A circle is not polygon

“Polygons have have become unseeingly fashionable…”

Trip Hawkins

My family loves the challenge of the weekly Brainwaves quiz. A recurring question is the naming of polygons or their number of sides. What is a five sided polygon called, or how many sides has a dodecahedron? You get the idea. Although polygon is a latin word, the naming nomenclature is Greek, except for triangle, quadrilateral and nonagram. If you are very cool, you will know that polygons have vertices and surfaces, rather than corners and sides. My favourite polygon is the enneacosakismyriagon which has 9 million surfaces. Going deep into the study of polygons inevitably leads to two existential questions, that evoke philosophy as much as mathematics. Firstly, is a polygon with an infinite number of surfaces the same as a circle? Secondly, does a circle have one or infinite surfaces? #pentagonand12 #letsmakelemonade