Cornrow as Fractals.

Alex

Ron Eglash used cornrow hairstyle to teach fractals in a math class:

Our first design tool was developed for the "African Fractals" project (Eglash 1999). Mathematics teachers with large African American student populations reported that they could not use fractals -- there was too much pressure to conform to the standard curriculum -- and that they felt that many of the examples were too culturally distant from the students. They all felt that the examples of hairstyles would work well however. Thus our first tool focused on the hairstyles, and used the term "iterative transformational geometry" rather than "fractals." The graphic above shows the result, called "Cornrow Curves."

http://diac.cpsr.org/cgi-bin/diac02/pattern.cgi/public?pattern_id=494 (via Boing Boing)


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It is news to me that the Romans used forks for eating. As far as I know (along with a small bit of Internet research) forks were only used by the Romans for carving and had two blades.

Since this is what it is, perhaps it has the wrong date and/or cultural attribution.
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I'm fairly certain the fork wasn't introduced until around the 1600's. And it took a long time to be accepted as a tool for eating. The church was vehemently opposed to its use claiming that God already provided us with the best tools for eating (our hands) and to imply that a fork was an improvement was akin to blasphemy.
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Hmm, ok, according to Wiki, forks are referenced in the old Testament, were used by the ancient Greeks AND that the Romans used them. Furthermore that there were many examples of Roman forks to be found. A casual search yielded a Roman fork that was awfully small if it was just for serving. So unless there is a rather widespread conspiracy sponsored by the Pro-Forks-For-Romans-League, I think a travel fork might be something a Roman might actually have.
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'The photos give enough detail for a skilled craftsman/smith to make one. Apply at your nearest Reenactor cutlery supplier'

They're ahead of us:

http://www.armillum.com/product.php?id_product=289
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@Johnny Cat

Might be difficult considering they didn't have corn. I suppose it could be made a flatbread, and allow you to get a nice mouthful of delicious garum. Mmm, fermented fish pasty goodness!
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