From Chief to Ball

That's all in the past. Shi Quan looks at everything he wrote back then with a more mature gaze than before. Although there are some green memories, he can clearly see all kinds of things that he didn't understand back then. .If it weren't for the fact that there were so many seemingly useless or even redundant officials raised in various aspects back then, I'm afraid things would not be so easy later. Who will take care of them?

Look at those years with Shi Quan's eyes at that time, which is the experience of the most ordinary farmers.Planting, corvee service, harvesting, food payment, transportation with the army, popularization of new tools, whether the children of Chinese and newcomers count as Chinese.But looking at it with the eyes of this time, it is from the very beginning that they are preparing for war, even preparing for victory.If you lose, why do you need so many officials to eat?Where are there so many people to manage?

On this not-so-heavy scroll of scrawled paper, many names that appeared have disappeared.Some of them died, and some of them followed Shi Quan from farm official to farm official and then again, and it was hard to see them again.

For example, the one who was whipped for being lazy at the beginning, when Shi Quan looked at it again, he couldn't remember the appearance of the other party, and he didn't even know what the other party's surname is now.

Another example is Li Da, the person who Shi Quan tried to mobilize to Xia Dong to be Li Si, this will not be forgotten, because he has three younger brothers, two of whom are common people today, but as the eldest brother Li Da was hard to see after the ink on the roll of paper disappeared.

At this time, seeing these long-standing names again, it is inevitable to feel a little embarrassed. Looking at the names that were familiar when he was a farmer but are not familiar now, Shi Quan shook his head with a smile, closed the roll of paper, and put it in the in the wooden box.

Chapter 125 Those People, Those Years ([-])

Shi Quan lamented that the gap between the stage and status gradually increased, so that when those once familiar names finally became people of two worlds with him, Li Dazheng, whose name appeared on his paper, was experiencing the final farewell of his relatives , but I can no longer see it.

In his whole life, he only took care of at most fifty households, and he was just an ordinary farmer.But when he died, because of his younger brother, many people came to see him off. Originally, even his mother died early, and now he has many relatives, including the child brought by the woman when he married him, who was also named Li.

I have been happy, such as knowing that my younger brother has made great achievements, such as living in the first brick house in the village, such as the birth of the first child that I clearly knew belonged to me...

Sadness, such as the destruction of the fields in the flood that year, such as the fact that the youngest daughter got sick and died before she grew up, such as being too old to catch up with the last batch of opportunities to make meritorious deeds...

When all this is over, it is also a relief to peacefully age and die-since his teeth started to loosen and fall out a few years ago, eating has become a pain, drinking rice porridge for many years, and sacrifices There are at least chicken and fish in the product.

The funeral rules have been established many years ago, and now no one dares to disobey them, and it has gradually become a habit and a matter of course.

After the grief, the immediate family gathers in the house.A middle-aged man was holding the child of his sister-in-law's surname Li. After the child timidly called "Fourth Grandpa", a strange smile appeared on his face.

The weird smile doesn't come from the heart, he has a scar on his face, so the corner of his mouth always looks scary, and one eye is always blinking like a star without stopping.

After the child got familiar with it, he was no longer afraid, and asked courageously, "Fourth Grandpa, why do you always blink your eyes? You always shed tears, and I stopped crying. Also, why is the corner of your mouth so long?" What about the scar?"

The middle-aged man laughed and said, "I have to ask your third grandfather. He was the smelter who made cannons and muskets. The ones he made were not strong, and the muskets exploded. This scar was left at that time. Left behind the problem of always blinking."

A man with a black face and thick arms beside him also said helplessly: "At that time, it always exploded. It would be good if the cannon didn't explode. Once when drilling the ignition door of the cannon, it was drilled a little to the front instead of the back. As a result, it exploded during the test of the cannon, and it all came out after a little bit of testing..."

When the two brothers talked about those years, they thought of those years, so they looked at the second brother together and asked: "Second brother, before the war in those years, I was selected to be a cannon, and the third brother was smelting, but you kings What are your direct disciples doing?"

Li Heyi spread his hands and said: "What are you doing? In 37, my classmates finally completed the assessment. The king taught us how to use paper and pen to calculate the root, and threw us a lot of numbers for us to calculate. He was doing other things in the smelter. of."

