Prime Number Visualization Simulation Spiral

Re:Prime Number Visualization Simulation Spiral by jlarocco on Sunday September 16, 2012 @01:41AM (#4528378)

I disagree with that. The entire point of data visualization is to highlight patterns in data to make the data easier to understand. Highlighting what's already known is a waste of time. A good visualization will help uncover something new.

I feel bad saying this, because it probably took a lot of work to make, but this prime number spiral is kind of pointless. What is it showing me? If I let the painfully slow animation run for a while, and look at the bigger picture, what insight will I gain about prime numbers? Probably nothing.

It's even a bit misleading, because to the best of my knowledge, there's no connection between spirals and prime numbers.

If I'm just being dense and not getting it, I'd love for somebody to explain it to me.

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Re:Prime Number Visualization Simulation Spiral by happyglucky on Sunday September 16, 2012 @03:50AM (#4528606)

"there's no connection between spirals and prime numbers"

You just shot yourself in the foot :( Yes, there is a connection. If you add up the total distance each line makes in a tick, its equivalent to the harmonic series, which is a special case of the zeta function. This is where the spiral comes from. Its a dirct consequence of the fact that each number has period 1/n. The spiral emerges naturally, its not programmed or forced into that shape.

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Re:Prime Number Visualization Simulation Spiral by jlarocco on Sunday September 16, 2012 @03:12PM (#4530016)

If that's the concept the visualization was trying to get across, then it failed pretty bad.

It may look neat, but it doesn't make any of those connections apparent.

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