• The Science Thread V2
    177 replies, posted
I got a brief tour of the new Blue Waters super computer facility at the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign. It's the fastest educational supercomputer in the world. Warning, huge low quality panorama. [img_thumb]http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/6983/k630.jpg[/img_thumb] The floor tiles are all removable and there's 6 feet of space underneath for water piping and cables. I seriously felt like I was in the Batcave.
[QUOTE=Falubii;42536870]I got a brief tour of the new Blue Waters super computer facility at the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign. It's the fastest educational supercomputer in the world. Warning, huge low quality panorama. [img_thumb]http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/6983/k630.jpg[/img_thumb] The floor tiles are all removable and there's 6 feet of space underneath for water piping and cables. I seriously felt like I was in the Batcave.[/QUOTE] Can it run Skyrim though? I think not
[QUOTE=KluKluxKid;42536918]Can it run Skyrim though? I think not[/QUOTE] It has 79,000 processors and 1.5 petabytes of physical memory.
Was having a discussion with my quantum mechanics lecturer a few weeks ago with some classmates after class and I asked him a question that I asked another lecturer (who's possibly the single most intelligent person at the entire uni) a few days prior which almost broke him. From it we got onto talking about a grand unified theory and then somebody mentioned string theory. From that comment my lecturer gave us an interesting talk about how string theory is 'worse than wrong' because at least a wrong theory makes wrong predictions about the universe which can then be tested, whereas string theory doesn't make any new testable predictions at all about the universe at all so you can't even do an experiment to see if it's wrong or not. I thought that was pretty interesting food for thought. As much as I love theoretical physics my lecturer is right - physics is fundamentally an 'experimental' science because even when you're doing the theory portion of it you're still aiming to describe nature, to explain the universe, and as such your models have to be able to make testable predictions about the nature of the universe itself to hold any real merit. String theory does not do that.
Watch out Johnny wants to be a string theorist. Don't make him bring down the ban hammer.
[QUOTE=Falubii;42640784]Watch out Johnny wants to be a string theorist. Don't make him bring down the ban hammer.[/QUOTE] As smart as Johnny is I respect the word of my lecturer who has a Ph.D in theoretical physics more-so than his.
[QUOTE=Falubii;42640784]Watch out Johnny wants to be a string theorist. Don't make him bring down the ban hammer.[/QUOTE] Lol, when you want to do string theory, you have to be able to handle detractors. There are a lot. [QUOTE=sltungle;42637516]Was having a discussion with my quantum mechanics lecturer a few weeks ago with some classmates after class and I asked him a question that I asked another lecturer (who's possibly the single most intelligent person at the entire uni) a few days prior which almost broke him. From it we got onto talking about a grand unified theory and then somebody mentioned string theory. From that comment my lecturer gave us an interesting talk about how string theory is 'worse than wrong' because at least a wrong theory makes wrong predictions about the universe which can then be tested, whereas string theory doesn't make any new testable predictions at all about the universe at all so you can't even do an experiment to see if it's wrong or not. I thought that was pretty interesting food for thought. As much as I love theoretical physics my lecturer is right - physics is fundamentally an 'experimental' science because even when you're doing the theory portion of it you're still aiming to describe nature, to explain the universe, and as such your models have to be able to make testable predictions about the nature of the universe itself to hold any real merit. String theory does not do that.[/QUOTE] I think your lecturer's opinion is ridiculous. Really it doesn't take anything more than to note that all models of string theory predict supersymmetry and we've already begun searching for superparticles at the LHC (we haven't found any in its energy range) to show that your professor is misinformed. That's falsifiability right there. The existence of supersymmetry wouldn't prove string theory true, of course, but it's evidence, and showing that supersymmetry is incorrect would pretty much kill string theory dead. Theories with large extra dimensions could also make string theory very directly testable. (If not, directly seeing the string nature of particles could be a long while.) I'm not gonna say that string theory doesn't have problems. I've had this discussion with experimentalists here and I'd even go so far as to agree that "string theory" could accurately be renamed "string hypothesis," but not having been tested =/= not having made a testable prediction =/= unfalsifiable. String theory is still in its infancy. It's been a long infancy but that's because it's a poorly understood theory, but frankly, problems or not, string theory is still our best candidate for a theory of quantum gravity, so the theorists aren't gonna drop it until it's dead in the water. [editline]25th October 2013[/editline] What does he research, out of curiosity?
