Let me preface this blog by reminding all of you that I was an English major and teacher NOT a math major and teacher, so if you want to know the deeper math behind this blog, then feel free to look it up. I will attempt to give you the basics, but even that might not be pretty.
On our trip to the Tennessee, we took a side trip up into Kentucky to visit both the Creation Museum and the Ark Encounter. Both were fantastic, but one of our “lectures” at the Creation Museum was extremely fascinating. It was on the Italian mathematician Fibonacci’s sequence and the Golden Ratio, both of which I had heard about but only slightly understood.
The Fibonacci sequence is a sequence where the the next number is the sum of the two preceding it. “The Fibonacci sequence is significant because of the so-called golden ratio of 1.618, or its inverse 0.618” (Fibonacci numbers). This ratio of 1 to 1.618 can be found together everywhere in nature, in art, in architecture––everywhere, and it is why these objects that have it are considered beautiful.
After a brief but “over my head” explanation of the ratio, we saw this phenomenon displayed in petals—the distance between the first and second petal, then the second and third, etc. and spirals. Then again on the human body: The ration length of a person’s pinky finger is one, and then from the bottom of the pinky to the wrist is 1.618. From the nose to the chin is one, and from the chin to the top of the head is 1.618. From the belly button to the crown of the head is one, and from the belly button to the sole of the foot is 1.618. This was demonstrated over and over again, with different sizes and genders and ages of people in the group.
Then we went to the Mona Lisa and the Taj Mahal, to photographs where the main object is offset just enough to create that golden ratio.
Finally, he played the video I have attached below to show how those same Fibonacci numbers, which produced this golden ratio, also creates beautiful music.
The takeaway? Our God is a god of precision and order, who created mathematics and angles and ratios, which in turn, produce the beauty within us and around us.
I really haven’t done the subject justice and perhaps have been a bit inaccurate in my explanation, but I would encourage you to dig a bit deeper so that you can appreciate even more the awesome precision of our amazing God.
On our trip to the Tennessee, we took a side trip up into Kentucky to visit both the Creation Museum and the Ark Encounter. Both were fantastic, but one of our “lectures” at the Creation Museum was extremely fascinating. It was on the Italian mathematician Fibonacci’s sequence and the Golden Ratio, both of which I had heard about but only slightly understood.
The Fibonacci sequence is a sequence where the the next number is the sum of the two preceding it. “The Fibonacci sequence is significant because of the so-called golden ratio of 1.618, or its inverse 0.618” (Fibonacci numbers). This ratio of 1 to 1.618 can be found together everywhere in nature, in art, in architecture––everywhere, and it is why these objects that have it are considered beautiful.
After a brief but “over my head” explanation of the ratio, we saw this phenomenon displayed in petals—the distance between the first and second petal, then the second and third, etc. and spirals. Then again on the human body: The ration length of a person’s pinky finger is one, and then from the bottom of the pinky to the wrist is 1.618. From the nose to the chin is one, and from the chin to the top of the head is 1.618. From the belly button to the crown of the head is one, and from the belly button to the sole of the foot is 1.618. This was demonstrated over and over again, with different sizes and genders and ages of people in the group.
Then we went to the Mona Lisa and the Taj Mahal, to photographs where the main object is offset just enough to create that golden ratio.
Finally, he played the video I have attached below to show how those same Fibonacci numbers, which produced this golden ratio, also creates beautiful music.
The takeaway? Our God is a god of precision and order, who created mathematics and angles and ratios, which in turn, produce the beauty within us and around us.
I really haven’t done the subject justice and perhaps have been a bit inaccurate in my explanation, but I would encourage you to dig a bit deeper so that you can appreciate even more the awesome precision of our amazing God.
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