March 12, 2026 • 34 mins
We all know pi, right? It's one of the most famous 'irrational numbers' in history, and mathematicians are still trying to figure it out in the modern day. While this may seem arcane to some of us non-mathheads, in today's episode, Ben, Noel and Max learn these numbers were3 once such a big deal that legends say folks got murdered for discovering them. Tune in to learn the harrowing tale of Hippasus, a Pythagorean cultist who discovered irrational numbers -- and, in doing so, pissed off the Gods so much that they drowned him.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. Let's hear it for our number
one super producer, Max, the Irrational Williams.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Max runs the Numbers, the Numbers guy and Irrational Williams.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, I have survived.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
I am back.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Yeah, you went on a you went on a bit
of a sojourn, didn't you.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
I did. I did. I went to the uh the uh.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
I guess it's a midwestern state, but I don't really
understand how it's.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Sort of on the cusp. Right, Yeah, Louis, Missouri. It's weird.
It feels sort of weirdly southern in some way. It's
been another way is it feels vaguely midwestern.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
What I was told is Saint Louis is midwestern, Missouri southern.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
So it's interesting. Guys. Oh that's mister Noel Brown.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Hello.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
They call me Ben and Bowling. It is, and.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Well for legal and tax purposes. Uh, but I'm going
to get me start on. I'm not gonna pay this guy.
I'm not gonna I did.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
I took a bath on it, all right, I won't
do it all right, well, like, well there's beending and all.
Speaker 5 (01:36):
Well, don't say it on air, but we we we're
talking about some uh, some fascinating rational things today.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
This is a unsolved murder from Millennia.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Go.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
But while we're talking Missouri, just so everybody knows, uh,
our brother Max was on a vacation and had some
adventures and Max nol I gotta see. I've been to Missouri,
and I love your pronunciation there, Noel. I've been to
Missouri a couple of times, and I was always freaked
(02:16):
out by how far away I was from the ocean.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
It is very in land, landlocked.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Yeah, don't don't eat this, don't don't eat the fish.
Maybe I don't know. It seems like they can get
good fish just about anywhere. We're landlocked here and we're
next to an airport, and we get really nice fresh
fish at our local markets. I wanted to take this
opportunity and talking about the great state of Missouri, h
to shout out a friend of the show, Christy, who
(02:45):
is here visiting in Atlanta right now to see Lady Gaga,
who I went and saw last night, And although our
seats were terrible, it was a fantastic spectacle of a show.
It was like Circa sole A. It was wonderful. I've
got all the song stuck in my head. But Christy
said that calling St. Lewis Saint Louis is like calling
Atlanta Atlanta.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, I just wanted to give her her due and
just put that out into the world.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
It didn't really occur to me that connection.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
The bar brothers from a school of humans. Some folks
we work with have said very much the same, and
I'm so happy to hear that. You guys did make
it to the Lady.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Gaga show for the second time. We thought it was
the previous week, and we went. We got all dulled up,
Me and the kid marched our way down to a
state farm arena and there was not a soul in sight.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
So you know, it was a trial run.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
If anyone gets a chance to see Mother Mayhem, by
all means, please do.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Yeah, and please note the time signatures, because music is math. Ultimately,
music is math plus poetry.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
Son of a bitch.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Pretty good, right, It's pretty good. So we are we are,
by way of irrational segues, we are going to we
are going to explore a story that the Jedi won't
tell you. This is part of our continuing series on
(04:11):
inventors who died in some way due to their own inventions.
This is a special case.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
This is especially boy is it ever? You ask yourself,
how can numbers kill? And I gotta say too. When
I saw the headline of this one, the irrational death
of hippoesis hyposis, I read it as irrational death of
hippopotamus and I was excited because that would have been
(04:41):
a throwback to remember the The Hippos The Wild Hippos
a Pablo Star one of our first episodes.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
I thought the hit The Wild Hippos were finally getting there.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Due Narco Hippos. For Narco's Narco Hippos? Are those hippos?
What narc are those hippos? What belonged to Narco?
Speaker 3 (04:59):
Terror?
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Be a cartoon of entity. I recently rewatched Scarface so
I could learn a little bit more about the drug
trade due to recent news. Thanks for the nod Max
acknowledgment that we are in the worst timeline. One thing
that's really great about a scarface is back in the
(05:23):
day when they used to have to do like edits
for television, that one has some bangers. In terms of
the replacements of the swears, I'm not gonna say what
the original is. This is a family show, but one
of them it turns into from the Bad Thing to
Miami is just a chicken waiting to be plucked.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
So use your imagination. Yeah, jump in here real quick.
Speaker 4 (05:46):
My favorite TV edit of all time it's still from
the Matrix, where Neo's on the side of the building
the very beginning and he was like, oh.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Sukes, Okay, don't know that one.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
But Big Lebowski also has some really quality ones. One
is this is what happened when you leave a stranger
in the Alps as opposed to the Bad Thing.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
It's up there with a so I watch a lot
of foreign films, and it's up there with the weird
translations that attempt to be palatable, where you have someone say, oh,
like the Mandarin would say something like, you know, let's
get it on because we are a family show, and
the translation will be let's spend some time together late
(06:29):
at night.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Now and then make pancakes how and that heck, are
we gonna pivot from Scarface TV at it's back to math.
It was my fault because I said Hipassas, and that
made me think of Hippopotamuss and it's just a whole
horror show. Foh on, But I think I just did it.
We're talking about a Greek.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, yeah, this is the legend of hipposis or hipassis.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Thank you much preferred.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Okay, So before we dive in, folks, it is crucial
to note that we as a crew are not math
surgeons or whatever the term is. But for this story,
we do need to briefly explain or explore the concept
of irrational numbers, which sounds like it sounds paradoxical, does
(07:21):
it not.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
I think about it with the same level of bewilderment
as I do leap year or or Thanksgiving or Easter.
You know, no, I think I'm more confused by irrational
numbers than giving. Easter is a little bit of a
head scratcher. But Thanksgiving, I know, it's a weird date thing,
but I kind of more or less get it. Irrational numbers, it's.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
It isn't a little bit of a heady concept.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
M Yeah, all right. So if we were to put
it simply, and this will be important later, an irrational
number is any real number, quote unquote, A positive or
negative number or zero, but it cannot be written as
a fraction. So for a fanci or definition, we could
(08:11):
say an irrational number can't be expressed as the ratio
of two integers.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
So this would be maybe to simplify a little bit.
