The term horse saddle is used, in contrast to monkey saddle, to designate a saddle point that is a minimax, that is to say a local minimum or maximum depending on the intersecting plane used. The monkey saddle has just a point of inflection. To see this, consider a line y = kx. Along this direction the surface becomes simply z = (1 − 3k2)x3, lacking any critical points.
Read more about this topic: Monkey Saddle
Famous quotes containing the words horse and/or saddle:
“Only a man harrowing clods
In a slow silent walk
With an old horse that stumbles and nods
Half asleep as they stalk.”
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928)
“As the saddle makes the horse, so the tailor makes the man.”
—Chinese proverb.