About Wyrd Smythe
The canonical fool on the hill watching the sunset and the rotation of the planet and thinking what he imagines are large thoughts.
Okay. I’ve been teasing doubly special Saturday and (especially this year) since last Monday (and planting hints along the way). If you haven’t figured it out by now, today is Albert Einstein’s birthday. It’s also pi day, and how cool is it that a guy like Al was born on pi day?
So: Happy Birthday Albert! The (especially this year) part is because it’s extra-special pi day (3/14/15) and because this year I’m finally going to do what I’ve been wanting to do here to commemorate Einstein’s birthday since I started this blog back in ought-eleven.
I’m going to write — at length — about Special Relativity!
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8 Comments | tags: Albert Einstein, Emmy Noether, faster than light, FTL, Happy Birthday, light speed, pi day, Special Relativity | posted in Math, Physics
It’s pi day! Be irrational!
Earlier this week I mentioned that “this coming Saturday is a doubly special date (especially this year).” One of the things that makes it special is that it is Pi Day — 3/14 (at least for those who put the month before the day). What makes it extra-special this year is that it’s 3/14/15— a pi day that comes around only once per century. (Super-duper extra-special pi day, which happens only once in a given calendar, happened way back on 3/14/1529.)
I’ve written before about the magical pi, and I’m not going to get into it, as such, today. I’m more of a tau-ist, anyway; pi is only half as interesting. (Unfortunately, extra-special Tau Day isn’t until 6/28/31, and the super-duper extra-special day isn’t until 6/28/3185!)
What I do want to talk about is a fascinating property of pi.
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149 Comments | tags: cake, Carl Sagan, Contact (book), Ellie Arroway, irrational numbers, Magnum Pi, normal sequence, numbers, pi, pi day, pie, real numbers, tau, tau day, transcendental numbers | posted in Math
Computing…
I’ve written here before about chaos theory and how it prevents us from calculating certain physical models effectively. It’s not that these models don’t accurately reflect the physics involved; it’s that any attempt to use actual numbers introduces tiny errors into the process. These cause the result to drift more and more as the calculation extends into the future.
This is why tomorrow’s weather prediction is fairly accurate but a prediction for a year from now is entirely guesswork. (We could make a rough guess based on past seasons.) Yet the Earth itself is a computer — an analog computer — that tells us exactly what the weather is a year from now.
The thing is: it runs in real-time and takes a year to give us an answer!
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3 Comments | tags: analog, analog computer, chaos theory, digital, Information Technology, mathematics, orbital mechanics, Pluto, Pluto is a planet, solar system, three-body problem, weather, weather prediction | posted in Math
I mentioned recently that I intended to write some “For The Record” (FTR) posts setting down — once and for all — my views on certain oft-debated topics. “Once and for all” is misleading, though. My opinions evolve over time, and no controversial topic is ever truly closed. “Here and for now” would be a better phrase.
This one will certainly draw a sand line where some will stand on my side and others — people I like and respect — will stand on the other. I’m not sure I believe there is a right answer here; it really depends on your worldview. If nothing else, this seeks to explain my rationale as well as my opinion.
So, for the record: here we go on guns!
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14 Comments | tags: For The Record, FTR, gun control, gun debate, gun laws, gun ownership, gun regulation, gun safety, guns, movie violence, NRA, Second Amendment, TV violence, violence, violence in movies, violent society | posted in Opinion
There is an old saying about March coming in like a lion (and going out like a lamb). The reverse is also imagined: if it comes in like a lamb, it will go out like a lion. Weather mythology aside, March does have some significant dates for me.
One is “Vern’s Equal Ox” — a day of rejoicing for Lovers of the Light. Our days will now be longer than our nights. That’s less than two weeks away. The coming Saturday is a doubly special date (especially this year), but more about that another day. Lastly, March contains the birthday of one of the four people I consider life-long best friends.
Trumping it all right now: last night I had my first fully lucid dream!
