HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: bruck@mtha.usc.edu (Ronald Bruck)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.math
Subject: Re: Why no Nobel Prize in Math?
Date: 1 Jan 1993 08:18:16 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: mtha.usc.edu

In article <1993Jan1.060048.14960@news.vanderbilt.edu> mwmv@athena.cas.vanderbilt.edu (Michael Mogensen-Vermillion) writes:
>The version of the story that I heard several years ago in 
>an NPR interview with a Nobel biographer was that a woman 
>Nobel proposed to rejected him in favor of a mathematician 
>(whom the biographer did not name)  The biographer then went
>on to state that there was no historical evidence to support
>the story. 


A few years ago at some University reception or other I casually
mentioned the legendary explanation of why there is no Nobel prize
in mathematics (with my usual disclaimer that it sounded too much
like an "urban legend" to be true), when the chairman of the 
astronomy department exclaimed that ASTRONOMERS have a similar
legend, featuring an ASTRONOMER and Nobel's wife.  One year he mentioned
the story to his beginning astronomy class; it intrigued one student
so much that she wrote to the Nobel committee inquiring as to its
truth!  While he didn't remember the details--I would love to see
THAT reply--it was something to the effect that they had heard the
story, but that it was almost certainly false; Nobel was a bachelor.
(He did have a mistress who may have caused him such problems, however.)

The astronomer went on to say that the real reason for the exclusion
of astronomy was that in those days it was considered a branch of physics,
which Nobel had already provided for.  Similarly, I have read that the
real reason for the exclusion of mathematics is that it was not considered
a practical science; that Nobel excluded _theoretical_ sciences.

One thing I have learned from lurking on the net has been that there are
folks out there with profound expertise in almost anything you want to
know.  I don't remember seeing this in the FAQ (I must confess it's been
awhile since I've read it), but it should be there; and I, at least,
would greatly appreciate a scholarly treatment of this question by one
of the knowledgeable historians lurking out there.

--Ron Bruck
bruck@mtha.usc.edu
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Recent article on QM in AJP
Keywords: QM, correspondence principle, Arnol'd cat
Date: 31 Dec 92 17:01:53 GMT
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: marki@netcom.com (Mark N. Iverson)

In article <1992Dec31.081559.11949@netcom.com>, marki@netcom (Mark N. Iverson) writes:
>     "Does quantum mechanics obey the correspondence principle?
>      Is it complete?"

>      Joseph Ford and Giorgio Mantica

>      Am. J. Phys. 60 (12), December 1992

I was unimpressed by the earlier Ford, Mantica, Ristow "The Arnol'd cat:
Failure of the correspondence principle" PHYSICA D 50:493 (1991).  It was
a clever derivation of some algorithm complexity involved in the Arnol'd
cat, before and after quantizing.  While neat, it depends on distinguish-
ing the rational numbers from the irrationals, and just saying (his FAQ
response, p519) that quantum mechanics permits arbitrarily precise measure-
ments doesn't address this.  His further correctly identifying the real
issue in the question is the distinguishing the random from the non-random
doesn't tell us how to make this physical either.
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: Leigh Palmer <palmer@sfu.ca>
Subject: Re: General Relativity Tests
X-Xxmessage-Id: <A764E0895A021C1F@rs15-annex3.sfu.ca>
X-Xxdate: Mon, 28 Dec 92 00:49:13 GMT
Organization: Simon Fraser University
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1.1d16
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 00:48:00 GMT

In article <rsf1.725556854@Ra.MsState.Edu> Robert S. Fritzius, 
rsf1@Ra.MsState.Edu writes:

>It's my understanding that the  c^2 factor relates to Einstein's view
that
>gravitational effects (static and dynamic) travel at the speed of light
and
>that 'c' in this case represents *the* gravitational propagation speed.

You are putting these words into his mouth. Why is that your
understanding?
Surely from a high school level book one should not infer such a subtle
nuance!

The formula does, indeed, refer to a particle moving in a static 
gravitational field, that of the sun, and employs the approximation that
the 
sun is stationary. Thus the question of the speed with which that static 
gravitational field "propagates" never arises. The general dynamical
problem 
of two massive bodies (the so-called "Kepler Problem" which was solved by 
Newton for classical gravitational interaction) has not been solved in GR.