For people that just barely past algebra, like myself, you
might think of this as a repeating decimal.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Right, that's great, Yeah, you nailed it. So decimals that.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Just goes on and on and on.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
No, yeah, it's no discernible repeating pattern, right, they continue
being a very famous one. And there are also things
like Euler's number or the Golden ratio.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
And stuff like this too that makes me kind of
look at numbers with a certain mysticism. There's a certain
quality of like being able to explain the unexplainable or
sort of boil down the scrits of the universe to
like numbers. And you start to think of like the
movie Pie and Kabbala and numerology and all that stuff.
(09:06):
When I think of irrational numbers and like a number
that just goes on ad infinitum, that starts to kind
of peauk my interest in that direction.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Oh yeah, Pie is such a great film. It's a
classic buddy comedy. We've got one.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Totally pleasant, a real good, a real rop. It's one
for the kiddo Police Academy, the movie.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Yes, Police Academy, the movie. Square roots are also Some
square roots are also irrational because they're not perfect squares.
So like if you enter the square root of numbers
such as two or thirteen or eighteen into a calculator,
the answer you get, the reply you get will not
(09:48):
be rational. The square root of two is the best
known of these. As you can tell, folks, this is
a whole messy bowl of spaghetti. But no, I think
we can agree this is on a positive note. It
is an exciting reminder that humanity, even now still doesn't
(10:10):
know everything about math.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Well that's what I was getting at. I mean, I
guess you could see why my head would go towards
the whole mysticism and the secrets of the universe and stuff.
And we have something that is meant to be and
on its surface is completely rational and a way of
boiling things down to very understandable you know, integers, formulas, etc.
(10:33):
To have an aspect of that that's unexplainable, it seems
counter to the whole idea of like the tidiness of math.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
You know, yeah, well put and you know in fact, folks,
Noel Max, if we're all cool with this, I would
like to issue an official ridiculous History challenge.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Hmmm. I thought it was going to be a proclamation challenge.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
A challenge and invitation way of the open hands. If
you are listening, fellow ridiculous historian, and you become the
first person to solve pie and prove it to us
and figure out where that decimal ultimately ends, we will
take you, Noel Max and yours truly will take you
(11:18):
on an all expenses paid trip to a Dave and
Busters of your choice.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Preferably you know, one in the the the metro Atlanta area,
preferably what I'm geting, we'll go. We'll go over wherever,
whatever your your DNB of choices.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
We'll meet you there, all expenses Ben, that's a are.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
Are we sure we can get finance to approve this?
Speaker 1 (11:39):
We're kind of doing a ask forgiveness loker thing.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Okay, yeah, I'm also you know what, I'm gonna go
ahead and put my money where my mouth is. If
you can solve this equation, this lish you know historical quandary.
I'll pony up the all expenses myself. Oh, come on
out of my own pocket. I've got your back.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
Thanks buddy, when you.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Have the Yeah, we got to go haves The's on this.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
That way, we won't get you. Guys are definitely going to.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Yeah, Max, I noticed you went mute on that one.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
What is there a three way version of Havesy's Triumvirate Tripsy's.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
No, no, no, We're a family show.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
So for I love the point that you made there
earlier a couple of times. For a lot of us,
the concept of irrational numbers is not simply paradoxical. It
is downright mystical. And according to the legends, we owe
(12:36):
the discovery of irrational numbers to a cult. What's say
we introduce.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Hipposis a numbers cult.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
I love it, Like was that one Jim Carrey movie
with the scary numbers.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Over the room. He's in a room.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
He's in a room, and he's I think he's written
all over his face. Even it's called like the numbers.
I don't know if this is there's a name for this.
Whenever there's a number associated with a title or even
a band, outside of blank one any too, because that's
just you know ingrained into my brain.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
I can never remember the number part.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
You'll often hear me say, it's just it's just this
with some number, I'll never I don't have a brain
for numbers. And that even comes with like remembering addresses
and you know, codes to doors.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
And I love numbers, but I don't understand them.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
No, you know, I love them too. I think they're fascinating,
as did this cult.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
I hope that we make more episodes in the future
because I would hate for our I would hate for
us to be struck by a meteor or a Shaha
drone and then have our last quotations be stuff like
I love numbers, but I don't understand them.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
That was that bient people out on my tombstone. He
loved numbers. Noel around who loved numbers but did not understand.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
So back around let's say five hundred BCEE or so,
we got this guy named Hipposis h I P P
A s U. S. Of Metapontum, which is you know,
it's common for people of that era to be described
as from a place.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
It's a little village right there on the coast of
modern day Greece seems like a lovely place to to vacation.
Some cool historic remnants of you know, Greek column structures
around you can see it was an ancient city of
Magna in Greece.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
And our guy, Hipposis, he is a philosopher. He is
an early follower of an enigmatic character named Pythagoras. Now
we all remember the name Pythagoras for one reason, right.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
The theorem. Yeah, that's the triangle one.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Right, how do you find the high potten news the
Pythagora pat.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
I was high on pot news.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, a square plus B squared equals C squared. Uh,
this was a revolution for the ages. And now it
is an old grade school math question. The thing is,
before we have characters like Plato and Aristotle, we've got
Pythagoras of Samos, And he is the guy who is
(15:29):
running around doing his version of Ted Talks saying math
is the key to the universe.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
He ain't wrong, it's not wrong.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
I was blown away by how early they figured out
all this stuff. I mean, I was stating the obvious,
but like, it's just these are some smart people who
figured out some very very interesting ways of solving some
very very heady questions using this seemingly on the surface,
very logical, formulaic approach. But Pythagoras knew that there was
(16:00):
something deeper, there was something behind the numbers, and he
took that thinking and more or less built it into
a kind of religion.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Okay, so now, Pythagoras, for most of us in twenty
twenty six, Pythagoras is a dusty old name you see
in math textbooks, maybe philosophy books. But to your point,
back in his heyday, his Hauseyon age, this guy was
a cult leader. Essentially, his ideas were so galvanizing, so
(16:38):
electric that people started following him and they created something
called the Pythagorean cult, which he founded and kind of
named after himself in a burst of humility.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
This was.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
A secretive, mystical communal society blended math, philosophy and interesting
religious practices. Like they were strict vegetarians.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Yeah, they believed in the music of the spheres and
in like sacred geometry and all of these sort of
harmonious connections between celestial bodies that they believed could be
explained using a lot of these mathematical concepts, and he
became quite the influencer of the time.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
He had over one thousand followers.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
At the time who helped him establish sort of an
achrom kind of situation, like a commune, and under his
leadership in that commune, a sort of to your point,
been very holistic approach to living, kind of flourished.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
They seemed to have almost like.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
An intentional community kind of set.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
You know, there we go.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
They believed in things like what we would call reincarnation today.
