Folding Paper in Half Twelve Times
On Mythbusters tonight, they covered an interesting myth: that it is impossible to fold a piece of paper in half more than seven times. My strange brain full of trivia made me exclaim “That myth was already busted, and by a high school student!” Indeed, a few minutes with a search engine revealed the story:
Folding Paper in Half Twelve Times
Note: Britney Gallivan not only busted the myth, but also derived a mathematical model that tells you why it is so hard to fold paper, and establishing limits on the process. That is how she was able to fold a long strip of paper a remarkable 12 times. The Mythbusters glossed over this nice bit of math, which in my mind really deserves more notice.
The Mythbusters did try folding a rectangular piece in alternating directions, beginning with a piece that basically covered the floor of the huge hangars in Moffett Field. They managed a respectable, but not record breaking 11 folds. Nice.
[tags]Mathematics,Mythbusters,Paper folding[/tags]