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Ok, my first blog post.. I am reluctantly posting this in fear of starting a chain of events that will blow up the universe!… What they hell am I on about? Well let me summarise

Today, Wednesday 30th January 2008, all of us Lamp staffers had a meeting and it was suggested we start a “water cooler” blog for us to post up random interesting LAMP related experiences we have in our lives… Well as it turns out, the time is now just after 9pm the same evening and I can’t wait to post this…

*** WARNING!!!! ***
Please don’t blame me, however, when the universe eventually explodes because of this post and destroys you and the nice cool beer you were about to enjoy in front of the now non existent computer and LAMP blog you were reading…

Anyway here we go…

I am having dinner at home with the in-laws tonight, my father-in-law is a soon to retire High School Maths teacher and today was his first day with the new 2008 Year 7 students. The conversation, as it always does, quickly turns to maths and he was telling us what he introduced into the classroom today… The Fibonacci sequence.

As a refresher, here is the link to the Wikipedia entry about it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number

Leonardo of Pisa (Fibonacci) posed this question:

“How many pairs of rabbits will be produced in a year, beginning with a single pair, if in every month each pair bears a new pair which becomes productive from the second month on?”

The first time you read the problem, it sounds a little intimidating. However, through reasoning the problem can be worked out. In the first month, there is one pair of rabbits. In the second month, there is still only one pair of rabbits, which reach maturity. In the third month, there are two pairs of rabbits. In the fourth month, there are five pairs. This creates a sequence: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21… In more mathematical terms, the sequence is:

Numn = Numn-1 + Numn-2

That means that the sequence is a recursively enumerable set; it is generated from a pair of axioms based on repeated rules of inference. To put that in simpler terms, each successive term is the sum of the two preceding terms–1+1=2, 2+1=3, 3+2=5…Basically, it’s a mathematical snowball. All sequences like this are called Lucas Sequences.

OK, got that?… Well here is where it blows up the universe…

I am having the Fibonacci (above) sequence explained to me over dinner and I decide afterwards to read my LAMP email… Gary Hayes has sent an email, introducing us to this new “Water Cooler” blog.. The following excerpt from that email, starts the chain of events that will eventually blow up the universe:

“Your Challenge, should you accept it - To post before Friday two cool things - short single paras, picture nice, opinion even better… “

hmmm….

Well, the following LAMP Staffers that have to do this.. Myself, Gary, Rachael, Catherine & Peter…

We are the initial Fibonacci rabbits… What you are currently reading is my first post.. Friday (2 days from now) I will have my second (doubled).. Fibonacci sequence starting…oooooohhhhhh

So by the end of this week (Friday) we would have gone from 0 posts to 10 … 5 people posting 2 water cooler blogs every 2 days, then 2 days later 10 posts.. get it?

So as this keeps doubling, we should pretty much use up all the technology available to LAMP, then the earth, solar system, galaxy etc until there is no energy left and the Universe will have no choice, but to explode in a massive suicidal rage, wiping us all out…

So, once more, I apologise for posting on this blog… Get that beer now… you don’t have long….