They also had rules that might sound oddly specific, like
you shouldn't eat fava beans. I don't know why with
a nice kiante. Yeah, yeah, nailed it. This thing that
flourishes in modern day southern Italy, this colony that the
(18:21):
Thagoras is leading. They start to become increasingly politically important,
and this makes powerful enemies that ultimately lead to the
ending of this intentional community. That's a story for another day.
For now, it's enough.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I mean, you can see why. It was almost the
behavior of like a heretic in a way. If you're
going against the prevailing pantheon and you're saying it's more
important to worship Math than it is to worship Zeus,
I can see how they can make you some powerful enemies.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Yeah, especially if you pop off at the mouth with
some easy thing like well, I think Zeus is actually
math and Poseidon is another kind of math. People don't
like to hear that well for sure.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
And usually this kind of intense rationalism, I guess you
could call it, even though there certainly was a mystical bent,
tends to fly in the face of like established much more,
you know, rigid religious beliefs that had that worship deities
of some kind, because typically these folks aren't gonna like
put my stock into that kind of thing. I'd bean like,
(19:30):
these these are fantasies, right. It disrupts power structures, that's
the issue. Yeah, And so okay, So it's enough for
us to know now that Pythagoras started occult all about numbers,
saying that reality can be explained through rational numbers and
to your point, through rational thought. Our buddy Hipposis is
(19:53):
an early adopter of these beliefs, and it makes sense
for us even now in twenty twenty six. People have
always endeavored to understand how the world works, and the
claim that the entirety of the universe can be understand
via rational numbers. This concept that everything could somehow make sense. Obviously,
(20:15):
this is hugely appealing, and Pythagoras does end up dying
in modern day Italy starves himself, but his followers carry
on his traditions for several more centuries. About one hundred
years later, the Pythagoreans are maintaining the traditions and they
(20:36):
attract the attention of a young up and comer named Hipposis,
and Hipposis at the beginning is having a great time
for sure.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Up until this time, Pythagoreans. Pythagoreans, Yeah, that works. They
were busy telling folks and spreading the word to the shade.
In any case, that all numbers could be expressed as
the ratio of integers.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Now let's hold on there, Noel, because okay, have you
ever been approached by a cult?
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Absolutely, the Moonies at the airport, Harry Krishna's the same. No,
they're different. I think the Moon's and the Harry Christians
are a little different. And I know it's sometimes offense.
Did throw around the sea word, and certainly we're not
here to denigrate anyone's beliefs, but both of those groups
do exhibit some kind of let's just say, uh, recruitment
type outreach situation. Yeah, and a scientologists. Have you ever
(21:36):
been to LA They'll come at you in the street. Yeah,
they'll try to get you to come in to the
all around Hubbard Museum and take the tour, which you
should do because it's interesting.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
But it is a recruitment tactic.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
One hundred percent. Yeah, like Zendik farms we used to have. Again, Yeah,
they send people out. No, Max, have you been approached
by a cult?
Speaker 4 (21:57):
I remember my freshman orientation or college I got attacked
by some people in frats trying to get them to
joint of frat?
Speaker 3 (22:03):
I mean, same thing. What really makes a frat that
mus different from a cult type? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
It's easier to catch more flies with honey than you
do with attacking people MLM.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
So the reason we're asking this folks, and please share
your cult stories with us is imagine if you are
in an airport or something and person walks up to you.
They're pitch to you is quote reality is all numbers,
It's all math, and you're thinking, well, this guy's kind
of strange, and then they say further, all numbers can
(22:36):
be expressed as the ratio of integers.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
End quote.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
You'd be like, you're the most boring cult leader or
you're the most boring cults representative ever. You're a snooze fest.
Aren't you supposed to tell me something weird about ancient
aliens or twin flames? But no integers you.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
I don't know, man, though, this is interesting what I
was getting, because we're obviously talking about the disruption of
this orderly way of viewing the universe, and I can
see how this numbers thing could have been really attractive
because there is something to it that is like so
understandable and rational in a way of like explaining a
(23:18):
lot of the movement of the stars and the planets
and all that kind of thing that sort of is
an interesting, easier to wrap your head around alternative some
of the more like you know, traditional Greek religious belief system.
But when you start throwing in this whole idea of like, well,
what if the numbers aren't as easy to understand? What
(23:40):
if there's something else to me? That is where the
mystical part comes in. I just wonder how disruptive this
must have been.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Yeah, along comes are pal Hyposis. From what we know,
he's an ordinary rank and file cult member, At first
they're saying yay number, and he says, yay numbers, and
they say be vegetarian, and he says, yay vegetarian, and
they say beat me here, Max fava beans, and he says, cool.
(24:11):
I'm still on board. But at some point, according to
the legend, he was trying to inscribe a dodecahedron inside
a sphere or best shape, the best shape, it's one
of the best dice out there. Or he was trying
to explain the ratio of lengths in a pentagram one
(24:32):
of the symbols, another sarians another six shape for sure.
And the story goes that while he was trying to
figure this out, he realized some of the lengths that
he was calculating could not be expressed as fractions. Therefore,
he provides the first proof of the existence of irrational numbers,
(24:57):
and he feels like he has to go public, he
has to blow the whistle on this rational number cult.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
Well and writes, and he was on board with it.
I mean, he was a follower of Pythagoras, so this
had to have been mind blowing, galaxy brain type stuff
for him as well. And to what I was sort
of speculating earlier. It's absolutely true. This flew in the
face of everything that these folks believed in and was
completely disruptive to their worldview. And I'm sorry if I'm
(25:26):
harping on this a little bit, but do you do
you kind of see where I'm coming from with like
how I how it feels like the mystery part of
numbers is more interesting and more a sign of the
mystical aspects of it than it being perfect, and like
you know, absolutely zero room for error, and like just no,
(25:48):
it's these these whole numbers. But I can understand how
it also at the time would have been really, really
difficult to reconcile the two.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
This flies in the face of everything the cult believes,
their entire worldview. The legend gets a little murky because
some people around the time, or within a few centuries
after the fact, they would tell you the Pythagoreans took
offence at this discovery of irrational numbers, and in other tales,
(26:27):
Hipposis made his results public and he got in trouble
not for discovering irrational numbers, but for blowing the whistle
about the sect's secret practices.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
Okay, there's a little more to numbers than initially met
the eye. He's kind of doxing these folks and exposing
some potentially problematic behavior.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, maybe so.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
History remembers him as snitching about irrational numbers. But maybe
he also so snitched about fava beans and they were like,
hey man, they'll talk about the beans. That's between us.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
And maybe even this if this means an extra google
or something like what did he do?
