Skip to main content

Home/ Advanced Concepts Team/ Group items tagged always

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
6More

Forget Brainstorming - Newsweek - 6 views

www.newsweek.com/...forget-brainstorming.html
shared by Dario Izzo on 03 Aug 10 - Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • Dario Izzo on 03 Aug 10
     
    nice link from toby .... it contains some of the things that I have been saying to the wind!!
  • ...3 more comments...
  • Francesco Biscani on 03 Aug 10
     
    Oh god, this is so beautiful... I'm not even going to quote the best parts, they are so many :)
  • LeopoldS on 04 Aug 10
     
    "employees need to be able to put their own ideas into practice" - but they also need to want to do it ....
  • LeopoldS on 04 Aug 10
     
    "In Galinsky's lab, people were more creative after watching a slide show about China: a 45-minute session increased creativity scores for a week." Hippo: we need more pictures from you!!
  • LeopoldS on 04 Aug 10
     
    "Do something only you would come up with-that none of your friends or family would think of." - according to them, this is one of their success recipes .... a recipe for the team?
  • Ma Ru on 04 Aug 10
     
    >Get moving. I always said that fitness test should be included in the recruitment process!!!
15More

Exotic matter : Insight : Nature - 5 views

www.nature.com/...index.html nan phy
shared by jmlloren on 03 Aug 10 - Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • jmlloren on 03 Aug 10
     
    Trends in materials and condensed matter. Check out the topological insulators. amazing field.
  • ...12 more comments...
  • Luzi Bergamin on 03 Aug 10
     
    Aparently very interesting, will it survive the short hype? Relevant work describing mirror charges of topological insulators and the classical boundary conditions were done by Ismo and Ari. But the two communities don't know each other and so they are never cited. Also a way to produce new things...
  • jmlloren on 04 Aug 10
     
    Thanks for noticing! Indeed, I had no idea that Ari (don't know Ismo) was involved in the field. Was it before Kane's proposal or more recently? What I mostly like is that semiconductors are good candidates for 3D TI, however I got lost in the quantum field jargon. Yesterday, I got a headache trying to follow the Majorana fermions, the merons, skyrnions, axions, and so on. Luzi, are all these things familiar to you?
  • Luzi Bergamin on 04 Aug 10
     
    Ismo Lindell described in the early 90's the mirror charge of what is now called topological insulator. He says that similar results were obtained already at the beginning of the 20th century... Ismo Lindell and Ari Sihvola in the recent years discussed engineering aspects of PEMCs (perfect electro-megnetic conductors,) which are more or less classical analogues of topological insulators. Fundamental aspects of PEMCs are well knwon in high-energy physics for a long time, recent works are mainly due to Friedrich Hehl and Yuri Obukhov. All these works are purely classical, so there is no charge quantisation, no considerations of electron spin etc. About Majorana fermions: yes, I spent several years of research on that topic. Axions: a topological state, of course, trivial :-) Also merons and skyrnions are topological states, but I'm less familiar with them.
  • LeopoldS on 04 Aug 10
     
    "Non-Abelian systems1, 2 contain composite particles that are neither fermions nor bosons and have a quantum statistics that is far richer than that offered by the fermion-boson dichotomy. The presence of such quasiparticles manifests itself in two remarkable ways. First, it leads to a degeneracy of the ground state that is not based on simple symmetry considerations and is robust against perturbations and interactions with the environment. Second, an interchange of two quasiparticles does not merely multiply the wavefunction by a sign, as is the case for fermions and bosons. Rather, it takes the system from one ground state to another. If a series of interchanges is made, the final state of the system will depend on the order in which these interchanges are being carried out, in sharp contrast to what happens when similar operations are performed on identical fermions or bosons." wow, this paper by Stern reads really weired ... any of you ever looked into this?
  • jmlloren on 04 Aug 10
     
    C'mon Leopold, it's as trivial as the topological states, AKA axions! Regarding the question, not me!
  • LeopoldS on 04 Aug 10
     
    just looked up the wikipedia entry on axions .... at least they have some creativity in names giving: "In supersymmetric theories the axion has both a scalar and a fermionic superpartner. The fermionic superpartner of the axion is called the axino, the scalar superpartner is called the saxion. In some models, the saxion is the dilaton. They are all bundled up in a chiral superfield. The axino has been predicted to be the lightest supersymmetric particle in such a model.[24] In part due to this property, it is considered a candidate for the composition of dark matter.[25]"
  • jmlloren on 04 Aug 10
     
