Math Is Beautiful: The U.S. Unemployment Graph Perfectly Matches Pornhub Traffic
By: Professor Stuart Canart, PhD
While Covid-19 ravages the global economy and challenges the capacity of hospitals, silver linings are hard to find. In our social isolation, we can take solace in small comforts, like the smooth top on a fresh jar of peanut butter, the serene night-time quiet of a neighborhood street, or the way the U.S. unemployment graph perfectly matches Pornhub traffic.
As a lover of math, I’ve found special pleasure in the way these graphs match. Unemployment’s nuanced ebbs and flows dance beautifully in tandem with Pornhub’s traffic. The way their curvaceous forms lie on top of each other, pulsing and undulating in perfect harmony … it makes me very excited.
It isn’t often in mathematics we see two statistical phenomena match so perfectly. Us academics hope and pray for such an alignment, yet too often we’re left unsatisfied, and must fantasize of such correlations while studying solo graphs. But last night we got lucky, and unemployment and Pornhub traffic explored each other’s crevices in an enviable way.
Looking back, it’s obvious I missed many chances at finding mathematical synchronicities in college. In the attic of a house party, the data ready and enthusiastically willing … but I was too timid. What if I finished early and mislabeled an axis? Word of my inexperience would travel and I’d be a laughingstock.
Today I kick myself for that cowardice. In my lifelong pursuit of mathematics, I’ve vowed never to be so meek, which is why I must scream from the mountaintops that U.S. unemployment and pornhub traffic are formulaicly unprotected and raw dogging each other in spectacular fashion.
These carefully collated charts aren’t animals, mind you. They’re updated with the most proper care, having grown intimate with each other for many months. When US unemployment and Pornhub traffic enmesh, it’s like two cosmic beings intertwining their stardust into one thrusting mass of spiritual connectedness, coming together at all the same points.
It’s been so long since I’ve neared such an experience, discovering it was like doing math for the first time. I hope it’s this good for others, too.