Speaker 5 (27:11):
What?
Speaker 2 (27:12):
We don't really have too much information on what he exposed. Essentially,
the legend goes that he exposed the existence of things
like the golden ratio or pie. He found that there
are some numbers that do not jibe with the worldview
of the Pythagorea and cult. Got it, but didn't He
(27:33):
also kind of expose some of their practices of, you know,
somewhat heretical behavior like offending gods and all of these
various acts of defiance that maybe they were doing behind
closed doors.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
That's part of it. Yeah, that's one of the other allegations.
We do know that the official story, again still legends
at this point time. The official story is that he
drowned somehow in the sea shortly after announcing he discovered
irrational numbers, and some scholars would later claim that he
(28:13):
was murdered by fellow cult members. Definite possibility. The juicier
version of the legend is that his discovery did not
just offend mortals, it offended the gods as well as Yes,
his death at sea is a divine punishment because he
looked too deeply behind.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
The curtain of reality.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Okay, death at sea, Yeah, what are we talking here?
Kind of just a voyage that went awry of Robert
Maxwell's situation. Perhaps that's the thing. Like so many ancient tales,
this one probably got embellished over time or it was
made up entirely. We know that a lot of modern
(29:01):
authors will say that hipposis did at least independently discover
irrational numbers, but there's not really any direct evidence to
support that. There's just a bunch of campfire stories in
the game of Telephone.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
For sure.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
And can I also just say there is one version
of the legend. Man, I found a cool piece on
Scientific American how Secret Society discovered irrational numbers, And it's
the image that they pulled. It's just like it looks
like a bunch of ring raths, Like it's just these
shadowy figures, robed figures with no faces. It is absolutely terrifying.
But one version of this legend is that it was
(29:40):
the cult members that turned on him and drowned him
to death at Seed.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
This was a hit.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Yeah, this is the thing. There's a third possibility about
his death. This is again a true crime story that
remains unsolved millennia later. What if he did discover ra numbers,
ruffled the wrong feathers and as fellow cultists got mad
enough to kill him. And what if later they claimed
(30:09):
he was drowned by the gods to throw authorities off
the trail, Right, because.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Right, the divine punishment for his for his own heresy. Yeah,
and I don't keep using that word, but I think
it's appropriate. It's it's perfect after all? Then, is now
the gods are beyond mortal jurisdiction. We also have to remember,
just to be fair, not to be fun police about
this story, but the world was full of different civilizations,
(30:40):
and they all had their own math wizards at the time.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
Right, they had other people who probably understood something like
irrational numbers. I don't know. No, I think it's fair
to say that hipposis may have independently discovered irrational numbers,
but it was probably not the first guy to ever
think of that.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
Certainly not tons of parallel thinking involved these kinds of
discoveries you know, throughout history. But since we are talking
about legend here, there's another version that says, and this
is specifically referenced in the Scientific American piece that I
was talking about, that there's a world or of a
version of events where none of.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
This stuff is true.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
That the Pythagoreans actually thought it was awesome that he
discovered this stuff, and that them, being such math geeks,
would have been super impressed and hailed it as a
as an achievement, and that would have made Pythagorasts himself
proud as opposed to rolling in his grave. But the
story of the spooky math cult, I think, is a
(31:49):
little sexier. Yeah, yeah, it's a lot sexier. It's rational.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
Dare we say to enjoy the juiciest version of a
But we know one thing for sure. Irrational numbers exist.
They some of them have yet to be quote unquote solved.
If that term even applies, and hipposis is definitely dead,
(32:17):
is he dead due to his own discovery or is
this a campfire tale that people told over and over
again for thousands of years. We leave the question to you, folks.
Thank you, as always so much for tuning in. We
we hope we did right, fellow ridiculous historians, especially.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
If you know more about math than we do.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
And we've got to thank our super producer, mister Max Williams. Max,
how do we do?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
Oh, Max, the math man Williams. There we go. I
will say, you did just fine, just fine, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
No. I know this is a shorter one, but you
know it is a little math heavy, and there's certainly
some stuff that we could have included, like the specific
formulas surrounding his discovery of irrational numbers.
Speaker 3 (33:06):
But it would have just made my it would have
done my head in.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
So thank you so much for maintaining my mental health
by allowing us.
Speaker 3 (33:12):
To gloss over some of that stuff.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
Ben, we didn't get to Graham's number, we didn't get
to Skew's number, we didn't.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
Get to offer my benefit.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Thank you, Google Plex.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
We've got so much I don't say no, stop stop
while you're ahead, starting.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
To feel the migraine coming.
Speaker 1 (33:28):
We've got so much stuff to get to in the future.
We hope you enjoyed our recent foray into the spiritualism
movement or Spiritualist movement with Jonathan Strickland aka the Quisters.
So a tepid, irrational thanks to him.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
Yeah, you know, I think I've put my beef with
strict aside for that last appearance.
Speaker 3 (33:53):
You know, he was so, he was so, he's so
pleasant and then made that he'll turn at the end.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
Man, sorry, I have conflicting feelings about that man.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
Let's just say big things. Also to doctor Rachel Big Spinach,
Lance aj Bahamas Jacobs, the puzzler we call them.
Speaker 2 (34:12):
Oh gosh, yes, Chris Frosciotis and he's Jeff cos here
in spirit. Also huge thanks to our buddy Main Gosh
how ticket Door of Kaleidoscope Podcast Network Fame not network,
but you know, a production company that makes some incredible shows.
I think we're going to get to hang with that
guy come a couple of weeks from now, looking forward
to it.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Just the best. And also Noel, thanks to you, man.
Speaker 3 (34:33):
Vou you as well. See you next time, folks.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. Let's hear it for our number
one super producer, Max, the Irrational Williams.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Max runs the Numbers, the Numbers guy and Irrational Williams.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, I have survived.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
I am back.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Yeah, you went on a you went on a bit
of a sojourn, didn't you.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
I did. I did. I went to the uh the uh.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
I guess it's a midwestern state, but I don't really
understand how it's.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Sort of on the cusp. Right, Yeah, Louis, Missouri. It's weird.