"In the summer of 38, I figured it out. Hundreds of thousands of dollars could be issued with pen and paper. After a whole year of calculation, we started arguing about one thing. After four years of arguing, the quarrel was finally over before the fight broke out. "

Li Silang wondered: "At that time, the whole Xia Kingdom was busy preparing for the war. You have been arguing for five or six years? What are you arguing about?"

Li Heyi thought for a while, and explained in words that his two younger brothers most likely understood: "We have been arguing for four years, and it's just about one thing. One circle, should it be divided into 250 six shares? Or divided into 360 shares."

"is that useful?"

"Nonsense, do you think that the scales on the half-circle boards you hold in your hands are drawn casually? When you are fighting, you measure the distance, and then look at the bronze medal at the end of the cannon. It says how far away is it?" Just adjust the muzzle as high as possible, and turn the operation of the cannon into the same process as farming. What about behind the scenes? You ask your third brother, how much did they make at that time? Casting ten doors is good luck, and one is good. If luck is not good, all It cannot be used, otherwise why did you attack Xirong with three small cannons?"

Li Silang hurriedly shook his head and said, "I know that, but I just want to know if there is a difference between dividing into 250 six shares and 360 shares?"

The younger generations who were listening to the adults telling the story also felt strange. Of course they knew who won the debate in the end, because as the heirs of these meritorious generations, they can go to the best school. The textbooks say that they are divided into 360 shares. So they felt that this should be taken for granted, and they didn't expect that there was still a dispute at the beginning.

In fact, what Li He said is very simple, but the original debate did not stop at this point?As one of the best figures in Jixia Academy, some things are already difficult to explain clearly to relatives, it's not that he can't say it, but it takes three to five years to say it.

So he said briefly: "After we learned how to calculate the square root, it was connected with the Pythagorean triangle. In addition, the king taught us to use a ruler to divide an angle into two... Then we started arguing. One A circle, two points, then four points, then eight points...these are divided into 250 six parts, of course."

"However, after dividing into 250 six parts, there is only one triangle we are familiar with, that is, the same rectangular angle as the Pythagorean. However, a triangle with one hook and two strands, or a triangle with three sides of the same length, cannot appear in this 250. Of the six."

"Some people say, why not 360 shares? Because if it is divided into 360 shares, the square with the same two sides has 45 shares on both sides; If it is divided into 180 parts, the two sides of the same rectangular angle are 22 and a half parts. Only 360 parts can separate all common weird corners and be whole. Of course, it is also possible to divide into 720 parts, but that is too much trouble .”

"For the sake of dividing into 360 shares, it took me two years to calculate that this number is just right, and it happens to be a whole number. If it is 250 six shares, it is not a whole number."

"But those people insisted on 250 six points, because they asked me to draw the corners one by one! I couldn't draw it. But if they were 250 six points, they could draw the corners one by one. But I said that although I I can’t draw it, but some common corners are all round; you can draw the smallest part, but only one common corner is round.”

"It took me a month to figure out that if I divide according to 360 parts, the largest whole angle I can make is fifteen, and according to 250 six points, they are one. Then I asked the king, the king Divide the circle into five, that is, you can make 72. Now you can make ninety, 72, sixty, 45, thirty, fifteen... Subtract sixty from 72 to get twelve, and subtract ten from fifteen Two is three."

"So, since then, I've been thinking about a problem. Using a ruler and a square, to trisect an angle. As long as I can do it, I can draw a piece of paper with a ruler and a ruler. corners. It’s been a long time now, and I still haven’t thought of any way to trisect an corner.”

"Hey! If you ask me the long-cherished wish in my life, I'm afraid that I will only see someone who can divide the corner into three equal parts. If someone solves it after I die, I must remember it and tell me when I burn the paper!"

The children hurriedly said: "We will write it down, and it will be passed down in the family motto in the future. If someone can use a ruler to divide the corner into three, we will definitely tell you during the family sacrifice."

A naughty child couldn't help but said: "If you use a very large ruler to draw a circle, it will take tens of thousands of steps to walk around. Dividing it by three hundred and six is ​​almost..."

Before he finished speaking, Li Heyi opened his eyes wide angrily, picked up the wooden staff beside him and said angrily: "There is no difference in the calculation!"

The child was still young, so he ran away in a whoosh. The child next to him thought that you forced your son to learn this thing. We may not like it, but we prefer to listen to other people's stories about the war in the past.