    Thank's Leopold. Sorry Luzi for being ironic concerning the triviality of the axions. Now, Leo confirmed me that indeed is a trivial matter. I have problems with models where EVERYTHING is involved.
  • Luzi Bergamin on 04 Aug 10
     
    Well, that's the theory of everything, isn't it?? Seriously: I don't think that theoretically there is a lot of new stuff here. Topological aspects of (non-Abelian) theories became extremely popular in the context of string theory. The reason is very simple: topological theories are much simpler than "normal" and since string theory anyway is far too complicated to be solved, people just consider purely topological theories, then claiming that this has something to do with the real world, which of course is plainly wrong. So what I think is new about these topological insulators are the claims that one can actually fabricate a material which more or less accurately mimics a topological theory and that these materials are of practical use. Still, they are a little bit the poor man's version of the topological theories fundamental physicists like to look at since electrdynamics is an Abelian theory.
  • jmlloren on 04 Aug 10
     
    I have the feeling, not the knowledge, that you are right. However, I think that the implications of this light quantum field effects are great. The fact of being able to sustain two currents polarized in spin is a technological breakthrough.
  • LeopoldS on 04 Aug 10
     
    not sure how much I can contribute to your apparently educated debate here but if I remember well from my work for the master, these non-Abelian theories were all but "simple" as Luzi puts it ... and from a different perspective: to me the whole thing of being able to describe such non-Abelian systems nicely indicates that they should in one way or another also have some appearance in Nature (would be very surprised if not) - though this is of course no argument that makes string theory any better or closer to what Luzi called reality ....
  • Luzi Bergamin on 04 Aug 10
     
    Well, electrodynamics remains an Abelian theory. From the theoretical point of view this is less interesting than non-Abelian ones, since in 4D the fibre bundle of a U(1) theory is trivial (great buzz words, eh!) But in topological insulators the point of view is slightly different since one always has the insulator (topological theory), its surrounding (propagating theory) and most importantly the interface between the two. This is a new situation that people from field and string theory were not really interested in.
  • Dario Izzo on 04 Aug 10
     
    guys... how would you explain this to your gran mothers?
  • jmlloren on 05 Aug 10
  • LeopoldS on 07 Aug 10
     
    *you* tried *your* best .... ??
2More

Watch construction of Nasa's new Mars rover live on the web - 0 views

www.physorg.com/...10-10-nasa-mars-rover-web.html nasa space
shared by Joris _ on 22 Oct 10 - No Cached
  • Joris _ on 22 Oct 10
     
    nice!!! They always have excellent ideas!
  • Ma Ru on 22 Oct 10
     
    What about installing a webcam in ACT's meeting room?
4More

Selective attention processes - 2 views

www.youtube.com/...NatureVideoChannel
shared by Giusi Schiavone on 27 Oct 10 - No Cached
  • Giusi Schiavone on 27 Oct 10
     
    they use invasive BCI for accessing to single neural cell on patiences with epilepsy.
  • ...1 more comment...
  • LeopoldS on 27 Oct 10
     
    scary ...
  • Giusi Schiavone on 27 Oct 10
     
    why? I think they used patients with epilepsy because they already had an implants with electrodes, for other reasons. Otherwise in normal subjects they could not obtain these results. I wonder who (among normal subject) would like to have electrodes implanted in the brain....thus they use subjects that already have an implant.
  • LeopoldS on 27 Oct 10
     
    well if I got it correctly then the had to cut and fizzle around in these brains ... always scaring, and then they claim that we have in our brains in single neurons abstract images e.g. of marilyn monroe . they speak even of Marilyn Monroe neurons :-) similarily his question "who is in control? are we in control of our neurons or our neurons in control of us? " ....
5More

[1010.3437] Dynamical mass generation via space compactification in graphene - 0 views

arxiv.org/1010.3437 technology science PHY
shared by santecarloni on 27 Oct 10 - No Cached
  • santecarloni on 27 Oct 10
     