There are plenty of PhDs who do work on String Theory, so I don't think the fact that your lecturer isn't a fan makes it inaccurate. Also I like this picture, [img_thumb]http://img.pandawhale.com/post-25044-Neil-DeGrasse-Tyson-meme-There-3utl.jpeg[/img_thumb]
Should decide where to apply and continue studying at in 6 months. Was thinking physics might be interesting enough to keep on studying, no idea where though. Also finals coming in March and I don't remember anything.
[QUOTE=JohnnyMo1;42641481]Lol, when you want to do string theory, you have to be able to handle detractors. There are a lot. I think your lecturer's opinion is ridiculous. Really it doesn't take anything more than to note that all models of string theory predict supersymmetry and we've already begun searching for superparticles at the LHC (we haven't found any in its energy range) to show that your professor is misinformed. That's falsifiability right there. The existence of supersymmetry wouldn't prove string theory true, of course, but it's evidence, and showing that supersymmetry is incorrect would pretty much kill string theory dead. Theories with large extra dimensions could also make string theory very directly testable. (If not, directly seeing the string nature of particles could be a long while.) I'm not gonna say that string theory doesn't have problems. I've had this discussion with experimentalists here and I'd even go so far as to agree that "string theory" could accurately be renamed "string hypothesis," but not having been tested =/= not having made a testable prediction =/= unfalsifiable. String theory is still in its infancy. It's been a long infancy but that's because it's a poorly understood theory, but frankly, problems or not, string theory is still our best candidate for a theory of quantum gravity, so the theorists aren't gonna drop it until it's dead in the water. [editline]25th October 2013[/editline] What does he research, out of curiosity?[/QUOTE] I don't personally know enough about the area to make any proper informed comments, but I do think that after decades we should have gotten somewhere a bit further by now than where we are with it. I mean, you said it yourself, it's been a bloody long infancy. I've always had a bit of a suspicion that maybe we've not yet developed the necessary maths to understand some things - I mean, it's hard to imagine a time before calculus was known but apparently it existed. Perhaps the issues we're having with unifying general relativity and quantum mechanics are going to remain issues until some revolution is made in the world of mathematics. And about my lecturer, [quote]Jared Cole is a senior research fellow in the School of Applied Sciences. He is a theoretical physicist, specialising in quantum theory and its application in electronics, computing and condensed-matter physics. Jared has extensive collaborations with both theoretical and experimental researchers overseas and within Australia. He has also taught various physics subjects at undergraduate and graduate level, both in Australia and Germany. His current research interests include quantum circuit theory, spin physics, decoherence, measurement and entanglement theory, quantum information and computing.[/quote]
[QUOTE=sltungle;42647473]I don't personally know enough about the area to make any proper informed comments, but I do think that after decades we should have gotten somewhere a bit further by now than where we are with it. I mean, you said it yourself, it's been a bloody long infancy. I've always had a bit of a suspicion that maybe we've not yet developed the necessary maths to understand some things - I mean, it's hard to imagine a time before calculus was known but apparently it existed. Perhaps the issues we're having with unifying general relativity and quantum mechanics are going to remain issues until some revolution is made in the world of mathematics. And about my lecturer,[/QUOTE] The thing is that it's still the most developed theory of quantum gravity and best hope for a unified theory that we have, which means that it's not a problem with string theory alone, but with the field as a whole. It's not like we're gonna throw it away because it's slow going. It's not as though nothing is being done but string theory has tended to go through periods of rapid growth and then slow dormancy.
Regarding your lecturer, I'm sure he is a very intelligent and qualified individual. BUT, there are many intelligent and qualified individuals who think the best use of their research time is String Theory. Because of that I personally don't have an opinion on it. I can't understand it and the professionals haven't formed a consensus.
Does anyone have a good article/text about Superparticles? This is like the first time I've ever heard of them, and the wiki page is a bit underwhelming.
Who's the motherfucker who decided kg as the SI unit? I'm gonna go beat them up because I took a physics test and when I finished, I remembered that the formulas I have are based off of the SI unit, but some of the problems I did I plugged in grams instead of kg because that was what I was given.
[QUOTE=titopei;42713507]Who's the motherfucker who decided kg as the SI unit? I'm gonna go beat them up because I took a physics test and when I finished, I remembered that the formulas I have are based off of the SI unit, but some of the problems I did I plugged in grams instead of kg because that was what I was given.[/QUOTE] Gotta convert bro. At this point when I see a gram or a centimeter I instinctively rewrite it. [editline]31st October 2013[/editline] So I attended a colloquium on the Non-equilibrium thermodynamics of space-time. A ton of professors and grad students were there. I'm only a freshman so I basically couldn't follow any of it.
