Sep 2, 2010

puzzle time

I can assure that the individual components that make up both triangles are identical. I made them myself using copy/paste.  I merely rearranged them.  Where does the space in the second one come from? They should have the same surface area right? Scroll down for the answer.

























The two triangles are not triangles.  They are quadrilaterals.  There is a slight kink where the red and green triangles meet because they have different slopes. The different placement of the red and green triangles creates either a convex or concave kink in the hypotenuse which changes the area slightly and accounts for the hole.  You can see more clearly the slightly kink below where I place one triangle on top of the other.

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