Kate Rauner's Blog, page 109
June 12, 2013
Energy’s Conserved – a Poem
A poem inspired by Richard Feynman’s book, Six Easy Pieces, Lecture 4: Conservation of Energy; with an update on Einstein’s famous equation, thanks to Mike’s comment.
It’s a Fact
By Kate Rauner
.
There is a fact in nature that energy’s conserved.
The total’s always constant, changing form, but not perturbed.
Gravitational, potential, nuclear, kinetic,
Radiant and chemical, elastic and electric.
Existence gives mass energy, Einstein got us there.
Mass and energy relate: E=mc squared;
(That’s when momentum is a null
From where you look to there.)
The energy so useful to power our machines
Is mathematical abstraction; reality as dreams.
Don’t need to understand it all to pay electric bills,
And speak of it with confidence, and calculate at will.
June 11, 2013
We Can’t See 85% of the Universe… Why Not?
Physics fascinates me, even though I don’t speak its language, mathematics, well enough to develop any intuition about the subject. The big questions in physics may not change what I do tomorrow, but I believe knowledge is a good thing. I’ve never regretted learning something. So this item intrigues me:
“Maybe dark matter is unseeable because its electromagnetic field loops in on itself — an anapole — instead of having the familiar two-pole set up of visible matter. An anapole field is generated by an electrical current traveling in a ring, resulting in the field being confined inside a doughnut shape. The setup not only keeps these particles from being visible, it also keeps them from interacting except when moving.
“‘The [anapole] model makes very specific predictions about the rate at which it should show up in the vast dark matter detectors that are buried underground all over the world,” he said. “These predictions show that soon the existence of anapole dark matter should either be discovered or ruled out by these experiments’.” This quote is from http://bit.ly/11t0HiC and you can find many other sites covering this news.
The theory is testable, the experimental equipment already exists, and we should know if anapoles are the answer soon. So many exotic theories in physics can’t be tested, so this is exciting.
Go Robert Scherrer and Chiu Man Ho! (They proposed the anapole idea at Vanderbilt University.)
Related articles
Dark Matter May Be Made Out of Majorana Fermions, Say Physicists (sci-news.com)
June 10, 2013
MIT’s Top Ten Hard Science Fiction
Based on the description of the emblem of the fictional Galactic Empire in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
“MITs Technology Review will publish TR:SF, a collection of original science fiction stories, in the fall. The stories will all be near-future, hard science fiction, inspired by the kinds of emerging technologies we see in our coverage at Technology Review.” What will MIT’s Sci Fi look like? They say they admire such classic authors as H. G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke. Take a look at their nominations for “Top Ten“. These are stories working scientists and engineers cite as their inspiration. Good Sci Fi makes you think, “This could really happen.” Check out the comments, too. They provide more Sci Fi favorites.
I always loved Asimov. I kept my copy of The Gods Themselves for years, and loved the puzzles presented by malfunctioning robots caught in dilemmas from the three laws of robotics. Those three laws and other features of Asimov’s robots provided a jumping-off place for other authors. For example, Asimov’s robots were built with positronic brains, a feature echoed by Star Trek’s Mr. Data.
June 8, 2013
Wildfire Meets Neighborhood – a Poem
Wildfire
By Kate Rauner
The fire roared, it flew, it crowned through this neighborhood at the edge of town.
It leaped and danced down streets of homes; And drove us to our safety zones.
Now flashing lights obscured by smoke mark engine crews still hard at work.
My hand crew seeks out embers red; We dig them out to stop their spread.
With families gone and power off; the night is dark for houses lost.
It’s oddly peaceful, hushed and calm, though that, we know, will not last long.
Tonight the crews in green and gold walk through the tales that should be told.
We do our job, but see the warning of tears that will come in the morning.
Learn about defensible space. http://www.firewise.org/ It’s not fate, it’s your responsibility.
Related articles
Top 5 Reasons Given For Not Being Fire Safe (yubanet.com)
Experts offer safety tips as wildfire season approaches (fox13now.com)
Forest Service To Hire 500 Fewer Firefighters As Wildfire Season Begins (denver.cbslocal.com)
June 5, 2013
The Sciences – a Poem
English: Photo given by George Chapline (in photo). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Here is a poem inspired by Richard Feynman’s book, Six Easy Pieces, Lecture 3: Relation of Physics to Other Sciences
Sciences
by Kate Rauner
Chemistry – Biology – We study these.
Astronomy – Geology – For tools we need.
Hydrometeorology – For lives we lead.
But physics –Curiosity demands.
Related articles
The Unexpected Artwork of Physicist Richard Feynman (io9.com)
June 4, 2013
“Classic” or “Modern”, SciFi is a Good Read
Are you looking for good science fiction? I ran across http://bestsciencefictionbooks.com/ There is a list of “top 25 picks for the best science fiction books ever written” and also a crowd ranked version of the list. The list includes many “classics of science fiction [that] are heavy on ground breaking ideas but pretty light on story and characters. Modern science fiction puts a lot more emphasis on story and characterization.” I have to agree. My memory of science fiction from childhood includes a lot of cardboard heroes, but I loved the stories anyway.
The blog lists three dozen sub-genres of science fiction, with reading suggestions for each. Whether you are looking for a good read, wondering how there can be that many types of SciFi, or just curious how your own reading stacks up against recommendations, take a look. One of my favorite books is rated highly:Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Any author who can write a trilogy containing five books has the right attitude. “Now cruising at a level of two to the power of twenty-five thousand to one against and falling, and we will be restoring normality just as soon as we are sure what is normal.” (If you are not chuckling at that quote, go read the book.)
(Note: The Best SciFi books blog seems to be just getting started; not all the links are live yet. But it looks interesting.)
Related articles
‘Sci-Fi’ or ‘Cli-Fi’… (lobstersstuffedwithtacos.wordpress.com)
