The trouble with science is that you need to do things properly. I’m working on a paper at the moment where we measured some phase diagrams. We’ve known what the results are for ages now, but because we have to do it properly we have to quantify how certain we are. Yes, that’s right. ERRORS! I’ve come on a long way with statistics, I’ve learned to love them, I defy anyone to truly love errors....
I came across this new feature in the NYT via Science Blogs by Steven Strogatz. You may remember him from his paper with Duncan Watts on small-worlds that arguably kick started modern network theory. It looks like it’s going to be a regular series so I highly recommend adding the feed to your rss reader. The article that first caught my eye was called Rock Groups. It starts by differentiating between the serious side of arithmetic and the playful side....
The New York Times is running a piece about tap water and the regulation thereof called “That Tap Water Is Legal but May Be Unhealthy”. One particular contaminant becomes dangerous on exposure to sunlight so, at a lake in Los Angeles, they’ve tipped 400,000 plastic balls into the lake to block out the sunlight. Perhaps this shows I’ve been in stat-mech too long. All I could think about upon seeing this picture was - “cool, a massive 2D elastic disc simulation!...
Probability can do strange things to your mind. This week I had a probability problem where every time I tried to use intuition to solve it I ended up going completely wrong. I thought I’d share it as I think it’s interesting. Consider a one dimensional random walk. At each time step my walker will go left with probability \(p_l\), and right with probability \(p_r\). It stays where it is with probability \(1 - p_l - p_r\)....
It’s been ages since my last post. This is because I’ve been busy doing lots of interesting physics, met a bunch of interesting physicists, maybe I’ll write something about it. For now, something I’ve been meaning to write about for a while, and for once it’s something that’s timely. The journal Soft Matter has an issue out with a membrane biophysics theme. You can read the editorial for yourself if you have access, otherwise make do with my ropey understanding of it....