# The 17/23 correlation?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-17-23-correlation/631426
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
**Created:** [August 14, 2012, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-17-23-correlation/631426 "2012-08-14T01:29:49Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)
#### Post date: [August 14, 2012, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-17-23-correlation/631426/1 "2012-08-14T01:29:49Z")
> **[Is the Trilateral Commission the secret organization that runs the world?](https://www.straightdope.com/21341698/is-the-trilateral-commission-the-secret-organization-that-runs-the-world)**
Could he have meant the 17/29 correlation?
> **[1729 (number)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1729_%28number%29)**
>
> 1729 is the natural number following 1728 and preceding 1730. It is notably the first taxicab number.
> 1729 is the smallest taxicab number, and is variously known as Ramanujan's number or the Ramanujan–Hardy number, after an anecdote of the British mathematician G. H. Hardy when he visited Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan in hospital. He related their conversation:
> I remember once going to see him when he was ill at Putney. I had ridden in taxi cab number 1729 and remarked that the numbe...
That is, 1729 is the Hardy–Ramanujan number.
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### Author:  [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)
#### Post date: [August 14, 2012, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-17-23-correlation/631426/2 "2012-08-14T18:08:10Z")
At first, I thought he was misinterpreting it as part of the Fibonacci Series (which it obviously isn’t, but you know how people misread things).
Then, I typed in 23/17ths into a search engine and got this:
> **[23 enigma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/23_enigma)**
>
> The 23 enigma is a belief in the significance of the number 23. The concept of the 23 enigma has been popularized by various books, movies, and conspiracy theories, which suggest that the number 23 appears with unusual frequency in various contexts and may be a symbol of some larger, hidden significance. A topic related to the 23 enigma is eikositriophobia, which is the fear of the number 23.
> Robert Anton Wilson cites William S. Burroughs as the first person to believe in the 23 enigma. Wilson, ...
Something about a 23 Enigma.
[23 enigma - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/23_enigma#Discordianism) look about halfway into the first paragraph of this subsection.
See also: [Dedroidify: Daily Dedroidify: The Number 23, 17 and the law of fives.](http://dedroidify.blogspot.com/2008/07/daily-dedroidify-number-23-17-and-law.html)
Still makes no sense, but at least we can say he typed in a number “correlation” that actually has some people interested in it.
Oddly enough, just typing in these links slows my computer and internet connection significantly. :eek:
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### Author:  [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)
#### Post date: [August 14, 2012, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-17-23-correlation/631426/3 "2012-08-14T23:43:27Z")
The game _Deus Ex_, which features the Illuminati, has a character that finds multiples of 17 and 23 in a piece of nanotechnology, and mentions that this is a signature of the Illuminati as 1723 is the birth year of founder Adam Weishaupt.
The strange part is that Weishaupt was actually born in 1748. So either Kadmon and the game designers have the same faulty source of information, or Kadmon derived his information from the game (it’s over a decade old), or this is just an odd coincidence.
Or heck, maybe the game designers read the Straight Dope and got their information from the letter…
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### Author:  [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)
#### Post date: [August 14, 2012, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-17-23-correlation/631426/4 "2012-08-14T23:48:40Z")
17? 23? Don’t you see? It’s all [Moleeds.](http://www.ted.com/talks/charles_fleischer_insists_all_things_are_moleeds.html)