19 JAN 2016 by ideonexus
Chomsky on the Failure of Postmodernism to Simplify
Since no one has succeeded in showing me what I'm missing, we're left with the second option: I'm just incapable of understanding. I'm certainly willing to grant that it may be true, though I'm afraid I'll have to remain suspicious, for what seem good reasons. There are lots of things I don't understand -- say, the latest debates over whether neutrinos have mass or the way that Fermat's last theorem was (apparently) proven recently. But from 50 years in this game, I have learned two things: (...Folksonomies: postmodernism
Folksonomies: postmodernism
1 
notes
notes30 MAY 2015 by ideonexus
The Question of Methodology
The methodological question. In a previous book I gave a
good deal of thought and analysis to the methodological importance
f°r work in the human sciences of finding and formulating a first
s t eP. a point of departure, a beginning principle.11 A major lesson I learned and tried to present was that there is no such thing as a
merely given, or simply available, starting point: beginnings have
to be made for each project in such a way as to enable what follows
from them. Nowhere in my experien...Folksonomies: methodology
Folksonomies: methodology
1 notes
notes06 FEB 2015 by ideonexus
The One-Electron Universe
I
received a telephone call one day at the graduate college at
Princeton from Professor Wheeler, in which he said, "Feynman, I
know why all electrons have the same charge and the same mass"
"Why?" "Because, they are all the same electron!" And, then he
explained on the telephone, "suppose that the world lines which
we were ordinarily considering before in time and space - instead
of only going up in time were a tremendous knot, and then, when
we cut through the knot, by the pl... 1 notes
notes29 JAN 2015 by ideonexus
Encyclopedia Galactica
A. I do not say now that we can prevent the fall. But it is not yet too
late to shorten the interregnum which will follow. It is possible,
gentlemen, to reduce the duration of anarchy to a single millennium, if my
group is allowed to act now. We are at a delicate moment in history. The
huge, onrushing mass of events must be deflected just a little, – just a
little – It cannot be much, but it may be enough to remove twenty-nine
thousand years of misery from human h... 1 notes
notes09 AUG 2014 by ideonexus
Hydrogen Levels in the Universe
Our Sun is significantly enriched, having formed when the Universe was more than 9 billion years old in the plane of a spiral galaxy, one of the most enriched places in the Universe. Yet, when our Sun formed, it was still made out of — by mass — 71% hydrogen, 27% helium, and about 2% “other” stuff. If we convert that into “number of atoms” and treat the Sun as typical of the Universe, that means, over the first 9.3 billion years of the Universe, the fraction of hydrogen ha... 1 notes
notes29 MAY 2014 by ideonexus
Cosmic Gall
Neutrinos, they are very small.
They have no charge and have no mass
And do not interact at all.
The earth is just a silly ball
To them, through which they simply pass.
Like dustmaids down a drafty hall
Or photons through a sheet of glass.
They snub the most exquisite gas,
Ignore the most substantial wall,
Cold shoulder steel and sounding brass.
Insult the stallion in his stall,
And, scorning barriers of class.
Infiltrate you and me. Like tall
And painless guillotines, they fall ...
1 Neutrinos wonderful or crass?
16 MAR 2014 by ideonexus
Dyson Spheres
The material factors which ultimately limit the expansion of a technically advanced species are the supply of matter and the supply of energy. At present the material resources being exploited by the human species are roughly limited to the biosphere of the earth, a mass of the order of 5 X 10^19 grams. Our present energy supply may be generously estimated at 10^20 ergs per second. The quantities of matter and energy which might conceivably become accessible to us within the solar system are ...Folksonomies: astronomy extraterrestrials
Folksonomies: astronomy extraterrestrials
1 The energy and time required to dismantle a planet and turn it into a biosphere surrounding a sun.
07 OCT 2013 by ideonexus
Heat is a Substance
We recognize in the concept of heat which appears
here a similarity to other physical concepts. Heat is,
according to our view, a substance, such as mass in
mechanics. Its quantity may change or not, like money
put aside in a safe or spent. The amount of money in a
safe will remain unchanged so long as the safe remains
locked, and so will the amounts of mass and heat in an
isolated body. The ideal thermos flask is analogous to
such a safe. Furthermore, just as the mass of an iso-
lat...Folksonomies: heat quantification
Folksonomies: heat quantification
1 notes
notesLike mass. It is a quantity.
16 JUL 2013 by ideonexus
Constant Surveillance Builds a Better Identity
There are some who argue that individuality
suffers under universal surveillance. When everything
about you is known, and you have little or
no control over how your identity is presented to
others, you become just another person in a mass
of similar persons. With no way to define yourself,
individuality is eroded. We all become everyman
and everywoman, or so the argument goes. To the
contrary, the amount of detail provided to everyone
around us in a transparent society helps to show
all of t... 1 notes
notesIf people know a great deal about you with a simple web search before they meet you, social interactions are smoother.
13 MAY 2013 by ideonexus
Dyson Spheres
The purpose of this report is to point out other possibilities which ought to be considered in planning any serious search for evidence of extraterrestrial beings. We start from the notion that the time scale for industrial and technical development of these beings is likely to be very short in comparison with the time scale of stellar evolution. It is therefore overwhelmingly probable that any such beings observed by us will have been in existence for millions of years, and will have already...An extraterrestrial civilization grown to a certain population will need to harvest the full resources of it's environment. By converting a planet like Jupiter into a shield around the system's star, the civilization could maximize the use of the sun's output.