Leigh
From: jac@ds8.scri.fsu.edu (Jim Carr)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: When your sun forges iron...
Date: 23 Dec 92 04:51:55 GMT
Reply-To: jac@ds8.scri.fsu.edu (Jim Carr)
Organization: SCRI, Florida State University

In article <1h8b15INNgr6@terminator.rs.itd.umich.edu> metzler@pablo.physics.lsa.umich.edu (Chris Metzler) writes:

    < regarding whether Fe-56 fission drives a supernova >

>In Supernovae of Type II, when the core burns to iron, it is no longer possible
>to support the mass above by nuclear processes, and the core collapses.
>This contraction results in very high temperatures and a lot of energetic
>photons.  For a Type II supernova, the iron core is above the Chandrasekhar
>limit, meaning that electron degeneracy pressure is not sufficient to
>support the mass of the star.  The matter can thus infall until the core is
>so hot and the photons so energetic that iron nuclei can photodisintegrate into
>He nuclei and neutrons.  This is not, strictly speaking, what we normally
>think of when someone says "fission," but the iron nonetheless does break
>down into smaller elements.

Exactly, as I think I sketched in my post.  Certainly some of the iron 
could photodisintegrate, some could even be struck by a very fast 
neutron and be broken apart in a spallation reaction, but neither 
would be called fission by a physicist.  I would also differ with 
the implication in the original post that this is the dominant process 
for driving the supernova, as I think your post makes clear also. 
The dominant mechanism is loss of energy production, not loss due to 
fission, followed by collapse if the mass exceeds the Chandrasekar limit 
so that the electrons cannot hold it up against gravity.  At that 
point, all sorts of interesting nuclear physics occurs, a lot of 
which involves electron capture leading to a neutron excess -- very 
important if we are to have the heavy elements that are formed 
during this time.  Certainly some Fe does break down, but this is 
irrelevant once the superclusters form just prior to the bounce. 
If this was the dominant process, there would be no heavy nuclei. 



--
J. A. Carr                                    |  "The New Frontier of which I  
jac@gw.scri.fsu.edu                           |  speak is not a set of promises
Florida State University  B-186               |  -- it is a set of challenges."
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute |   John F. Kennedy (15 July 60)
Xref: sparky sci.physics:22027 sci.math:17593
From: wsadjw@rw7.urc.tue.nl (Jan Willem Nienhuys)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.math
Subject: Exam anecdote (was Re: Why no Nobel Prize in Math?)`
Date: 2 Jan 93 12:20:28 GMT
Reply-To: wsadjw@urc.tue.nl
Followup-To: sci.physics
Organization: Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands

In article <1993Jan2.013607.29530@mcshub.dcss.mcmaster.ca> riehm@maccs.mcmaster.ca (Carl Riehm) writes:
>
>Reminds me of a recent anecdote:
>A is back at his alma mater (in the version I heard, it was Stanford) for his
>20th anniversery after his PhD.   Professor B has put on display questions from
>the most recent PhD qualifying exam.  A opines to Professor B:  "Hey those are 
>the same questions on my qualifying exam over 20 years ago!"  Professor B
>counters with "Aha but we've changed the answers!".      

A similar anecdote I heard about the late Hans Freudenthal.  His oral exam
on the subject of geometry always started like this:
Given 5 points in the plane (in general position) and a line through one 
of them.  Through these 5 points there will be a unique conic. The line 
will intersect this conic in one more point. Construct that point.
After this the question would be to do it (just by ruler) if the given
line did not pass through the point.  After the answer "impossible", he
would ask which extra data would be needed then.  After the correct answer
that with a single given conic (a circle for instance) it would be possible,
he would ask the candidate to show how then.  And so on.
On the day I took the exam, somewhere in 1964 or 1965 I guess, two of my
friends took the same exam.  Afterwards we compared notes, and he had
asked us all the same things the first quarter or so.
We didn't know at that time that many years before that, someone had said
to F. that he shouldn't always ask the same questions.  To which he
replied: "Well, the questions are the same, but I vary the answers."

I conjecture that this professor's joke goes back to the previous
century.

JWN
From: mcirvin@husc8.harvard.edu (Matt McIrvin)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: FTL communication in SR does not violate causality
Keywords: FTL SR causality Special Relativity
Date: 30 Dec 92 21:48:46 GMT

markc@smsc.sony.com (Mark Corscadden) writes:

[very nice summary of conclusions deleted]

It appears we're in total agreement now, incidentally...  faster than
light communication that preserves causality violates SR, but can be
made to do no real violence to the current structure of physics,
as long as you assume some other process that behaves in the way you
describe.

>So, is it true that misconceptions about FTLC and SR really are common?
>They seem to be; what do other people think?  How many people were aware
>that FTLC is consistent with the Lorentz transformation (2)?  How many
>have seen "proofs" that FTLC violates causality, proofs which make use
>of nothing but the Lorentz equations and therefore can't be valid?  Does
>anyone besides me agree that it's worth understanding that neither (1)
>nor (2) alone contradict FTLC, but only both taken together?

The "proofs" generally really assume (1) as well; that's what I was
doing in my "counterexample."  It's not always clear from the wording,
though.  I really assumed (1) by deciding that a physical situation
described by certain coordinates in one frame can also be set up to
be described by the same coordinates in another frame.

