As a resource: The Golden Ratio: The Story of Phi, The World's Most Astonishing Number

Mario Livio

The golden ratio is often denoted by the Greek letter phi.

The golden ratio = 1.61803399

and can be represented as:

Expressed algebraically:

This equation has as its unique positive solution the algebraic irrational number:

The ratio is often encountered when taking the ratios of distances in simple geometric figures
such as the pentagon, pentagram, decagon and dodecahedron.
Given a rectangle having sides in the ratio , is defined as the unique number such that
partitioning the original rectangle into a square and new rectangle as illustrated above results in a
new rectangle which also has sides in the ratio (i.e., such that the yellow rectangles shown
above are similar). Such a rectangle is called a golden rectangle, and successive points dividing a
golden rectangle into squares lie on a logarithmic spiral, giving a figure known as a whirling
square. (May leave this out – not necessary to understanding of phi).

One definition of Phi (the golden section number) is that

to square it you just add 1
or, in mathematics:
Phi2 = Phi + 1
The larger value 1·618... we call Phi
which is the name of the Greek capital letter
the smaller value –0·618... is –phi
using the small Greek letter (or ) the large P indicates the larger positive value 1·618...
the small p the smaller positive value 0·618....

link for phi to first 2000 decimal places:

http://www.mcs.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/R.Knott/Fibonacci/phi.html

Resources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

http://goldennumber.net/

http://goldennumber.net/neophite.htm

http://www.mcs.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/R.Knott/Fibonacci/phi.html