SPUG: laughing Re: Primes

[Fred Morris]

I'm laughing alright. Yes, looks like you've got yer implementation of the 
Sieve there below. Or for an official definition:

  http://www.nist.gov/dads/HTML/sieve.html

On Saturday 06 October 2007 10:50, Doug Treder wrote:
> Maybe this was unintentional, but I found it hilarious.

The joke is, like Einstein purportedly said of radio (comparing it to 
telegraph): "you pull its tail in New York and it meows in Los Angeles, 
except that there is no cat!"

So back to the topic at hand: 

> For those not in on the joke, this algorithm is (or is very similar to) 
> the Sieve of Erastothenes, and is widely known as the earliest known 
> algorithm of any kind (not just for finding prime numbers).

Should say "...this algorithm is not (but I want to claim it is similar to) 
the Sieve of Eratosthenes, which is widely known as the earliest known 
algorithm of any kind (not just for finding prime numbers)." and I'll leave 
it to Babylonian, Egyptian and biblical scholars to demolish the rest of the 
hyperbole.

--

Fred Morris