Link for the boyfriend
Dec. 19th, 2005 03:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
treeskinGot this off the campus infolist; someone sends out links to teaching resources periodically. Anyway, there's a 3-hr mini-series from PBS on the Elegant Universe--String Theory. The email said it's all online. Have fun!
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Do it, Tristan
Date: 2005-12-19 10:01 pm (UTC)It kicks butt
Re: Do it, Tristan
Date: 2005-12-19 10:11 pm (UTC)Tim, if you want to get further into it. Joseph Polchinski's book "An Introduction to the Bosonic String" is a great place to start.
There is another book called "A First course in String Theory" that is pretty good, but uses a few to many big words for me :) I can't remember the author's name
I also like this web page http://www.superstringtheory.com/
and my inner geek is really showing, so I will shut up now :)
Re: Do it, Tristan
Date: 2005-12-20 12:25 am (UTC)yep, yep, yep...I'm a lucky guy :)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-19 10:10 pm (UTC)The direct download address is:
http://a388.g.akamai.net/5/388/142/3f9e93f2/1a1a1afb6ae049ae214fc034aad839a91985ea187bea5786f362d841a61948bf2688f01f87fb6fdf0e7ceb61c22186fb/
Plus "nova_eu_3012c01_hi_100.mov", etc.
3013 and 3014 are the second and third hour, c01 through c08 for each segment.
Food for thought...
Date: 2005-12-19 10:30 pm (UTC)Editorial: Physics' greatest endeavour is grinding to a halt
THE 21st century, so pundits keep telling us, will be the century of biology. There is no doubt that biology is advancing rapidly on many fronts, from molecular biology to evolutionary theory. On the other hand, the opposition is not making much of a race for it. Physics' greatest endeavour has ground to a halt.
We are in "a period of utter confusion", said Nobel laureate David Gross, summing up last week's prestigious Solvay conference on the quantum structure of space and time (see "Baffled in Brussels"). That is worrying because the topic is central to finding a "theory of everything" that will describe every force and particle in nature.
Einstein's relativity, which reigned supreme for a century, is a flawed basis for such a theory. Although it deals with gravity, it tells us nothing else about the nature and interactions of matter. Crucially, general relativity is incompatible with quantum theory. Since the 1960s, theorists have struggled to solve this problem, so far to no avail. And the trouble is we have nothing to put in relativity's place.
The great hope, string theory, which views particles as emanating from minuscule strings, has generated myriad mathematical descriptions linked to the dance of particles. But these equations tell us nothing about where space and time come from and describe nothing we would recognise. At best, string theory depicts the way particles might interact in a collection of hypothetical universes.
For decades, string theorists have been excused from testing their ideas against experimental results. When astronomers discovered the accelerating expansion of the universe, which string theory fails to account for, many string theorists took shelter in a remarkable excuse: that their equations describe all possible universes and should not be tied to matching data in just one of them.
But when the theory does not match the one data set we have, is it science? There is a joke circulating on physics blogs: that we can, after all, call our universe unique. Why? Because it is the only one that string theory cannot describe. Should we laugh or cry?
There is a growing feeling that string theory has run into the sand. Gross thinks we are missing something fundamental. We need a leap in understanding, though where it will come from is not clear. Many of the greatest minds in physics were there at last week's conference, and none had an answer.
We are approaching the end of Einstein's centennial year - a celebration of physics. While some lesser-known areas of the subject are flourishing, the search for a theory of everything is in a sorry state. Unless string theory gets a radical shake-up, gifted but frustrated minds will begin to drift into other areas of science. And if that is what makes biology the subject of the century, it will be depressing reason indeed.
From issue 2529 of New Scientist magazine, 10 December 2005, page 5
Re: Food for thought...
Date: 2005-12-20 01:07 am (UTC)http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/archives/2005/05-10-19.html
Re: Food for thought...
Date: 2005-12-20 01:08 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-20 01:19 am (UTC)I found a book last spring that detailed several aspects of how quantum physics might start to explain magick. Okay, cool. Then I started reading "The Elegant Universe" (one of the things I picked up on the Great Lawrence Excursion). Turns out that while string theory isn't easily verified by experimental means, the math works astoundingly well. Trouble is, it undermines the core ideas expressed in the book I picked up earlier this year. So, arrogant fool that I am, I decided to see if I could find a way to merge the first theory with what I've learned about string theory (and, no, I'm really not talking about knitting--much to Jera's dismay). And, luckily, now I've got another resource with which to work.
Thanks, sweetheart. Least now I've got something to do this weekend. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-20 01:42 am (UTC)http://www.theory.caltech.edu/
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-20 01:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-20 02:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-20 02:08 am (UTC)**suddenly feels WAAAAY too dumb to be studying high-energy multidimensional physics**
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-20 01:11 pm (UTC)Some people look to Science as the Truth Detector; the absolute.
If you go back and look, there is of course the famous "bumblebees can't fly" situation, along with way too many 'scientific facts' that have been disproven for this to be True.
For me, what Is IS.
It is Science that is growing and developing.
We allow ourselves that when Science grows and learns enough to be able to wrap its theorems around something, when Science finally develops a way to measure something older than Time, that this previously unbelievable thing is now Fact; it is now Scientifically Proven, and therefore it's OK to believe it.
"I have this nifty pair of calipers. Everything that I can measure with it is Real. Anything I cannot measure with it is theory, conjecture or myth."
Kinda limiting for my tastes.
For some, Science is the Religion; the go/no-go switch that tells you what you can believe. Yet a thousand years ago, look where Science was. The Universe was as it is now, but Science saw it compeletely differently.
The Universe did not fundamentally change; Science did.
So which is the more stable, more "believable" entity?
Once upon a time, there was a 2 dimensional world. It was completely composed of 2 dimensional geometric entities. They were happy in the security of their 2 dimensional world.
One day a sphere, happily going along its own way, passed through the plane of this 2 dimensional world.
To the 2 dimensional creatures, a strange and unknown Point suddenly appeared out of nowhere. It started to grow in every direction. Curiousity surrendered to abject panic; their scientists used every tool they had, and predicted that the evil would consume their entire world. The 2 dimensional creatures waged war on the evil; but to no avail.
In time, the Priests came to dispell the Evil. All rites and rituals were hurled at the Evil.
About this time the equator of the sphere was passing through the plane.
The Evil was shrinking; it was getting smaller! Religion was saving the day!
The Evil shrunk back to a point and disappeared completely.
The 2 dimensional world was shaken forever.
The sphere was only aware of a tickle that was moving from its bottom to its top and giggled.
"Captain, his manuevers indicate 2 dimensional thinking..."
Sometimes Science is not the Be All - End All our society wants it to be now, is it?
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-21 01:02 am (UTC)