    Is it really possible?
  • ...2 more comments...
  • Luzi Bergamin on 27 Oct 10
     
    The affiliation is Saudi Arabia and Marocco, not countries famous for their contributions to physics... But nonetheless, yes this is possible, to me it even looks very plausible! But you should know that the term "mass" in this context just means a certain parameter in the dynamical equations and only has a loose relation to what we usually call "mass" in the macroscopic world.
  • LeopoldS on 27 Oct 10
     
    ok - admit that I only read the abstract but to me the seems to be a little bit of magic happening ... even if "mass is only a certain parameter in the dynamical equations" ... I assume it still bears some "heavy" consequences in terms of their speed, interactions etc, no? and assuming that you gradually bend such a structure from a 2D to a 1D one ... does it "gain" mass gradually? all very strange to me ...
  • santecarloni on 28 Oct 10
     
    I think the problem is in the boundary conditions... the issue is that if you use and infinite sheet or a cylinder in the equations you always take cyclic boundary condition. If this guys are right then the mass of the quasi-particles in a crystal depends on its topology... this is a major thing...
  • Luzi Bergamin on 28 Oct 10
     
    BINGO!! It's almost like good ol' Kaluza-Klein...
5More

Evidence for a Collective Intelligence Factor in the Performance of Human Groups - 2 views

www.sciencemag.org/...686 intelligence team talking women
shared by Isabelle DB on 05 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • Isabelle DB on 05 Nov 10
     
    What do you think of this one ?
  • ...2 more comments...
  • Luzi Bergamin on 05 Nov 10
     
    Great! Women perhaps are not more intelligent as individuals, but now at least they have more collective intelligence... Interesting research topic, though, but I doubt that any of these results can be generalized to real live situations.
  • Isabelle DB on 05 Nov 10
     
    Maybe by passing the message to ensure some men understand it would be their interest to have (more) women in their teams ? No problem at the ACT, this maybe why it works so well ? :-))
  • Luzi Bergamin on 05 Nov 10
     
    Well, that's perhaps the reason, why meetings were always so f... boring while I was at ACT :D
  • sreejanag on 08 Nov 10
     
    Lots more resources on collective intelligence: http://cci.mit.edu/
2More

How to walk through walls - 6 views

physicsworld.com/...44576 phy transformation_optics
shared by pacome delva on 15 Dec 10 - No Cached
  • Luzi Bergamin on 15 Dec 10
     
    and yet another TO nonsense... And why always Harry Potter, dont't these darn scientists have more imagination or is their intellectual level just as low as being unable to read more complex literature than J.K. Rawling?? btw.: how about this skype session on TO, Leo?
  • dejanpetkow on 15 Dec 10
     
    Combine it with touchable holography (search for SIGGRAPH 2009 at youtube) and name it Holosuite 0.1.
4More

Yet another issue to take into account when you want to travel at c - 1 views

www.newscientist.com/...lls-especially-warp-speed.html PHY interstellar travel human spaceflight speed of light
shared by Ma Ru on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • Ma Ru on 19 Feb 10
     
    While my attitude to articles about interstellar travel is generally sceptical, this one seems to raise quite an interesting point... Physicists?
  • ...1 more comment...
  • pacome delva on 19 Feb 10
     
    mmm, I think that if we manage to travel at 99.999998 per cent the speed of light, we'll have the technology to deviate these atoms ! one way could be a super strong magnetic field, or a super laser that would act as an ice breaker with the radiation pressure (the good thing is that light always travel at the speed of light, even if you are at 99.999998 per cent the speed of light)
  • Francesco Biscani on 19 Feb 10
     
