In 1998, Ask Ars was an early feature of the newly launched Ars Technica. Now, as then, it's all about your questions and our community's answers. We occasionally dig into our question bag, provide ...

Possibly not everyone knows that March 14th is Pi Day, in honor of the symbol used to denote the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. Pi is commonly approximated as 3.14, but it ...

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A basic feature of number theory, prime numbers are also a fundamental building block of computer science, from hashtables to cryptography. Everyone knows that a prime number is one that cannot be ...

Kaisa Matomäki has proved that properties of prime numbers over long intervals hold over short intervals as well. The techniques she uses have transformed the study of these elusive numbers. This ...

A shard of smooth bone etched with irregular marks dating back 20,000 years puzzled archaeologists until they noticed something unique – the etchings, lines like tally marks, may have represented ...

A prime number is a number that is only divisible by one and itself, which is essentially saying that it has no divisor. That takes half of all possible numbers off the table right away (the evens), ...