It feels sort of weirdly southern in some way. It's
been another way is it feels vaguely midwestern.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
What I was told is Saint Louis is midwestern, Missouri southern.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
So it's interesting. Guys. Oh that's mister Noel Brown.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Hello.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
They call me Ben and Bowling. It is, and.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Well for legal and tax purposes. Uh, but I'm going
to get me start on. I'm not gonna pay this guy.
I'm not gonna I did.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
I took a bath on it, all right, I won't
do it all right, well, like, well there's beending and all.
Speaker 5 (01:36):
Well, don't say it on air, but we we we're
talking about some uh, some fascinating rational things today.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
This is a unsolved murder from Millennia.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Go.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
But while we're talking Missouri, just so everybody knows, uh,
our brother Max was on a vacation and had some
adventures and Max nol I gotta see. I've been to Missouri,
and I love your pronunciation there, Noel. I've been to
Missouri a couple of times, and I was always freaked
(02:16):
out by how far away I was from the ocean.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
It is very in land, landlocked.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Yeah, don't don't eat this, don't don't eat the fish.
Maybe I don't know. It seems like they can get
good fish just about anywhere. We're landlocked here and we're
next to an airport, and we get really nice fresh
fish at our local markets. I wanted to take this
opportunity and talking about the great state of Missouri, h
to shout out a friend of the show, Christy, who
(02:45):
is here visiting in Atlanta right now to see Lady Gaga,
who I went and saw last night, And although our
seats were terrible, it was a fantastic spectacle of a show.
It was like Circa sole A. It was wonderful. I've
got all the song stuck in my head. But Christy
said that calling St. Lewis Saint Louis is like calling
Atlanta Atlanta.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, I just wanted to give her her due and
just put that out into the world.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
It didn't really occur to me that connection.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
The bar brothers from a school of humans. Some folks
we work with have said very much the same, and
I'm so happy to hear that. You guys did make
it to the Lady.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Gaga show for the second time. We thought it was
the previous week, and we went. We got all dulled up,
Me and the kid marched our way down to a
state farm arena and there was not a soul in sight.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
So you know, it was a trial run.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
If anyone gets a chance to see Mother Mayhem, by
all means, please do.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Yeah, and please note the time signatures, because music is math. Ultimately,
music is math plus poetry.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
Son of a bitch.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Pretty good, right, It's pretty good. So we are we are,
by way of irrational segues, we are going to we
are going to explore a story that the Jedi won't
tell you. This is part of our continuing series on
(04:11):
inventors who died in some way due to their own inventions.
This is a special case.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
This is especially boy is it ever? You ask yourself,
how can numbers kill? And I gotta say too. When
I saw the headline of this one, the irrational death
of hippoesis hyposis, I read it as irrational death of
hippopotamus and I was excited because that would have been
(04:41):
a throwback to remember the The Hippos The Wild Hippos
a Pablo Star one of our first episodes.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
I thought the hit The Wild Hippos were finally getting there.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Due Narco Hippos. For Narco's Narco Hippos? Are those hippos?
What narc are those hippos? What belonged to Narco?
Speaker 3 (04:59):
Terror?
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Be a cartoon of entity. I recently rewatched Scarface so
I could learn a little bit more about the drug
trade due to recent news. Thanks for the nod Max
acknowledgment that we are in the worst timeline. One thing
that's really great about a scarface is back in the
(05:23):
day when they used to have to do like edits
for television, that one has some bangers. In terms of
the replacements of the swears, I'm not gonna say what
the original is. This is a family show, but one
of them it turns into from the Bad Thing to
Miami is just a chicken waiting to be plucked.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
So use your imagination. Yeah, jump in here real quick.
Speaker 4 (05:46):
My favorite TV edit of all time it's still from
the Matrix, where Neo's on the side of the building
the very beginning and he was like, oh.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Sukes, Okay, don't know that one.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
But Big Lebowski also has some really quality ones. One
is this is what happened when you leave a stranger
in the Alps as opposed to the Bad Thing.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
It's up there with a so I watch a lot
of foreign films, and it's up there with the weird
translations that attempt to be palatable, where you have someone say, oh,
like the Mandarin would say something like, you know, let's
get it on because we are a family show, and
the translation will be let's spend some time together late
(06:29):
at night.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Now and then make pancakes how and that heck, are
we gonna pivot from Scarface TV at it's back to math.
It was my fault because I said Hipassas, and that
made me think of Hippopotamuss and it's just a whole
horror show. Foh on, But I think I just did it.
We're talking about a Greek.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, yeah, this is the legend of hipposis or hipassis.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Thank you much preferred.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Okay, So before we dive in, folks, it is crucial
to note that we as a crew are not math
surgeons or whatever the term is. But for this story,
we do need to briefly explain or explore the concept
of irrational numbers, which sounds like it sounds paradoxical, does
(07:21):
it not.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
I think about it with the same level of bewilderment
as I do leap year or or Thanksgiving or Easter.
You know, no, I think I'm more confused by irrational
numbers than giving. Easter is a little bit of a
head scratcher. But Thanksgiving, I know, it's a weird date thing,
but I kind of more or less get it. Irrational numbers, it's.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
It isn't a little bit of a heady concept.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
M Yeah, all right. So if we were to put
it simply, and this will be important later, an irrational
number is any real number, quote unquote, A positive or
negative number or zero, but it cannot be written as
a fraction. So for a fanci or definition, we could
(08:11):
say an irrational number can't be expressed as the ratio
of two integers.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
So this would be maybe to simplify a little bit.
For people that just barely past algebra, like myself, you
might think of this as a repeating decimal.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Right, that's great, Yeah, you nailed it. So decimals that.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Just goes on and on and on.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
No, yeah, it's no discernible repeating pattern, right, they continue
being a very famous one. And there are also things
like Euler's number or the Golden ratio.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
And stuff like this too that makes me kind of
look at numbers with a certain mysticism. There's a certain
quality of like being able to explain the unexplainable or
sort of boil down the scrits of the universe to
like numbers. And you start to think of like the
movie Pie and Kabbala and numerology and all that stuff.