    Also, remember never to dereference null pointers.
  • Ma Ru on 19 Feb 10
     
    True, it's almost like installing accelerometers upside down...
4More

Special relativity passes key test - 2 views

physicsworld.com/...40834 phy quantum_gravity special_relativity gamma_ray_burst
shared by pacome delva on 15 Dec 09 - Cached
  • Granot and colleagues studied the radiation from a gamma-ray burst – associated with a highly energetic explosion in a distant galaxy – that was spotted by NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope on 10 May this year. They analysed the radiation at different wavelengths to see whether there were any signs that photons with different energies arrived at Fermi's detectors at different times.
  • According to Granot, these results "strongly disfavour" quantum-gravity theories in which the speed of light varies linearly with photon energy, which might include some variations of string theory or loop quantum gravity. "I would not use the term 'rule out'," he says, "as most models do not have exact predictions for the energy scale associated with this violation of Lorentz invariance. However, our observational requirement that such an energy scale would be well above the Planck energy makes such models unnatural."
  • Dario Izzo on 16 Dec 09
     
    essentially they made an experiment that does not prove or disprove anything -big deal-... what is the scientific value of "strongly disfavour"??? I also like the sentence "most models do not have exact predictions for the energy scale associated with this violation of Lorentz invariance" ... but if this is true WHAT IS THE POINT OF THE EXPERIMENT!!!! God, physics is in trouble ....
  • pacome delva on 17 Dec 09
     
    hum, null result experiments are not useless !!! there is always the hope of finding "something wrong", which would lead to a great discovery. For the state of theoretical physics (the "no exact predictions" quote), i totally agree that physics is in trouble... That's what happen when physicists don't care anymore about experiments...! All you can do now is drawing "nice"graph with upper bounds on some parameters of an all tunable weird theory !
14More

STLport: An Interview with A. Stepanov - 2 views

www.stlport.org/...StepanovUSA.html computer science
shared by Francesco Biscani on 23 Mar 10 - Cached
  • Generic programming is a programming method that is based in finding the most abstract representations of efficient algorithms.
  • I spent several months programming in Java.
  • for the first time in my life programming in a new language did not bring me new insights
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • it has no intellectual value whatsoever
  • Java is clearly an example of a money oriented programming (MOP).
  • Francesco Biscani on 23 Mar 10
     
    One of the authors of the STL (C++'s Standard Template Library) explains generic programming and slams Java.
  • ...6 more comments...
  • Ma Ru on 24 Mar 10
     
    "Java is clearly an example of a money oriented programming (MOP)." Exactly. And for the industry it's the money that matters. Whatever mathematicians think about it.
  • Joris _ on 24 Mar 10
     
    It is actually a good thing that it is "MOP" (even though I do not agree with this term): that is what makes it inter-operable, light and easy to learn. There is no point in writing fancy codes, if it does not bring anything to the end-user, but only for geeks to discuss incomprehensible things in forums. Anyway, I am pretty sure we can find a Java guy slamming C++ ;)
  • Francesco Biscani on 24 Mar 10
     
    Personally, I never understood what the point of Java is, given that: 1) I do not know of any developer (maybe Marek?) that uses it for intellectual pleasure/curiosity/fun whatever, given the possibility of choice - this to me speaks loudly on the objective qualities of the language more than any industrial-corporate marketing bullshit (for the record, I argue that Python is more interoperable, lighter and easier to learn than Java - which is why, e.g., Google is using it heavily); 2) I have used a software developed in Java maybe a total of 5 times on any computer/laptop I owned over 15 years. I cannot name of one single Java project that I find necessary or even useful; for my usage of computers, Java could disappear overnight without even noticing. Then of course one can argue as much as one wants about the "industry choosing Java", to which I would counterargue with examples of industry doing stupid things and making absurd choices. But I suppose it would be a kind of pointless discussion, so I'll just stop here :)
  • Joris _ on 24 Mar 10
     
    "At Google, python is one of the 3 "official languages" alongside with C++ and Java". Java runs everywhere (the byte code itself) that is I think the only reason it became famous. Python, I guess, is more heavy if it were to run on your web browser! I think every language has its pros and cons, but I agree Java is not the answer to everything... Java is used in MATLAB, some web applications, mobile phones apps, ... I would be a bit in trouble if it were to disappear today :(
  • Dario Izzo on 24 Mar 10
     
