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Kanithakalam KANITHAKALAM The Joy of Math

Mathematics, taken apart carefully.

A hard idea usually has a simple shape underneath it. These are problems worth sitting with — written so that a school student can follow every step, and an engineer can enjoy watching a complicated thing turn out to be intuitive.

Foundations Nothing but curiosity and a pencil

Geometry Shape, distance, arguments you can see

Probability Where randomness hides a simple answer

Linear Algebra Vectors, transformations, moving grids

Information Theory Entropy and the limits of what can be said

Wireless Communication Getting a message through noise

Latest

Finding π on a Hardwood Floor

Buffon’s needle explained from scratch: why a needle dropped on a plank floor crosses a crack with probability 2/π, solved two ways with geometric probability, plus how to estimate π by tossing needles.

Oct 4, 2026
10 min

The Math Problem That Broke “Random”

Bertrand’s paradox: draw a random chord in a circle. Is it longer than a side of the inscribed triangle? Depending on what ‘random’ means, the answer is 1/3, 1/2 or 1/4.

Sep 23, 2026
6 min

The Geometry of a Missed Connection

Two friends arrive at random within an hour and wait 15 minutes each. What are the odds they meet? Map time to a square and the answer is the area of two triangles.

Sep 16, 2026
5 min

Break the Longer Piece. Does That Help?

A small change to the broken stick problem quietly breaks the method that solved it — and a logarithm turns up where no logarithm should be.

Sep 6, 2026
7 min
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Kanithakalam is a place to come together — not just to learn mathematics, but to enjoy it.