(09:06):
When I think of irrational numbers and like a number
that just goes on ad infinitum, that starts to kind
of peauk my interest in that direction.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Oh yeah, Pie is such a great film. It's a
classic buddy comedy. We've got one.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Totally pleasant, a real good, a real rop. It's one
for the kiddo Police Academy, the movie.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Yes, Police Academy, the movie. Square roots are also Some
square roots are also irrational because they're not perfect squares.
So like if you enter the square root of numbers
such as two or thirteen or eighteen into a calculator,
the answer you get, the reply you get will not
(09:48):
be rational. The square root of two is the best
known of these. As you can tell, folks, this is
a whole messy bowl of spaghetti. But no, I think
we can agree this is on a positive note. It
is an exciting reminder that humanity, even now still doesn't
(10:10):
know everything about math.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Well that's what I was getting at. I mean, I
guess you could see why my head would go towards
the whole mysticism and the secrets of the universe and stuff.
And we have something that is meant to be and
on its surface is completely rational and a way of
boiling things down to very understandable you know, integers, formulas, etc.
(10:33):
To have an aspect of that that's unexplainable, it seems
counter to the whole idea of like the tidiness of math.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
You know, yeah, well put and you know in fact, folks,
Noel Max, if we're all cool with this, I would
like to issue an official ridiculous History challenge.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Hmmm. I thought it was going to be a proclamation challenge.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
A challenge and invitation way of the open hands. If
you are listening, fellow ridiculous historian, and you become the
first person to solve pie and prove it to us
and figure out where that decimal ultimately ends, we will
take you, Noel Max and yours truly will take you
(11:18):
on an all expenses paid trip to a Dave and
Busters of your choice.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Preferably you know, one in the the the metro Atlanta area,
preferably what I'm geting, we'll go. We'll go over wherever,
whatever your your DNB of choices.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
We'll meet you there, all expenses Ben, that's a are.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
Are we sure we can get finance to approve this?
Speaker 1 (11:39):
We're kind of doing a ask forgiveness loker thing.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Okay, yeah, I'm also you know what, I'm gonna go
ahead and put my money where my mouth is. If
you can solve this equation, this lish you know historical quandary.
I'll pony up the all expenses myself. Oh, come on
out of my own pocket. I've got your back.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
Thanks buddy, when you.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Have the Yeah, we got to go haves The's on this.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
That way, we won't get you. Guys are definitely going to.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Yeah, Max, I noticed you went mute on that one.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
What is there a three way version of Havesy's Triumvirate Tripsy's.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
No, no, no, We're a family show.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
So for I love the point that you made there
earlier a couple of times. For a lot of us,
the concept of irrational numbers is not simply paradoxical. It
is downright mystical. And according to the legends, we owe
(12:36):
the discovery of irrational numbers to a cult. What's say
we introduce.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Hipposis a numbers cult.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
I love it, Like was that one Jim Carrey movie
with the scary numbers.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Over the room. He's in a room.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
He's in a room, and he's I think he's written
all over his face. Even it's called like the numbers.
I don't know if this is there's a name for this.
Whenever there's a number associated with a title or even
a band, outside of blank one any too, because that's
just you know ingrained into my brain.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
I can never remember the number part.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
You'll often hear me say, it's just it's just this
with some number, I'll never I don't have a brain
for numbers. And that even comes with like remembering addresses
and you know, codes to doors.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
And I love numbers, but I don't understand them.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
No, you know, I love them too. I think they're fascinating,
as did this cult.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
I hope that we make more episodes in the future
because I would hate for our I would hate for
us to be struck by a meteor or a Shaha
drone and then have our last quotations be stuff like
I love numbers, but I don't understand them.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
That was that bient people out on my tombstone. He
loved numbers. Noel around who loved numbers but did not understand.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
So back around let's say five hundred BCEE or so,
we got this guy named Hipposis h I P P
A s U. S. Of Metapontum, which is you know,
it's common for people of that era to be described
as from a place.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
It's a little village right there on the coast of
modern day Greece seems like a lovely place to to vacation.
Some cool historic remnants of you know, Greek column structures
around you can see it was an ancient city of
Magna in Greece.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
And our guy, Hipposis, he is a philosopher. He is
an early follower of an enigmatic character named Pythagoras. Now
we all remember the name Pythagoras for one reason, right.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
The theorem. Yeah, that's the triangle one.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Right, how do you find the high potten news the
Pythagora pat.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
I was high on pot news.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, a square plus B squared equals C squared. Uh,
this was a revolution for the ages. And now it
is an old grade school math question. The thing is,
before we have characters like Plato and Aristotle, we've got
Pythagoras of Samos, And he is the guy who is
(15:29):
running around doing his version of Ted Talks saying math
is the key to the universe.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
He ain't wrong, it's not wrong.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
I was blown away by how early they figured out
all this stuff. I mean, I was stating the obvious,
but like, it's just these are some smart people who
figured out some very very interesting ways of solving some
very very heady questions using this seemingly on the surface,
very logical, formulaic approach. But Pythagoras knew that there was
(16:00):
something deeper, there was something behind the numbers, and he
took that thinking and more or less built it into
a kind of religion.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Okay, so now, Pythagoras, for most of us in twenty
twenty six, Pythagoras is a dusty old name you see
in math textbooks, maybe philosophy books. But to your point,
back in his heyday, his Hauseyon age, this guy was
a cult leader. Essentially, his ideas were so galvanizing, so
(16:38):
electric that people started following him and they created something
called the Pythagorean cult, which he founded and kind of
named after himself in a burst of humility.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
This was.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
A secretive, mystical communal society blended math, philosophy and interesting
religious practices. Like they were strict vegetarians.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Yeah, they believed in the music of the spheres and
in like sacred geometry and all of these sort of
harmonious connections between celestial bodies that they believed could be
explained using a lot of these mathematical concepts, and he
became quite the influencer of the time.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
He had over one thousand followers.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
At the time who helped him establish sort of an
achrom kind of situation, like a commune, and under his
leadership in that commune, a sort of to your point,
been very holistic approach to living, kind of flourished.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
They seemed to have almost like.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
An intentional community kind of set.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
You know, there we go.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
They believed in things like what we would call reincarnation today.
They also had rules that might sound oddly specific, like
you shouldn't eat fava beans. I don't know why with
a nice kiante. Yeah, yeah, nailed it. This thing that
flourishes in modern day southern Italy, this colony that the
(18:21):
Thagoras is leading. They start to become increasingly politically important,
and this makes powerful enemies that ultimately lead to the
ending of this intentional community. That's a story for another day.