    I personally do not believe in interoperability :)
  • Ma Ru on 24 Mar 10
     
    Well, I bet you'd notice an overnight disappearance of java, because half of the internet would vanish... J2EE technologies are just omnipresent there... I'd rather not even *think* about developing a web application/webservice/web-whatever in standard C++... is it actually possible?? Perhaps with some weird Microsoft solutions... I bet your bank online services are written in Java. Certainly not in PHP+MySQL :) Industry has chosen Java not because of industrial-corporate marketing bullshit, but because of economics... it enables you develop robustly, reliably, error-prone, modular, well integrated etc... software. And the costs? Well, using java technologies you can set-up enterprise-quality web application servers, get a fully featured development environment (which is better than ANY C/C++/whatever development environment I've EVER seen) at the cost of exactly 0 (zero!) USD/GBP/EUR... Since many years now, the central issue in software development is not implementing algorithms, it's building applications. And that's where Java outperforms many other technologies. The final remark, because I may be mistakenly taken for an apostle of Java or something... I love the idea of generic programming, C++ is my favourite programming language (and I used to read Stroustroup before sleep), at leisure time I write programs in Python... But if I were to start a software development company, then, apart from some very niche applications like computer games, it most probably would use Java as main technology.
  • Francesco Biscani on 24 Mar 10
     
    "I'd rather not even *think* about developing a web application/webservice/web-whatever in standard C++... is it actually possible?? Perhaps with some weird Microsoft solutions... I bet your bank online services are written in Java. Certainly not in PHP+MySQL :)" Doing in C++ would be awesomely crazy, I agree :) But as I see it there are lots of huge websites that operate on PHP, see for instance Facebook. For the banks and the enterprise market, as a general rule I tend to take with a grain of salt whatever spin comes out from them; in the end behind every corporate IT decision there is a little smurf just trying to survive and have the back covered :) As they used to say in the old times, "No one ever got fired for buying IBM". "Industry has chosen Java not because of industrial-corporate marketing bullshit, but because of economics... it enables you develop robustly, reliably, error-prone, modular, well integrated etc... software. And the costs? Well, using java technologies you can set-up enterprise-quality web application servers, get a fully featured development environment (which is better than ANY C/C++/whatever development environment I've EVER seen) at the cost of exactly 0 (zero!) USD/GBP/EUR... Since many years now, the central issue in software development is not implementing algorithms, it's building applications. And that's where Java outperforms many other technologies." Apart from the IDE considerations (on which I cannot comment, since I'm not a IDE user myself), I do not see how Java beats the competition in this regard (again, Python and the huge software ecosystem surrounding it). My impression is that Java's success is mostly due to Sun pushing it like there is no tomorrow and bundling it with their hardware business.
  • Joris _ on 24 Mar 10
     
    OK, I think there is a bit of everything, wrong and right, but you have to acknowledge that Python is not always the simplest. For info, Facebook uses Java (if you upload picture for instance), and PHP is very limited. So definitely, in company, engineers like you and me select the language, it is not a marketing or political thing. And in the case of fb, they come up with the conclusion that PHP, and Java don't do everything but complement each other. As you say Python as many things around, but it might be too much for simple applications. Otherwise, I would seriously be interested by a study of how to implement a Python-like system on-board spacecrafts and what are the advantages over mixing C, Ada and Java.
2More

How to quadruple your productivity with an army of student interns - 6 views

blog.ksplice.com/...oductivity-with-an-intern-army inf
shared by Francesco Biscani on 13 Mar 10 - Cached
  • Francesco Biscani on 13 Mar 10
     
    Potential lessons for out own trainee program?
  • LeopoldS on 16 Mar 10
     
    well - part of it we already do ... e.g. : (did you see the picture in the report?) "Tolerate a little crowding. It took a little creativity to suddenly find a dozen new workspaces in our two-room office. Fortunately, we've found that a room can always fit one more person-and by induction, you can fit as many as you need. (All those years we spent proving math theorems came in handy after all.) "
7More

Seminar: You and Your Research, Dr. Richard W. Hamming (March 7, 1986) - 10 views

www.chris-lott.org/...kaiser.html science research Methods methodology Nobel Bell Labs Los Alamos
shared by Luís F. Simões on 07 Jan 11 - Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • This talk centered on Hamming's observations and research on the question "Why do so few scientists make significant contributions and so many are forgotten in the long run?" From his more than forty years of experience, thirty of which were at Bell Laboratories, he has made a number of direct observations, asked very pointed questions of scientists about what, how, and why they did things, studied the lives of great scientists and great contributions, and has done introspection and studied theories of creativity. The talk is about what he has learned in terms of the properties of the individual scientists, their abilities, traits, working habits, attitudes, and philosophy.
  • Luís F. Simões on 07 Jan 11
     