It's always worthwhile to know what your assumptions really are.

I wasn't aware of possibilities such as you described until I read 
about one scheme with a preferred frame in, of all places, 
rec.arts.sf.written.  The author (whose identity I have unfortunately
forgotten) described it as a nice way to put FTL communication/travel
into a science fiction novel without automatically implying causality
paradoxes.

-- 
Matt McIrvin
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: nariani@utdallas.edu (Sushil Nariani)
Subject: bubble in container
Organization: Univ. of Texas at Dallas
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 21:39:40 GMT

There's this inexpandible container which is completely full of water but
for a small bubble at the bottom. If the bubble rises to the top, does the
pressure on the sides of the container change?

Sushil

Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.math
From: hausner@qucis.queensu.ca (Alejo Hausner)
Subject: Re: Why no Nobel Prize in Math?
Organization: M.Sc, C.S, Queen's, Kingston, Canada.
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 20:53:33 GMT

In article <1992Dec31.145732.19319@cbnewsl.cb.att.com> wjh@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (william.j.hery) writes:
>hausner@qucis.queensu.ca (Alejo Hausner) writes:
>>       It seemed unlikely to me at the time that a mathematician
>>would have a love life, much less an adulterous one, but I've
>>since realized they're human too.
>
>?????? Is that because you think that all mahtematicians are 1) asexual,
>2) homosexual, 3) perfect moral speicmens according to some moral
>code that you recognize, 4) prudes, or 5) just don't have the time
>because they spend so much time doing mathematics?????
>

I should have put smileys on it.  Math is such an abstract,
seemingly incorporeal subject that it doesn't seem such a strange
conclusion for a young mind such as mine to make.

So I guess at the time I would have chosen 1) asexual. 

No flames please.

Alejo (hausner@qucis.queensu.ca)

Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: gay@selkirk.sfu.ca (Ian D. Gay)
Subject: Re: Christmas problem
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 21:16:00 GMT

palmer@sfu.ca (Leigh Palmer) writes:

>>2. An astronout takes a bottle filled half with whine with him
>>   in space. What does he see when he looks to the bottle in
>>   space?

>I don't know what a half-filled bottle of wine would look like in space,
>but if one drops a bottle it looks "sloshed" while in free fall. It's my
>guess that "sloshed" is as good an answer as you will get. If the bottle
>were to remain absolutely unperturbed the minimum energy condition would 
>be determined by surface tension, and the minimum surface condition 
>corresponds pretty much to the shape the liquid takes in a more mundane
>environment. That is, ultimately an undisturbed half-full bottle of wine 
>would have the wine at one end or the other and a flat air-wine interface.

No, it's more complicated than that, because you need to consider the 
liquid-glass interfacial tension also. Conceivably the equilibrium 
configuration is a layer all over the inside of the bottle, with a 
hole in the middle.


>MX&aHNY,

>Leigh
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.skeptic,alt.paranormal,alt.conspiracy,alt.alien.visitors
From: sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti)
Subject: Precognition mechanism of mathematical discovery?
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 20:51:30 GMT


re-posted from WELL conference on mathematical discovery:

Are you all aware of what Penrose thinks in Emperor's New Mind?
I conjecture that mathematical forms are actually intelligent and create
themselves using the quantum connection backward in time violating David
Deutsch's basic principle of the philosophy of science. You know the
mathematician has a precognition of his discovery that pops into her
consciousness - prior training is needed to recognize the significance of
the message from the future etc.

What we have learned is that a formal model of this can be made but it
involves a minimal generalization of present day standard quantum mechanics
to allow a non-fatal kind of non-unitarity in the time evolution that still
conserves probabilities. This is analogous to the non-fatal globally self
consistent causality violation that time machine traversable wormholes
permit according to Kip Thorne et-al.

This model of mathematical creation as precognition is actually consistent
with Penrose's phenomenology in Emperor's New Mind. The world of Platonic
Forms are, in this model, intelligent programs that form the Mind of God and
that communicate backwards in time to our minds.
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti)
Subject: re: Baez's unwitting proof that Lorentz invariance->advanced waves.
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 06:34:48 GMT