For now, it's enough.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I mean, you can see why. It was almost the
behavior of like a heretic in a way. If you're
going against the prevailing pantheon and you're saying it's more
important to worship Math than it is to worship Zeus,
I can see how they can make you some powerful enemies.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Yeah, especially if you pop off at the mouth with
some easy thing like well, I think Zeus is actually
math and Poseidon is another kind of math. People don't
like to hear that well for sure.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
And usually this kind of intense rationalism, I guess you
could call it, even though there certainly was a mystical bent,
tends to fly in the face of like established much more,
you know, rigid religious beliefs that had that worship deities
of some kind, because typically these folks aren't gonna like
put my stock into that kind of thing. I'd bean like,
(19:30):
these these are fantasies, right. It disrupts power structures, that's
the issue. Yeah, And so okay, So it's enough for
us to know now that Pythagoras started occult all about numbers,
saying that reality can be explained through rational numbers and
to your point, through rational thought. Our buddy Hipposis is
(19:53):
an early adopter of these beliefs, and it makes sense
for us even now in twenty twenty six. People have
always endeavored to understand how the world works, and the
claim that the entirety of the universe can be understand
via rational numbers. This concept that everything could somehow make sense. Obviously,
(20:15):
this is hugely appealing, and Pythagoras does end up dying
in modern day Italy starves himself, but his followers carry
on his traditions for several more centuries. About one hundred
years later, the Pythagoreans are maintaining the traditions and they
(20:36):
attract the attention of a young up and comer named Hipposis,
and Hipposis at the beginning is having a great time
for sure.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Up until this time, Pythagoreans. Pythagoreans, Yeah, that works. They
were busy telling folks and spreading the word to the shade.
In any case, that all numbers could be expressed as
the ratio of integers.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Now let's hold on there, Noel, because okay, have you
ever been approached by a cult?
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Absolutely, the Moonies at the airport, Harry Krishna's the same. No,
they're different. I think the Moon's and the Harry Christians
are a little different. And I know it's sometimes offense.
Did throw around the sea word, and certainly we're not
here to denigrate anyone's beliefs, but both of those groups
do exhibit some kind of let's just say, uh, recruitment
type outreach situation. Yeah, and a scientologists. Have you ever
(21:36):
been to LA They'll come at you in the street. Yeah,
they'll try to get you to come in to the
all around Hubbard Museum and take the tour, which you
should do because it's interesting.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
But it is a recruitment tactic.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
One hundred percent. Yeah, like Zendik farms we used to have. Again, Yeah,
they send people out. No, Max, have you been approached
by a cult?
Speaker 4 (21:57):
I remember my freshman orientation or college I got attacked
by some people in frats trying to get them to
joint of frat?
Speaker 3 (22:03):
I mean, same thing. What really makes a frat that
mus different from a cult type? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
It's easier to catch more flies with honey than you
do with attacking people MLM.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
So the reason we're asking this folks, and please share
your cult stories with us is imagine if you are
in an airport or something and person walks up to you.
They're pitch to you is quote reality is all numbers,
It's all math, and you're thinking, well, this guy's kind
of strange, and then they say further, all numbers can
(22:36):
be expressed as the ratio of integers.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
End quote.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
You'd be like, you're the most boring cult leader or
you're the most boring cults representative ever. You're a snooze fest.
Aren't you supposed to tell me something weird about ancient
aliens or twin flames? But no integers you.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
I don't know, man, though, this is interesting what I
was getting, because we're obviously talking about the disruption of
this orderly way of viewing the universe, and I can
see how this numbers thing could have been really attractive
because there is something to it that is like so
understandable and rational in a way of like explaining a
(23:18):
lot of the movement of the stars and the planets
and all that kind of thing that sort of is
an interesting, easier to wrap your head around alternative some
of the more like you know, traditional Greek religious belief system.
But when you start throwing in this whole idea of like, well,
what if the numbers aren't as easy to understand? What
(23:40):
if there's something else to me? That is where the
mystical part comes in. I just wonder how disruptive this
must have been.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Yeah, along comes are pal Hyposis. From what we know,
he's an ordinary rank and file cult member, At first
they're saying yay number, and he says, yay numbers, and
they say be vegetarian, and he says, yay vegetarian, and
they say beat me here, Max fava beans, and he says, cool.
(24:11):
I'm still on board. But at some point, according to
the legend, he was trying to inscribe a dodecahedron inside
a sphere or best shape, the best shape, it's one
of the best dice out there. Or he was trying
to explain the ratio of lengths in a pentagram one
(24:32):
of the symbols, another sarians another six shape for sure.
And the story goes that while he was trying to
figure this out, he realized some of the lengths that
he was calculating could not be expressed as fractions. Therefore,
he provides the first proof of the existence of irrational numbers,
(24:57):
and he feels like he has to go public, he
has to blow the whistle on this rational number cult.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
Well and writes, and he was on board with it.
I mean, he was a follower of Pythagoras, so this
had to have been mind blowing, galaxy brain type stuff
for him as well. And to what I was sort
of speculating earlier. It's absolutely true. This flew in the
face of everything that these folks believed in and was
completely disruptive to their worldview. And I'm sorry if I'm
(25:26):
harping on this a little bit, but do you do
you kind of see where I'm coming from with like
how I how it feels like the mystery part of
numbers is more interesting and more a sign of the
mystical aspects of it than it being perfect, and like
you know, absolutely zero room for error, and like just no,
(25:48):
it's these these whole numbers. But I can understand how
it also at the time would have been really, really
difficult to reconcile the two.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
This flies in the face of everything the cult believes,
their entire worldview. The legend gets a little murky because
some people around the time, or within a few centuries
after the fact, they would tell you the Pythagoreans took
offence at this discovery of irrational numbers, and in other tales,
(26:27):
Hipposis made his results public and he got in trouble
not for discovering irrational numbers, but for blowing the whistle
about the sect's secret practices.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
Okay, there's a little more to numbers than initially met
the eye. He's kind of doxing these folks and exposing
some potentially problematic behavior.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, maybe so.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
History remembers him as snitching about irrational numbers. But maybe
he also so snitched about fava beans and they were like,
hey man, they'll talk about the beans. That's between us.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
And maybe even this if this means an extra google
or something like what did he do?
Speaker 5 (27:11):
What?