    Here's the link related to one of the lunch time discussions. I recommend it to every single one of you. I promise it will be worth your time. If you're lazy, you have a summary here (good stuff also in the references, have a look at them):      Erren TC, Cullen P, Erren M, Bourne PE (2007) Ten Simple Rules for Doing Your Best Research, According to Hamming. PLoS Comput Biol 3(10): e213.
  • ...3 more comments...
  • pacome delva on 11 Jan 11
     
    I'm also pretty sure that the ones who are remembered are not the ones who tried to be... so why all these rules !? I think it's bullshit...
  • Luís F. Simões on 11 Jan 11
     
    The seminar is not a manual on how to achieve fame, but rather an analysis on how others were able to perform very significant work. The two things are in some cases related, but the seminar's focus is on the second.
  • pacome delva on 12 Jan 11
     
    Then read a good book on the life of Copernic, it's the anti-manual of Hamming... he breaks all the rules !
  • LeopoldS on 12 Jan 11
     
    honestly I think that some of these rules actually make sense indeed ... but I am always curious to get a good book recommendation (which book of Copernic would you recommend?) btw Pacome: we are in Paris ... in case you have some time ...
  • pacome delva on 12 Jan 11
     
    I warmly recommend this book, a bit old but fascinating: The sleepwalkers from Arthur Koestler. It shows that progress in science is not straight and do not obey any rule... It is not as rational as most of people seem to believe today. http://www.amazon.com/Sleepwalkers-History-Changing-Universe-Compass/dp/0140192468/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1294835558&sr=8-1 Otherwise yes I have some time ! my phone number: 0699428926 We live around Denfert-Rochereau and Montparnasse. We could go for a beer this evening ?
4More

Video - The Great Global Warming Swindle - 2 views

video.google.com/videoplay
shared by duncan barker on 06 Jan 11 - Cached
  • LeopoldS on 07 Jan 11
     
    joke posting??
  • ...1 more comment...
  • duncan barker on 07 Jan 11
     
    No. People SHOULD look at alternative views to be more informed. Criticism of areas of science is a GOOD thing, it helps science to grow. Unfortunately, when it comes to this issue, people, including ACT members have a closed mind and do not want to listen to alternative view points. But I am sure many people in the group have seen it before. Have you?
  • duncan barker on 07 Jan 11
     
    This is why i always post crazy stuff .... its disruptive. ..... although sometimes its a joke ;)
  • LeopoldS on 07 Jan 11
     
    why not this one then? http://www.venganza.org/
3More

Eco - "Writings: IBM vs. Mac" - 5 views

www.themodernword.com/...eco_mac_vs_pc.html inf
shared by Francesco Biscani on 07 Mar 11 - Cached
LeopoldS and Ma Ru liked it
  • The fact is that the world is divided between users of the Macintosh computer and users of MS-DOS compatible computers. I am firmly of the opinion that the Macintosh is Catholic and that DOS is Protestant.
  • Francesco Biscani on 07 Mar 11
     
    An amusing opinion piece by Italian writer Umberto Eco.
  • LeopoldS on 07 Mar 11
     
    read this first time 10 years ago - but always nice to re-read indeed ...
1More

Who uses Facebook? An investigation into the relationship between the Big Five, shyness... - 2 views

www.sciencedirect.com/science science social facebook Web 2.0
shared by Ma Ru on 09 Mar 11 - No Cached
  • Ma Ru on 09 Mar 11
     
    Some introspection's always good...
6More

Google's 8-Point Plan to Help Managers Improve - 7 views

www.nytimes.com/...13hire.html CMS INF
shared by Dario Izzo on 16 Mar 11 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • Dario Izzo on 16 Mar 11
     
    Well, well, Google says it. And all is a result of an algorithm..... Among the interesting fincings the algorithm says that technical competence of the boss is not needed..... against their own beliefs!!
  • ...3 more comments...
  • LeopoldS on 16 Mar 11
     