[QUOTE=titopei;42713507]Who's the motherfucker who decided kg as the SI unit? I'm gonna go beat them up because I took a physics test and when I finished, I remembered that the formulas I have are based off of the SI unit, but some of the problems I did I plugged in grams instead of kg because that was what I was given.[/QUOTE] The French originally had it as the gram but then they realized gram is a bit weird for mass so they changed it to kilogram. It still irks me a lot. Also I've been busy figuring out what would happen if the Pope and Antipope accidentally met and ended up annihilating each other. I assumed the pope with all of his papal vestments and clothes and various things he carries would come to a weight of 80kg, and the antipope the same. Assuming 160kg of matter was annihilated, I get an explosion of about 3.4 gigatons. Not a happy day for the pope.
[QUOTE=titopei;42713507]Who's the motherfucker who decided kg as the SI unit? I'm gonna go beat them up because I took a physics test and when I finished, I remembered that the formulas I have are based off of the SI unit, but some of the problems I did I plugged in grams instead of kg because that was what I was given.[/QUOTE] Well that's not anyone's fault but your own. I'm sure everyone at some point has cocked up and forgotten to convert units but that's not the fault of the unit itself (or whoever created it) - it's yours.
[QUOTE=Sobotnik;42716340]The French originally had it as the gram but then they realized gram is a bit weird for mass so they changed it to kilogram. It still irks me a lot. Also I've been busy figuring out what would happen if the Pope and Antipope accidentally met and ended up annihilating each other. I assumed the pope with all of his papal vestments and clothes and various things he carries would come to a weight of 80kg, and the antipope the same. Assuming 160kg of matter was annihilated, I get an explosion of about 3.4 gigatons. Not a happy day for the pope.[/QUOTE] I feel like we've heard this before lol.
Visited Argonne National Lab the other day. Apparently they needed a $10 million detector for one of the experiments that was essentially just a hospital MRI machine. They weren't allocated the $10 million they asked for, so an undergraduate intern decided to look on eBay. Turns out a German hospital just upgraded to a new model and had their old MRI sitting in the parking lot just waiting to be given away.
Wait what does astrophysics have to do with bioterrorism? What college is this? What is this project? What? [editline]12th November 2013[/editline] This sounds like a shitty modern FPS plot. [editline]12th November 2013[/editline] I know an okay amount, I've read The Making of the Atomic Bomb (long ass book on the atomic bomb). When it comes to radioactivity most of my information comes from the side rather than formal education, but you can add me on Steam and I'll try to answer what I can.
I don't even understand what information they want from the three points they told you to cover: "Problem Formulation Exposure, Effects Management, and Communication." The most dangerous immediate issue would be the phosgene, because it's hard to detect and pretty toxic. It's actually classified as a [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Schedule_3_substances_(CWC)]schedule 3[/url] substance under the Chemical Weapons Convention, so IRL they probably would only produce it within the same facility that was using it. According to the [url=http://www.americanchemistry.com/ProductsTechnology/Phosgene/Phosgene-Safe-Practice-Guidelines-Manual/PDF-Transportation.pdf]IPCS[/url], gaseous or aqueous ammonia can be used to contain a gaseous phosgene spill. Now, this is all assuming that the train car goes up with the flaming, leaking ones. If your firefighters are able to put it out then that's all well and good, but they might want to give it a misting of ammonia just in case. As for the BPA spill, that shit's been in our bottles for a while and its health effects are still being debated, so I highly doubt anyone will just drop dead on the spot because of it. Now, the radioactivity. A dirty bomb is actually not very good at killing people. The official death toll from Chernobyl was only 30, and the citizens of Pripyat sat in that shit for days. The best move would be a massive evacuation form the area. Strontium-90 is probably the most problematic contaminant because it is chemically very similar to calcium, and can be absorbed into bones, which can lead to bone cancer or leukemia. Again, they didn't release all that much Strontium-90, so it probably won't do much. As for the spent nuclear fuels, again, with an evacuation I don't see many people dying. Depleted Uranium is only a threat as a toxic metal, nothing to do with its radioactivity. As for the nerve agents, I don't really know too much about nerve agents, so I'm assuming it would be best just to run away, with a gas mask if possible. How would you communicate this to people? Civil defense sirens and the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_Alert_System]Emergency Alert System[/url].
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