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27 Comments | tags: dream control, dreaming, dreams, lucid dreaming, March, vernal equinox | posted in Life
Bear with me; I have another get it off my chest rant about how something on the TV machine made me angry. In this case it concerns a show that’s risen quite high on the list of shows I watch: NBC’s Grimm.
I enjoy the show a lot, but I’m really annoyed about one particular aspect. It’s a glaring flaw in an otherwise very appealing show. I understand why the flaw exists, but it concerns something that’s generally bugged me in storytelling for a long time. In the case of Grimm it especially grates; I wish the writers had taken another tack.
The issue concerns keeping secrets from loved ones.
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18 Comments | tags: Batman, Castle (TV series), Galaxy Quest, Ghost Rider, Grimm (TV series), mistaken identity, Nick Burkhardt, secret identity, secrets, Spiderman, Superman, The Man Who Knew Too Little, TNT, wesen, woge | posted in Rant, Sci-Fi Saturday, TV
A whale of a tale.
Somewhere out in the Pacific Ocean swims what is said to be the loneliest whale in the world. He (or she, but here I’m going to assume he) is known as the 52-hertz whale. That designation comes from the sound of his whale song, which has a much higher pitch than any known species fitting his migratory pattern.
His calls were first heard by Woods Hole in 1989 and again in 1990 and 1991. His cries have been detected every season since 2004. His movements (he’s been tracked, but never seen) don’t match blue or fin whales any more than his cries do. One theory is that he was born deaf and never learned to sing like others of his species.
All of which gives me a real affinity for the poor guy!
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17 Comments | tags: blue whale, deafness, fin whale, Heinrich Hertz, hertz, loneliness, ocean, the hum, unexplained sounds, whale cries, whale song, whales, Wiki Walk, Wikipedia, xkcd | posted in Life
My Minnesota Twins played their first spring training game last night. It was an exhibition game against the University of Minnesota. And, wouldn’t you know it, those professional experienced baseball players managed to beat the college kids. That hasn’t been the case for some other teams (the Philadelphia Phillies lost to the University of Tampa Bay last Sunday, for example).
In about three hours the Twins begin Spring Training games for real by hosting the Boston Red Sox (who beat two different college teams in a double-header Tuesday).
To celebrate, I thought I’d share my MLB Parks Tour plan.
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14 Comments | tags: baseball park, baseball season, Boston Red Sox, Major League baseball, Minnesota Twins, MLB, MLB Ballpark Tour, MLB baseball parks, road trip, Spring Training, Twins 2015, University of Minnesota | posted in Baseball
Once I’ve decided that I like something, I tend to be pretty loyal. That’s even more the case when it comes to people. But hate is very close to love; both are very strong and persistent emotions — they just have opposite polarities. The true opposite of love (or hate) is indifference.
And it does happen that, sometimes a single event that gets on the wrong side of me instantly flips the polarity of my feeling. Sadly, it’s always been from positive to negative. I’ve never had the movie experience of hating and then loving.
Recently two things have flipped my switch, and a third one is tugging at it.
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34 Comments | tags: customer service, delivery pizza, NCIS, NCIS:Los Angeles, NCIS:New Orleans, Papa Johns, pizza, salsa, Target stores | posted in Life, Rant
I don’t know that synchronicity plays any greater role in my life than it does for anyone else. I seem to notice it fairly often, and I love when it happens. It’s generally an illusion; coincidences occur all the time. Sometimes they stand out in a way seems like evidence of greater import or design.
But that is usually a matter of selection bias. Coincidence that impresses us is memorable. Cops, as well as doctors and nurses who work ER shifts, often think the full moon brings out the crazies, but the data doesn’t really support that.
Regardless, synchronicity is fun when it happens.
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5 Comments | tags: Captain Kirk, Colonel Klink, David McCallum, Illya Kuryakin, Leonard Nimoy, Leverage (TV series), Mr. Spock, Napoleon Solo, Robert Vaughn, Star Trek, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Werner Klemperer, William Shatner | posted in TV
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