One of my neighbours banged on my window today while I was studying the extremely interesting form on the Horses at Haydock Park today... 
Can you fix my beeping smoke alarm? Really!
TBH, I detest Electronics these days. Better things to do. Ah, well, went round and fixed it for gratis. Detached the smoke head with a screwdriver. Recommended new 9V backup battery. Job done.
It gets worse. My landlord wants to sort out my Plum Tree tomorrow. Flippin' Sunday. My Day of Rest. Leave me alone! Plum tree will survive without interference IMO.
I am certain that my friend Dick Feynman would have left me alone tomorrow.
Leonard Susskind: My friend Richard Feynman - YouTube
I have a life of my own.
Can you fix my beeping smoke alarm? Really!
TBH, I detest Electronics these days. Better things to do. Ah, well, went round and fixed it for gratis. Detached the smoke head with a screwdriver. Recommended new 9V backup battery. Job done.
It gets worse. My landlord wants to sort out my Plum Tree tomorrow. Flippin' Sunday. My Day of Rest. Leave me alone! Plum tree will survive without interference IMO.
I am certain that my friend Dick Feynman would have left me alone tomorrow.
Leonard Susskind: My friend Richard Feynman - YouTube
I have a life of my own.
Actually, Galu, I (or we, because I am a real socialist) wouldn't miss one or two...
This tree has gone bonkers this year. Must have had 4 bucketfuls off it already.
Everybody mooching down the street is raiding it!
Cost me £4 at LIDL 10 years back when it was a 2 foot stick. Look at it now!
The issue is we are struggling to get the high ones due to lack of ladders, and my upstairs neighbour can't see out of her window. But she's eating them too!
Why don't people grow more stuff? Costs nearly nothing. The Apple tree out the back is having a record year too.
I'll get back to Physics in the next post.
This tree has gone bonkers this year. Must have had 4 bucketfuls off it already.
Everybody mooching down the street is raiding it!
Cost me £4 at LIDL 10 years back when it was a 2 foot stick. Look at it now!
The issue is we are struggling to get the high ones due to lack of ladders, and my upstairs neighbour can't see out of her window. But she's eating them too!
Why don't people grow more stuff? Costs nearly nothing. The Apple tree out the back is having a record year too.
I'll get back to Physics in the next post.
Attachments
I've got to add that, just like the universe, a plum tree can have different topologies.
- Bush
- Pyramid
- Fan
- Cordon
Attachments
AW, thanks, mate. Maybe we should prune it tomorrow! I thought you cut them back in November when the sap is falling.
Richard and Lisa from over the road turned up with a 12 foot ladder today. We are sorted on picking.
I couldn't find the exact Freeman Dyson review that explained how Dick Feynman derived Black Hole evaporation from stimulated Photon emission from spinning Black Holes versus spontaneous Photon emission from static ones. Apparently photons bounce off a spinning Black Hole with more energy than they come in with. But all familiar enough in Nuclear Physics apparently. There's an equation for this.
I must buy the book!
These people just work at an entirely different level of understanding from most of us duffers. I read this one a few years back at Portsmouth University library.
Elementary Mathematics from a Higher Standpoint | SpringerLink
Felix Klein just did a bit of projective geometry up to quartic equations to prove they are actually all the same, but just viewed from a different point. Seen one, seen them all.
Just came down to x^4=0 when viewed the right way. Of course it doesn't work for quintics. Because projective geometry has only 4 variables in geometric progression IIRC.
Richard and Lisa from over the road turned up with a 12 foot ladder today. We are sorted on picking.
I couldn't find the exact Freeman Dyson review that explained how Dick Feynman derived Black Hole evaporation from stimulated Photon emission from spinning Black Holes versus spontaneous Photon emission from static ones. Apparently photons bounce off a spinning Black Hole with more energy than they come in with. But all familiar enough in Nuclear Physics apparently. There's an equation for this.
I must buy the book!
These people just work at an entirely different level of understanding from most of us duffers. I read this one a few years back at Portsmouth University library.
Elementary Mathematics from a Higher Standpoint | SpringerLink
Felix Klein just did a bit of projective geometry up to quartic equations to prove they are actually all the same, but just viewed from a different point. Seen one, seen them all.
Just came down to x^4=0 when viewed the right way. Of course it doesn't work for quintics. Because projective geometry has only 4 variables in geometric progression IIRC.
Last edited:
You like to bandy about the mathematical terms, Steve! Let's explain what a quartic and a quintic is.
In Latin, the word quadrus means “square.” Quadratic equations (of the form ax2 + bx + c = 0) are therefore so called because they contain a squared term.
However, mathematicians also have immense fun with cubic, quartic and quintic equations. A cubic equation has at least one x3 term, a quartic equation at least one x4 term, and a quintic equation at least one x5 term.
It's said that the impossibility of solving a quintic equation in radicals may be likened to the impossibility of connecting all the points of a 5 points shape together without having a line intersection - but what would I know!
Attachments
I am a terrible dilettante (lazy amateur) with mathematics and physics. But I do know the quintic is insoluble with radicals. Galois and Abel proved that. Both died younger than they should have.
The nicest story in Freeman Dyson's memoir IMO, is about how Dick Feynman was invited to a Physics friend's house at 8PM.
His friend's young daughter was terribly upset when Uncle Dick didn't turn up. She was sent to bed crying and disappointed. Possibly took it personally. Dick turned up at 10PM. Said he was late because he had had "a genius idea on the way." Maybe QED, who knows?
But the first thing he then did was go up and see the little girl. Had her in stitches of delight with drum music and his usual jokes. What a guy!
Doubtless discussed his other ideas later at night with the grown-ups.
The nicest story in Freeman Dyson's memoir IMO, is about how Dick Feynman was invited to a Physics friend's house at 8PM.
His friend's young daughter was terribly upset when Uncle Dick didn't turn up. She was sent to bed crying and disappointed. Possibly took it personally. Dick turned up at 10PM. Said he was late because he had had "a genius idea on the way." Maybe QED, who knows?
But the first thing he then did was go up and see the little girl. Had her in stitches of delight with drum music and his usual jokes. What a guy!
Doubtless discussed his other ideas later at night with the grown-ups.
Last edited:
@system7 i thought the internals of smoke alarms were toxic !!! you feeling al-right ?
British Nuclear Fuels were very keen to enlist my doubtless talents on Radioactivity.
But I had better things to do. Come to think of it, I seem to recall that Smoke Alarms rely on some toxic radioactive substance. Thorium or Radon? I dodged this stuff 45 years ago. I hardly think 2 minutes exposure to my mean neighbour's Smoke Alarm will kill me.
But I was out of there fast, because I knew he wasn't going to pay me my usual £160 p.h. In fact he paid me nothing.
Sometimes you have to pay forwards. If you follow? Makes for a better World.
- Status
- Not open for further replies.