Math Forum / Mathematics / Recreational Math / May 2004

I need help solving this problem:
Find an ellipse having having a horizontal major axis given only a
center point and a point on the ellipse.
Whole problem:

Okay, this isn't really a puzzle, but it is puzzling. What follows is a
great example of human nature, which is bizarre enough but even more so
when mathematics kicks in!
The recreation ... to auction off a $5 bill.

On a standard clock face, the minute hand crosses the hour hand a
certain number of times between the hours of 12:01 a.m. and 12:00 p.m.
Question 1: How many times?
Question 2: What are the exact times when the minute hand crosses the

A simple cartesian equation:
x^n + y^n = r^n
where n approaches infinity (and is even).
The higher n becomes, the more square its graph will be.  The square

there's  a puzzle but i would like to have the answer.
it goes like this.
* * *  line a
* * *  line b

Can anyone help please?
Using the information given in the paragraphs given below could anybody work
out the following problem for me explaining the methods used please.
Question: if a smoke detector remains in use for 10 years what percentage of

My 3rd grader has challenged me to finish her math homework before she
does, and there's one problem I just can't figure out!!!
Here it is:
Broken CDs

a *     *    *     *      *      *      *      *     *    *      *b
  *                                                                       *
  *                                                                       *
  *                                                          ...

From: Proginoskes (proginoskes@email.msn.com)
Subject: Re: calculating roots
View this article only
Newsgroups: alt.math.recreational, alt.math, sci.math

please excuse any apparent fumbling around this subject - i'm reading up on
stats and i could do with some help clarifying a few things.
i'm looking at the nonparametric mann-whitney statistic and the chi-squared
significance test.

I wrote a program (in C++) to express an arbitrary fraction as a rational
expression that best approximates its value.  It finds the most accurate
denominator using an accessory function that takes two parameters:
1 - a "double" containing the fraction to represent (eg 0.123456789)

three infinite colums of bins
column a bins have 6 marbles
column b bins have 9 marbles
column c bins have 20 marbles

There are these nice questions: Given that and that,
construct a triangle from that.
Some of these questions are very easy to answer, as for
example: given distances |AB|, |BC| and |CA|, construct

Let S be a point inside a circle with center M.
Find peripheral points B and C with line BC
perpendicular to SM such that the area of triangle
SBC is a maximum.

Here is a simple question:
What should be the dimensions of a rectangle that can be inscribed in
an ellipse whose equation is x^2/a^2 + y^2/b^2 ?
Many thanks for the help