Later I learned the big word and its meaning. The mathematical term is defined as the act of arranging all the members of a set into some sequence or order. The number of unique permutations of a given set of size n = n! called “n factorial” which is the product of 1, 2, 3, …, n of the terms. The exclamation sign is the symbol for this mathematical operation.
For example, the number of permutations of a set with four members is
There are 24 unique ways (or orders) that four members of a set could be arranged.
Permutations and partial permutations (sub sets with less members than the overall set) are very important in certain math areas such as statistics. (I’ll keep it simple and not address partial permutations. Fell free to google it and learn more.)
I said permutations have always interested me. Growing up there was a beer brewed in nearby Great Falls, Montana called “Great Falls Select.” I don’t know if it is still available or not. I sort of imagined a big pipe stuck in the Missouri River where it flows through Great Falls that goes to the brewery. Not exactly Coors “Rocky Mountain Spring Water,” but probably not that different.
Their motto was “Always Brewed Carefully.” The neat thing about the phrase is that all permutations make sense and they used them all in their ads. Notice you can abbreviate the three words as “A,” “B,” “C.” Isn’t that elementary? Good advertisement copy!
Since there are three terms, then the number of possible permutations is
Here they are:
A B C A C B B A C B C A C A B C B A
Let’s try the permutations to see if they all make sense:
Great Falls Select is
ABC = Always Brewed Carefully ACB = Always Carefully Brewed BAC = Brewed Always Carefully BCA = Brewed Carefully Always CAB = Carefully Always Brewed CBA = Carefully Brewed Always
Maybe that’s where I got my love of math … from beer!!
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