But for Li Heyi, it was a war, a war without gunpowder.He firmly believes that counting is very sacred, but this sacredness should be related to life, at least it should not go beyond reality until everyone understands counting; while another group of people firmly believes that counting is not just counting, it is beyond everything. , so the circle can be divided into 250 six parts. As for the common angles that are not round, it doesn't matter, there must be a number that can be dealt with.

This kind of bloodless and bloody war between the two sides has been going on for a long time, especially after more than ten or twenty years, a new generation of children who have been exposed to these things since childhood have grown up.With Li Heyi and the others also becoming teachers, this kind of war became more intense.

This war started from geometric circles and angles, but it was decisively fought on arithmetic addition and subtraction multipliers.

Because of the appearance of the circle and the Pythagorean, the children who supported Li Heyi were convinced that arithmetic should be integrated with reality, using artificially defined methods to change the most basic things, so that common things can be understood by most people.But the opponent's faction rejected it in the simplest way. The simplest isosceles right-angled triangle number, there is no way to express it in the form of a whole or a fraction... They will calculate the square root in writing. The solution is that some people still haven't seen the end of the square root after calculating for a month. This is a common thing, and what kind of number can be used to define this kind of number that can't be counted at the end?

Li Heyi's disciples gave a very random definition, thinking that the root of a number is another kind of number, and there is no need to figure out what it is, just add a symbol to replace the root of the number and it will be fine. It will not affect the calculation; others insist that arithmetic is mysterious. This definition does not convince everyone. Since a number that cannot be calculated is given, then this number must represent some kind of elusive connotation. Among them, we can find out a new method of counting by looking at its origin, so that these seemingly endless numbers become endless, and even the original origin is wrong at the beginning, so these numbers that cannot be explained clearly exist.

Then Li Heyi and his disciples also launched a nonsense counterattack. Calculated by dividing the circle into 250 parts, the 45 of the 250 ​​group is the same as the 32 of the [-] group.

So is it possible to prove that 45 is the same as 32?If it is not the same, it means that the name will not affect the final calculation result, that is, the so-called origin is meaningless.

The two sides began to tear from here, until their king only gave what was true but did not give what seemed right, such as Pythagorean, corner splitting, and square opening, and began to consider the most basic things. Because of this, I slowly established a new realm of tearing force - first sit down and come up with a basic definition that everyone agrees on, and stop weird situations like 32 equals 45, and then build on this definition that everyone agrees on. Continue to tear - such as the most basic, the beginning of their tear: what is a circle?What is a circle?

This kind of war is meaningless to the vast majority of people in the room at this time, but Li Heyi and a few former classmates and disciples never tire of it.

But he is not the kind of person who looks stupid because he is immersed in it. Seeing that his younger brothers and nephews are not interested, he has no choice but to stop talking about the stories he wants to tell.

The children secretly cheered, and asked the other two grandpas or uncles, who seemed unlikely to be able to say such boring things, to ask about the story of the year.

Chapter 126 Those People, Those Years ([-])

"Back then? Back then I worked as a gunner and blacksmith in the Metallurgy Department. At that time, it was a tiring job. The king followed him every day, and he was sweating every day."

The descendants of Master Li suddenly felt a little strange, and said in surprise: "Third Grandpa, will you always see the king at that time?"

"Yes, of course. It was 37 years ago. We were busy making the mold of the cannon. The king went to Sucheng. Three months after he came back, he cast the cannon for the first time, but it failed..."

"Three months? Why did it take so long? Why did it fail?"

Li San recalled it, and sighed: "How can it be so easy? First, we need to build a high platform, so that the smelted copper juice can be poured into the mold; A kind of stove, separated by a wall in the middle, while the fire is lit, the copper and tin that have been smelted are poured in after melting again."

"The king said that there are some impurities in coal and charcoal. It is not clean to smelt with copper directly, and it will be very brittle, so we can only use that kind of furnace, which took some time. The furnace is not difficult. At the beginning A batch of iron smelting furnaces are equipped with that kind of furnace, which is nothing more than the fire going from above, separating the copper material from coal and charcoal with walls, and using the hot gas to remove the copper."

"As a result, it was poured for the first time three months later, and everyone's hearts were cold. The mud rod used as the core of the gun was glued together with the copper gun after cooling, and it was burnt into bricks. No matter how you dig it out, you can't get it out. No brass bumps on the barrel."

"I had to re-smelt it and find a way to improve it. It took another two months. It was too troublesome to make a mold."