We found reality's programming language. Physics is the operating system, but it's written in equations. E=mc^2 defines large parts of reality in fewer bytes than it takes to say "my penis" and has similar effects on local spacetime, ladies (~ 90 percent, + gentlemen ~ 10 percent). But that's physics. There are pure mathematical equations which are just as capable of blowing your mind.

Calculating pi has become the computer scientist equivalent of tuning muscle cars: we don't actually need more digits for anything useful, because the basics do everything we actually need it for, but we've spent years stacking up air-cooled hardware just because. In 1985 it was calculated to 17 million digits. Srinivasa Ramanujan found the formula used. Around 1910.

It wasn't the only such formula, but was incredibly useful because it converged exponentially compared to other algorithms, making it ideal for computers. Interesting note: at the time there was no such thing as computers. Srinivasa Ramanujan had pre-empted processors by decades. In 1985 his formula was used in the world record calculation of pi to 17 million digits, and a slight variant modified by David and Gregory Chudnovsky now holds the title at 10 trillion. We're not saying he's a robot, but if a perfect calculating machine ever goes missing in a time travel experiment we already know where it ended up.

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It turns out that rogue Terminators like sharp suits and counting forever.

The solution is as brilliant as it sounds stupid. You deal with the impossible by sneaking up on it. It's nice to know calculus solves problems the same way SEAL teams do it: sneakily and permanently.

Taking the limit as X goes to zero means that you never actually get there, but you get as close as you need to be, no matter how close that is. Then the "limit" as you tend toward zero -- but never actually reach it -- gives you the answer. As X gets small, sin X is approximately equal to X, so you're always dividing something by itself and getting one. Then, with a particularly cunning flourish, you end up dividing nothingness by itself and becoming one. Which I think means mathematics is the king of zen.

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His decades of calm are going to be wasted when he finds out mathematicians worked it out with a pencil.

There's a fairly easy proof using the squeeze theorem. Which doubles as a good line when you want to chat up a mathematician.

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"... and you'll be with me because I give quite excellent dick, QED."

These limits as you hit zero, which is a much less depressing sentence in mathematics, are essential for calculus. And calculus is essential for everything. If math is the programming language of reality, calculus is the graphics processor working out things like explosions, lasers, and gravity, all the cool special effects. Or as we call them in physics, effects.

You want the the 10-trillion-and-33rd digit of pi? No problem. There's a fundamental constant of reality and now, without any input apart from being in the same reality, this equation can read out any part of it. That's like pulling rabbits out of a hat where the rabbits are Star Trek energy beings and your hat is a beret.

The process of using the formula sounds like someone found a glitch in god's computer. If you want the Nth term, you split the infinite sum at the Nth term, and a bit of modulo math skims out the required digit in hexadecimal. That sounds like something you'd read on Mr Mxyzptlk's GameFAQ. Reality, mathematics, and the design of 8-bit computers lining up to accidentally output one of the universe's BIOS settings. The craziest part? It's still slower than Ramanujan for finding the whole thing. It really is just a cheat code for reality.

In places where X and Y satisfy the inequality you get black, where it doesn't it's white, and this Manichean math outputs itself. It's the Facebook formula, the mathematical equivalent of social media: You were expecting an intelligent answer, but it just refers to itself. In fact, it's the mathematical equivalent of infinite monkeys, as it eventually produces every possible 106 x 17 pixel image as you scroll through higher and higher numbers.

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Though most monkey math is applied to fecal ballistics

The formula is just one of many bitmap decoding functions. Any image can be represented as numbers.

Strangely, Brockway's images are always triplets of sixes.

The number for the formula is 543 digits long, so you can expect another hellayottahellayottahellayottayotta-scale number for similar pictures. Making this the smartest, longest, and biggest dick joke we've ever shown:

Quite Excellent Dick.

The imaginary unit is "i." When real numbers couldn't find the root of negative things, we found imaginary ones which could help us solve our problems. That's the calculation equivalent of a Disney movie. And if it sounds impossible, stop using electronics, AC power, and atoms, because imaginary numbers are essential for understanding all of them.

If pi is the keycode for space, Euler's constant "e" is the number of mathematics itself. The rate of change of e^x is e^x, making 2.71828 a perfect point in differentiation and integration, which are everything. Connecting calculus to numerals feels like connecting poetry to prehistoric pond water, but that's pretty much what happened: Something beginning with one trying to plus one to become two eventually led to everything we've ever known. The e is used to calculate so many things you'd swear it was Star Trek-nobabble. It's used in phasor notation, probability theory, calculus, compound interest, and more. It's so powerfully nerdy Google pledged to raise e billion dollars in their IPO.

So you've got the imaginary, oneness, nothingness and two irrational transcendental numbers. It could only be a better calculation of the meaning of life if it equaled 42. And it gets even smarter from there. e to the power of a complex number projects you into the complex plane. Which sounds like something you do to Superman villains when the writer thinks, "Damn, Superman doesn't kill anyone, but we really need to get rid of this guy."

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Regular guns? Evil. Eternal banishment to a limbo dimension with inevitable mental breakdown, insanity, and escape to murder countless innocents? No problem

Two dimensional pictures have horizontal and vertical. The complex plane does the same thing with uses realistic and imaginary. Every real number you've ever seen is just a line, an antiquated slide-rule for counting, while complex numbers are the full page where math draws pictures of pure intellect. e^ix draws a circle around the zero point on this complex plane. It's a more incredible imaginary landscape than Dali's.

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A curve hasn't been imagined by so many nerds since rumors of the Tomb Raider nude code

2pi takes you around a complete circle, so e^i pi is halfway round the circle at minus one. The formula combines transcendental truths with oneness to reveal nothing. Math is how humanity understands the former instead of the latter.

Continue expanding your mind with 5 Reasons Homophobia Is Unmanly , or chill your brain out with the opposite of intelligence inThe 5 Worst Video Game Reviews Ever.

For more incredibly applications of intellect, behold 6 Badass Spacecraft Landings Humanity Totally Nailed and 9 Badass Lasers That Prove The Death Star Isn't Far Off.

Luke also describes Whiskey Output, The Irish Jaeger Which Wasn't In Pacific Rim, tumbles, and responds to every single tweet.