Indiana Almost Made pi = 3.2

That post links to this one, in which Scott Aaronson describes how to recognize mathematical crankery:

https://web.archive.org/web/20150506055228/http://www.timecu...

That in turn links to Sean Carroll's guide for how not to be dismissed as a scientiic crank:

https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2007/06/19/the-alt...

I was expecting at least one of those to mention the line "that's what they want you to think", but it does not. I guess I'm exposed to a lot of economic and political science crankery. I'd enjoy similar compendia of pitfalls of that kind of crank.

TFA spells my Alma Mater's name wrong; it's "Purdue" not "Perdue"

This is an instance of being just plain wrong, but imagine what it means for actual important things, or things with adversarial “experts.” If they can’t be trusted to evaluate whether pi is 3.2, why would they do better with climate change or links between smoking and cancer?

This is not that different from the "serious" discussion now about NFTs, and other crypto stuff. We've got something that's objectively nonsense but people don't want to look stupid so they pretend they understand and participate in it. There was a thing recently about KPMG buying an NFT. NFTs were being sold at Sotheby's or Christie's (until whatever tech bros ran the NFT pulled out to troll them), etc. Its all BS, but for laypeople, it's just a different brand of magic they don't understand. No different with this Pi thing (except eventually they were smart enough not to go through with it)

In 1897.

"So in 1897 he approached the Indiana state legislature with a proposal: if they officially declared the proof correct, he’d let them use it free of charge, thereby saving a lot of money on royalties."

The Underwood Dudley article on “trisectors” linked in OP’s article is one of the more delightful things I’ve read in awhile. Being acquainted with a few cranks myself, I always find the energy and time they have to devote to crankery both impressive and sad.

But why not 3.1?