Speaker 2 (27:12):
We don't really have too much information on what he exposed. Essentially,
the legend goes that he exposed the existence of things
like the golden ratio or pie. He found that there
are some numbers that do not jibe with the worldview
of the Pythagorea and cult. Got it, but didn't He
(27:33):
also kind of expose some of their practices of, you know,
somewhat heretical behavior like offending gods and all of these
various acts of defiance that maybe they were doing behind
closed doors.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
That's part of it. Yeah, that's one of the other allegations.
We do know that the official story, again still legends
at this point time. The official story is that he
drowned somehow in the sea shortly after announcing he discovered
irrational numbers, and some scholars would later claim that he
(28:13):
was murdered by fellow cult members. Definite possibility. The juicier
version of the legend is that his discovery did not
just offend mortals, it offended the gods as well as Yes,
his death at sea is a divine punishment because he
looked too deeply behind.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
The curtain of reality.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Okay, death at sea, Yeah, what are we talking here?
Kind of just a voyage that went awry of Robert
Maxwell's situation. Perhaps that's the thing. Like so many ancient tales,
this one probably got embellished over time or it was
made up entirely. We know that a lot of modern
(29:01):
authors will say that hipposis did at least independently discover
irrational numbers, but there's not really any direct evidence to
support that. There's just a bunch of campfire stories in
the game of Telephone.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
For sure.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
And can I also just say there is one version
of the legend. Man, I found a cool piece on
Scientific American how Secret Society discovered irrational numbers, And it's
the image that they pulled. It's just like it looks
like a bunch of ring raths, Like it's just these
shadowy figures, robed figures with no faces. It is absolutely terrifying.
But one version of this legend is that it was
(29:40):
the cult members that turned on him and drowned him
to death at Seed.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
This was a hit.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Yeah, this is the thing. There's a third possibility about
his death. This is again a true crime story that
remains unsolved millennia later. What if he did discover ra numbers,
ruffled the wrong feathers and as fellow cultists got mad
enough to kill him. And what if later they claimed
(30:09):
he was drowned by the gods to throw authorities off
the trail, Right, because.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Right, the divine punishment for his for his own heresy. Yeah,
and I don't keep using that word, but I think
it's appropriate. It's it's perfect after all? Then, is now
the gods are beyond mortal jurisdiction. We also have to remember,
just to be fair, not to be fun police about
this story, but the world was full of different civilizations,
(30:40):
and they all had their own math wizards at the time.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
Right, they had other people who probably understood something like
irrational numbers. I don't know. No, I think it's fair
to say that hipposis may have independently discovered irrational numbers,
but it was probably not the first guy to ever
think of that.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
Certainly not tons of parallel thinking involved these kinds of
discoveries you know, throughout history. But since we are talking
about legend here, there's another version that says, and this
is specifically referenced in the Scientific American piece that I
was talking about, that there's a world or of a
version of events where none of.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
This stuff is true.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
That the Pythagoreans actually thought it was awesome that he
discovered this stuff, and that them, being such math geeks,
would have been super impressed and hailed it as a
as an achievement, and that would have made Pythagorasts himself
proud as opposed to rolling in his grave. But the
story of the spooky math cult, I think, is a
(31:49):
little sexier. Yeah, yeah, it's a lot sexier. It's rational.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
Dare we say to enjoy the juiciest version of a
But we know one thing for sure. Irrational numbers exist.
They some of them have yet to be quote unquote solved.
If that term even applies, and hipposis is definitely dead,
(32:17):
is he dead due to his own discovery or is
this a campfire tale that people told over and over
again for thousands of years. We leave the question to you, folks.
Thank you, as always so much for tuning in. We
we hope we did right, fellow ridiculous historians, especially.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
If you know more about math than we do.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
And we've got to thank our super producer, mister Max Williams. Max,
how do we do?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
Oh, Max, the math man Williams. There we go. I
will say, you did just fine, just fine, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
No. I know this is a shorter one, but you
know it is a little math heavy, and there's certainly
some stuff that we could have included, like the specific
formulas surrounding his discovery of irrational numbers.
Speaker 3 (33:06):
But it would have just made my it would have
done my head in.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
So thank you so much for maintaining my mental health
by allowing us.
Speaker 3 (33:12):
To gloss over some of that stuff.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
Ben, we didn't get to Graham's number, we didn't get
to Skew's number, we didn't.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
Get to offer my benefit.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Thank you, Google Plex.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
We've got so much I don't say no, stop stop
while you're ahead, starting.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
To feel the migraine coming.
Speaker 1 (33:28):
We've got so much stuff to get to in the future.
We hope you enjoyed our recent foray into the spiritualism
movement or Spiritualist movement with Jonathan Strickland aka the Quisters.
So a tepid, irrational thanks to him.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
Yeah, you know, I think I've put my beef with
strict aside for that last appearance.
Speaker 3 (33:53):
You know, he was so, he was so, he's so
pleasant and then made that he'll turn at the end.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
Man, sorry, I have conflicting feelings about that man.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
Let's just say big things. Also to doctor Rachel Big Spinach,
Lance aj Bahamas Jacobs, the puzzler we call them.
Speaker 2 (34:12):
Oh gosh, yes, Chris Frosciotis and he's Jeff cos here
in spirit. Also huge thanks to our buddy Main Gosh
how ticket Door of Kaleidoscope Podcast Network Fame not network,
but you know, a production company that makes some incredible shows.
I think we're going to get to hang with that
guy come a couple of weeks from now, looking forward
to it.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Just the best. And also Noel, thanks to you, man.
Speaker 3 (34:33):
Vou you as well. See you next time, folks.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Girlfriends: Trust Me Babe
When a group of women from all over the country realise they all dated the same prolific romance scammer they vow to bring him to justice. In this brand new season of global number 1 hit podcast, The Girlfriends, Anna Sinfield meets a group of funny, feisty, determined women who all had the misfortune of dating a mysterious man named Derek Alldred. Trust Me Babe is a story about the protective forces of gossip, gut instinct, and trusting your besties and the group of women who took matters into their own hands to take down a fraudster when no one else would listen. If you’re affected by any of the themes in this show, our charity partners NO MORE have available resources at https://www.nomore.org. To learn more about romance scams, and to access specialised support, visit https://fightcybercrime.org/ The Girlfriends: Trust Me Babe is produced by Novel for iHeartPodcasts. For more from Novel, visit https://novel.audio/. You can listen to new episodes of The Girlfriends: Trust Me Babe completely ad-free and 1 week early with an iHeart True Crime+ subscription, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Open your Apple Podcasts app, search for “iHeart True Crime+, and subscribe today!