The best satire is virtually indistinguishable from real life:
DOVER, Pennsylvania - The Dover school board has raised eyebrows and ire across Pennsylvania and the country after requiring math teachers to offer 3 as an acceptable value of Pi. Pi is the name given to the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter, commonly accepted to be 3.141592, though the actual number is believed to go on endlessly, without repeating.
"That's all well and good," said Maureen Callister, Dover school board member, "But what about God? Doesn't he have a say?" Callister cited the Bible, First Kings chapter 7, verse 23, where it says, "He [King Solomon] proceeded to make the molten sea ten cubits from its brim to its other brim, [...] and it took a line of thirty cubits to circle all around it." "If 3 is a good enough 'pi' for the Almighty, then it ought to be good enough for us," stated Callister.
"Listen, I go to church on Sundays, I tithe, I don't need this," said Timothy Ernesto, a 10th grade math teacher in the district, "I need to get these kids ready for the rest of their lives, the SAT's, the ACT, the whole alphabet soup of testing they'll face before college. On top of all that, I have to teach an 'alternate reality' flavor of mathematics? I'm going to need my summer off!"
Posted by kswygert at December 3, 2004 12:15 PM