece of stiff wire and doing just that: bring the ends of the wire ... Continue reading
Originally, each country had its own, and rather poorly reproducible, unit of luminous intensity; it was necessary to wait until 1909 to see a beginning of unification on the international level, when ... Continue reading
The cone is another three-dimensional shape based on the circle. You could think of it as the cross between a circle and a right triangle. Its properties will have features of both shapes, and this ... Continue reading
