Taxicab geometry, considered by Hermann Minkowski in the 19th century, is a form of geometry in which the usual distance function or metric of Euclidean geometry is replaced by a new metric in which the distance between two points is the sum of the absolute differences of their coordinates. The taxicab metric is also known as rectilinear distance, L1 distance or norm (see Lp space), city block distance, Manhattan distance, or Manhattan length, with corresponding variations in the name of the geometry. The latter names allude to the grid layout of most streets on the island of Manhattan, which causes the shortest path a car could take between two intersections in the borough to have length equal to the intersections' distance in taxicab geometry.
Read more about Taxicab Geometry: Formal Description, Measures of Distances in Chess
Famous quotes containing the word geometry:
“The geometry of landscape and situation seems to create its own systems of time, the sense of a dynamic element which is cinematising the events of the canvas, translating a posture or ceremony into dynamic terms. The greatest movie of the 20th century is the Mona Lisa, just as the greatest novel is Gray’s Anatomy.”
—J.G. (James Graham)