    "Although people are always looking for the next new thing in leadership," he said, "Google's data suggest that not much has changed in terms of what makes for an effective leader."
  • nikolas smyrlakis on 16 Mar 11
     
    "Managers often want to hire people who seem just like them" does the ACT look like the managers or the managers like the ACT ? hmmm
  • Ma Ru on 16 Mar 11
     
    "the topic often feels a bit like golf" What other comparison can one use in an article aimed towards managers? :D
  • LeopoldS on 17 Mar 11
     
    nobody in the ACT plays golf yet as far as I know ...
  • Ma Ru on 17 Mar 11
     
    Which is a pity as you have a golf field not that far away :-D Maybe a good idea for a nice team building event??
4More

Black Holes play drums - 8 views

www.jannalevin.com/science.html
shared by Dario Izzo on 08 Jun 11 - No Cached
  • Dario Izzo on 08 Jun 11
     
    Another great presentation at this conference!! Plus I always wanted to enter the numerical computations of orbit around black holes.... with Luzi we had a project on formation flying around black holes .... revolutionary idea (of course we did not do it!!!)
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Ma Ru on 08 Jun 11
     
    formation flying around black holes... so practical...
  • pacome delva on 08 Jun 11
     
    nice movie, and song :) we should definitely implement GR orbits in pagmo !
  • Dario Izzo on 08 Jun 11
     
    I agree Marek, yet was it practical for Apollonio to study conic sections more than 1500 years before Kepler found his three laws? And here is a good paper to start with: http://prd.aps.org/abstract/PRD/v77/i10/e103005, making an analogy between the periodic table and the taxomony of all orbits around a black hole.
16More

Bitcoin P2P Currency: The Most Dangerous Project We've Ever Seen - 10 views

launch.is/...dangerous-project-weve-ev.html bitcoin p2p money disruptive
shared by Luís F. Simões on 16 May 11 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • After month of research and discovery, we’ve learned the following:1. Bitcoin is a technologically sound project.2. Bitcoin is unstoppable without end-user prosecution.3. Bitcoin is the most dangerous open-source project ever created.4. Bitcoin may be the most dangerous technological project since the internet itself.5. Bitcoin is a political statement by technotarians (technological libertarians).*6. Bitcoins will change the world unless governments ban them with harsh penalties.
  • The benefits of a currency like this:a) Your coins can’t be frozen (like a Paypal account can be)b) Your coins can’t be trackedc) Your coins can’t be taxedd) Transaction costs are extremely low (sorry credit card companies)
  • An individual with the name -- or perhaps handle -- of Satoshi Nakamoto first wrote about bitcoins in a paper called Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • * We made this term up to describe the “good people” of the internet who believe in the fundamental rights of individuals to be free, have free speech, fight hypocrisy and stand behind logic, technology and science over religion, political structure and tradition. These are the people who build and support things like Wikileaks, Anonymous, Linux and Wikipedia. They think that people can, and should, govern themselves. They are against external forms of control such as DRM, laws that are bought and sold by lobbyists, and religions like Scientology. They include splinter groups that enforce these ideals in the form of hacktivism, such as the takedown of the Sony Playstation Network after Sony tried to prosecute a hacker for unlocking its console.
  • Ma Ru on 17 May 11
     
    Sounds good!
  • ...9 more comments...
  • pacome delva on 18 May 11
     
    wow it's frigthening! it's the dream of every anarchist, every drug, arm, human dealer! the world made as a global fiscal paradise... the idea is clever however it will not replace real money because 1 - no one will build a fortune on bitcoin if a technological breakthrough can ruin them 2 - government never allowed parallel money to flourish on their territory, so it will be almost impossible to change bitcoin against euros or dollars
  • Nicholas Lan on 18 May 11
     
    interesting stuff anyone read cryptonomicon by neal stephenson? similar theme.
  • Luís F. Simões on 18 May 11
     
