[John] sent this one in to us a little bit after Christmas, but we’ll give him a pass because it’s so beautiful. Think of it this way: now you have almost a full year to make a binary advent calendar of your own before December 1st rolls around again.
Normal advent calendars are pretty cool, especially when there is chocolate behind all 24 doors. But is it really a representational ramp-up if you never get more than one chocolate each day? [John] doesn’t think so. The economics of his binary advent calendar are a bit magical, much like the holiday season itself. Most days you’ll get two pieces of chocolate instead of one, and many days you’ll get three. That is, as long as you opened the right doors.
A momentary switch hidden behind the hinge of each door tells the Arduino clone when it’s been opened. The Arduino checks your binary counting abilities, and if you’re right, a servo moves a gate forward and dispenses one chocolate ball per opened door. We love the simplicity of the dispensing mechanism — the doors are designed with a ceiling that keeps non-qualifying chocolates in their channels until their flag comes up.
[John] is working out the kinks before he releases this into the wild. For now, you can get a taste in the demo video featuring a bite-sized explanation. If you don’t like chocolate, maybe this blinky advent calendar will light you up inside.
So, does that make this a good Christian way to teach your kids how to think in binary while also observing advent?
(I really am not being sarcastic, here, BTW)
I don’t remember where exactly, but there is a passage in the Bible about how Jesus spoke of wanting to bring faith through candy.
Ooo yeah I remember.
Mark 14:21 “And lo Jesus said unto the crowd, there 10 types of people in the World. Those that know binary and those that will burn in hell fire.”
How is it powered? If you go look in the Old Testament, there’s a bit in Judges about Li-Ion bringing forth sweetness.
Maybe, but the Christian Era starts at year 1, not year 0, and the Old Testament says Pi is 3 (1 Kings 7:23) so I don’t know if this would be, you know, Kosher.
To be fair, this specified a fixed unit of measurement cubits, and did not specify any decimal/fractions. It should rationally be considered as a lossy rounding of figures to whole cubit values.
If you want to disprove a religion that’s fine, but be fair about the math.
Not trying to disprove any religion, I’m just saying maybe Solomon should have hired better engineers, but then again maybe we should consider (Matthew 19:26) “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
Is there a geometry where a circles circumference to diameter ratio is always 3?
Maybe that’s our answer.
I had a Data Communications instructor who told us that “a good rule of thumb for Pi, equals 2.”
While I would NEVER send someone to ‘Answers in Genesis’ or the like, there are a few simple explanations listed here: https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-explanation-of-1-Kings-7-23/answer/John-Simpson-4
It gives uneven amounts of chocolate on consecutive days: 1,1,2,1,2,2,3,1,2,2,3,3,3,3,4,1,2,2,3,2,3,4,2,3,3,4,2
It’s a bit of an anti-climax on Christmas eve. However, if it gave 2^n chocolates on every day, you’d end up with a truckload.
67 million and a bit total balls by christmas day. If the balls weigh just 1/2 ounce each, it’s 1000 tons of chocolate. Quite a bit more than truckload.
2^14 is 16.8 million and each day before that is half the amount, so the total comes to somewhere around 35 million pieces of chocolate. I don’t think they’re ½ ounce, more like a quarter, so around 250 tons.
Depends on what you define as a “truck” then.
http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/RKUC_HSm7cM/maxresdefault.jpg
It’d easily adapt to carry those little toy eggs. Could even slip in five gold rings on the fifth day of christmas.
The hen’s and partridges might be messy though.
any serious attempt at a 12 days of christmas reenactment results in an unmanageable amount of wildlife
B.F. Skinner would approve.
My son would like this – especially as his birthday is on the 15th! Maximum chocolate.
Have you ever tried this with gray-code?
That will bring you a day with five candys, but only two on christmas eve again?
When I saw the picture, I thought it would spell out the binary by having one candy color as 0 and the other as 1, so each day would be represented as 5 bits of candy.