science and mathematics: November 2007 Archives

NASA's released a huge photo of Niagara Falls as seen from space. Whoa.

The recent Australian elections, which ousted conservative Prime Minister John Howard, and brought in Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, have led Rudd to pledge that Australia will ratify the Kyoto Protocol. Australia is the only other major developed nation besides the US to not ratify the Kyoto Protocol.

A neat video on solutal convection by New Scientist, using cream and Tia Maria:

The Telegraph and New Scientist report on a new Unification Theory by a penny-less surfer and theoretical physics doctorate published recently called "An Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything":

Lisi's inspiration lies in the most elegant and intricate shape known to mathematics, called E8 - a complex, eight-dimensional mathematical pattern with 248 points first found in 1887, but only fully understood by mathematicians this year after workings, that, if written out in tiny print, would cover an area the size of Manhattan.

Lisi's breakthrough came when he noticed that some of the equations describing E8's structure matched his own. "My brain exploded with the implications and the beauty of the thing," he tells New Scientist. "I thought: 'Holy crap, that's it!'"

What Lisi had realised was that he could find a way to place the various elementary particles and forces on E8's 248 points. What remained was 20 gaps which he filled with notional particles, for example those that some physicists predict to be associated with gravity.

An interesting read, and when the LHC is finished next year, we'll see if the theory pans out against current favourite, String Theory.

Surfer dude stuns physicists with theory of everything [The Telegraph]

Is mathematical pattern the theory of everything? [New Scientist]

Are you a wine-sipping hippie? (like me?)

Perhaps you'd be interested in the carbon foot print of your wine, as researched by Dr. Vino. The really interesting part is the wine-carbon line that runs down the US:

There’s a “green line” that runs down the middle of Ohio. For points to the West of that line, it is more carbon efficient to consume wine trucked from California. To the East of that line, it’s more efficient to consume the same sized bottle of wine from Bordeaux, which has had benefited from the efficiencies of container shipping, followed by a shorter truck trip. In the event that a carbon tax were ever imposed, it would thus have a decidedly un-nationalistic impact.

I'm going to have to add a few bottles of Bordeaux wines next time I'm out shopping.

If you're tuned into the geeky side of the blogging world, you're no doubt familiar with the obsession over the "plane on a treadmill" problem:

Imagine a plane is sitting on a massive conveyor belt, as wide and as long as a runway. The conveyer belt is designed to exactly match the speed of the wheels, moving in the opposite direction. Can the plane take off?

The problem has divided physicists, pilots, and bloggers alike, inspiring this Joy of Tech comic that sums up the fervour nicely.

Well... Mythbusters to the rescue! In an episode airing in December, Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman will finally lay this problem to rest:

"... We just finished one that has confounded us our entire careers.''

"We put the plane on a quarter-mile conveyor belt and tested it out,'' says Savage about the experiment using a pilot and his Ultralight plane. ``I won't tell you what the outcome was, but the pilot and his entire flight club got it wrong.''

I'm so stoked for this episode. The Physics geek in me can't wait.

Following up on my previous chemistry related post, kottke brings this video of 20,000 lbs. of sodium being dumped into a lake in the 1940s:

Boom.

The slow and utter death of real chemistry sets is something that's bothered both myself and my mom (who is a chemist and science teacher.) Their contents have become more and more barren and mundane, killing their usefulness in learning about chemical reactions and the basics of the scientific method to kids everywhere.

12 Angry Men writes at length on the decline of the once wonderful chemistry set:

Some of Gilbert’s original sets included such items as sodium cyanide, radioactive samples (complete with a Geiger counter), and glass blowing kits. I will freely admit that one of the first things I did with my chemistry set was to attempt to make an explosive. I remember mixing up chemicals that evolved free chlorine gas and having to evacuate the house. I remember mixing potassium nitrate and sugar to make rocket engines and quickly evolving to higher specific impulse fuels. I remember the joy of finally obtaining some nitric acid which allowed me to nitrate basically everything in the house (cotton for gun cotton, glycerine and alcohol for nitroglycerine). So yes, I have to admit that there is a risk involved. But this is how people learn. Sometimes knowledge comes with pain — one-shot induction.

Today however, the Chemistry Set is toast. Current instantiations are embarrassing. There are no chemicals except those which react at low energy to produce color changes. No glass tubes or beakers, certainly no Bunsen burners or alcohol burners (remember the clear blue flames when the alcohol spilled out over the table). Today’s sets cover perfume mixing and creation of luminol (the ‘CSI effect’ I suppose).

Via /.