    :) yes. One of the comments on reddit was precisely drawing the parallels with Neal Stephenson's Snowcrash / Diamond Age / Cryptonomicon. Interesting stuff indeed. It has a lot of potential for misuse, but also opens up new possibilities. We've discussed recently how emerging technologies will drive social change. Whether it's the likes of NSA / CIA who will benefit the most from the Twitters, Facebooks and so on, by gaining greater power for control, or whether individuals are being empowered to at least an identical degree. We saw last year VISA / PayPal censoring WikiLeaks... Well, here's a way for any individual to support such an organization, in a fully anonymous and uncontrollable way...
  • tvinko on 18 May 11
     
    One of my colleagues has made a nice, short write-up about BitCoin: http://www.pds.ewi.tudelft.nl/~victor/bitcoin.html
  • LeopoldS on 18 May 11
     
    very nice analysis indeed - thanks Tamas for sharing it!
  • pacome delva on 20 May 11
     
    mmm I'm not an expert but it seemed to me that, even if these criticisms are true, there is one fundamental difference between the money you exchange on internet via your bank, and bitcoins. The first one is virtual money and the second one aims at being real, physical, money, even if digital, in the same way as banknotes, coins, or gold.
  • nikolas smyrlakis on 20 May 11
     
    An algorithm wanna-be central bank issuing untraceable tax free money between internet users? not more likely than the end of the world supposed to take place tomorrow, in my opinion. Algorithms don't usually assault women though !:P
  • LeopoldS on 21 May 11
     
    well, most money is anyway just virtual and only based on expectations and trust ... (see e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_supply) and thus if people trust that this "money" has some value in the sense that they can get something of value to them in exchange, then not much more is needed it seems to me ...
  • pacome delva on 23 May 11
     
    @Leopold: ok let's use the rigth words then. Bitcoin aim at being a currency ("physical objects generally accepted as a medium of exchange" from wikipedia), different than the "demand deposit". In the article proposed by Tamas he compares what cannot be compared (currencies, demand deposits and their mean of exchange). The interesting question is wether one can create a digital currency which is too difficult to counterfeit. As far as I know, there is no existing digital currency except this bitcoins (and maybe the currencies from games as second life and others, but which are of limited use in real world).
  • nikolas smyrlakis on 23 May 11
     
    well of course money is trust, and even more loans and credit and even more stock and bond markets. It all represents trust and expectations. However since the first banks 500 years ago and the first loans etc. etc., and as well the fact that bonds and currencies bring down whole countries (Greece lately), and are mainly controlled by large financial centres and (central) banks, banks have always been on the winning side no matter what and that isn't going to change easily. So if you are talking about these new currencies it would be a new era, not just a new currency. So should Greece convert its debt to bitcoins ;P ?
  • pacome delva on 23 May 11
     
    well, from 1936 to 1993 the central bank of france was owned by the state and was supposed to serve the general interest...
6More

BBC News - Speed-of-light experiments give baffling result at Cern - 5 views

www.bbc.co.uk/...science-environment-15017484 PHY physics Einstein
shared by LeopoldS on 22 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • LeopoldS on 22 Sep 11
     
    Sante, Luzi have a look at this???!!!
  • ...3 more comments...
  • Luís F. Simões on 23 Sep 11
     
    and here's the xkcd on it: http://xkcd.com/955/
  • Luzi Bergamin on 23 Sep 11
     
    And here's the arXiv paper http://arxiv.org/abs/1109.4897 Serious? Difficult to say. I'm theorist and can't really rate their measurement techniques. Certainly be cautious, mostly such things disappear faster than they appeared.
  • LeopoldS on 23 Sep 11
     
    it took them 3 years to "appear"!
  • Luzi Bergamin on 23 Sep 11
     
    Leo, you mean that they measured 3 years? That's not a point to criticize: since the only interaction of neutrinos with matter is the Weak Interaction (which is indeed very, very weak), it is extremely hard to get a reasonable statistic. By the same reason, it's essentially impossible to shield the experiment from the background. And this background (solar neutrinos, cosmic radiation neutrinos) is huge.
  • pacome delva on 28 Sep 11
     
    for sure a result to be taken seriously. It makes a buzz in my lab... but always be cautious with this kind of declaration, that hugely violates all physics we know and even most of the reasonable alternative theories... Remember the Pionneer anomaly for which it took almost ten years to set up that finally its a thermal effect.
« First ‹ Previous 41 - 60 of 74 Next ›
Showing 20▼ items per page