Baez writes:
Since it's the holiday season I will be nicer than usual; to do the
above one needs to know what something like delta(f(x)) really means,
and they don't usually teach this well enough.  Say f(0) = 0 and
f'(0) > 0.  What's the difference (near x = 0) between delta(f(x)) and
the good old Dirac delta(x)?  Well, delta(f(x)) only makes sense
integrated against a smooth test function, and if one does the integral
by a change of variables one sees that delta(f(x)) = delta(x)/f'(x).
Makes sense: the faster f(x) changes with x, the skinnier the delta
function delta(f(x)) is, so one must divide by f'(x).  :-)  (Yes, friends,
this CAN be made rigorous.  Read Gelfand's book Generalized Functions.)
So one can show

delta(t^2 - r^2) = delta(t - r)/2r + delta(t + r)/2r

end of Baez's reamrk - I now add that this equation is central to Feynman's
QED the delta(t-r) is a retarded propagation and the delta(t+r) is an
advanced propagation backward in time - no way of avoiding it.
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti)
Subject: re:Professionalism
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 06:43:31 GMT


Oh yes, I remember the name of the psychic being tested by Brendan O Regan
in Puthoff and Targ's SRI laboratory was Ingo Swann. I think he is referred
to in the book on UFOs OUT THERE by the NY TIMES reporter - the chapter in
which Ingo remote views Soviet submarines for high level defense officials.

O Regan worked for Astronaut Edgat Mitchell at Noetics Institute which
provided funds to SRI. O Regan asked Swann to remote view the future when
Swann, a trance medium, started to speak in a cold metallic voice repeating
the same sort of stuff I heard as a kid in Brooklyn years earlier in 1952-
the SRI incident was in mid 70's. This particular story was told to me by
Barbara Honneger befoe she went to the Reagan White House with the guy from
Hoover Martin ... who was domestic policy advisor. Honneger at the time was
working for Toy manufacturer Henry Dakin who was funding Michael Murphy's
work on sports and psi - see his recent book. Both Dakin and Murphy are
active in Gorbachev Foundation USA today at a very high level. It's
interesting that their group also brought Boris Yeltsin to US before he was
elected President of Russia- strange connections indeed! All tru - check it
out boys and girls!
From: sichase@csa3.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: QM question
Date: 24 Dec 1992 18:45 PST
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.198
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    

In article <Bzs9F7.Ion@utdallas.edu>, nariani@utdallas.edu (Sushil Nariani) writes...
> 
>	There's this thing about QM which Liboff writes in his book
>	"Introductory QM" :
>		"The measurement of an observable of a particle leaves it 
>	in an eigenstate of the corresponding operator till another
>	measurement is made"
>	Also, delta(x) is the eigenfunction of the position operator x.
>	Now what bothers me is this: Suppose I make an infinite precision
>	measurement on the particles position. That would leave it in the
>	state delta(x-x') where x' would be the measured value for position.
>	Now if i do not make any other measurement, the particle should 
>	remain in this state. Does'nt this indicate that the particle should
>	remain at the same position later on? In which case the momentum
>	uncertainty is zero. Now I think I've got something wrong here
>	but can't figure it out. The author does'nt help much. Pliss to
>	illuminate the ignoranti.

There is a difference between making a measurement of position and a 
measurement of momentum for a free particle.  Only the momentum is 
a good quantum number, i.e., position does not commute with the Hamiltonian.
That is, position, in general, evolves in time, no matter what you do.
The rule you describe only applies when the operator *does* commute
with the Hamiltonian for the system.  

Since kinetic energy is p^2/2m, it will be very hard to construct a system
for which x is a good quantum number.  I suppose you could imagine a 
velocity-dependent potential which cancels the kinetic energy, though I 
don't know what physical system this would describe.  If position is a
good eigenvalue, then it will surely be very strange indeed.

-Scott
--------------------
Scott I. Chase			"It is not a simple life to be a single cell,
SICHASE@CSA2.LBL.GOV		 although I have no right to say so, having
				 been a single cell so long ago myself that I 
				 have no memory at all of that stage of my 
				 life." - Lewis Thomas
Xref: sparky sci.physics:21791 alt.sci.physics.new-theories:2620
From: sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories
Subject: re: ABIAN as an AI Program - a case of precognition?
Date: 27 Dec 92 17:30:37 GMT
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link


I saw the book on Boolean rings myself last week; the back flap has a
biographical sketch of the author and even a photograph. Alexander Abian
has indeed taught mathematics at Iowa State, among other universities.

If this *is* the work of an AI team at Iowa State, it will go down as the
Usenet hoax of the decade. The perpetrators will gain fame, but perhaps
not the Turing prize -- the human guinea pigs were not even made aware of
the possibility that they might be conversing with software.

In any case, I await with bemused interest Abian's reply to your calling
him a computer virus.

I seem to recall that some joker the other day posted something to the
effect that the Autonomous Belaboring something-or-other AI expert system
is available for beta-test from Iowa State. Perhaps that is what gave
you this idea?

With amusement (and best wishes for the new year),

Dale Atems

------
Dale Atems
Wayne State University, Detroit, MI
Department of Physics and Astronomy
atems@igor.physics.wayne.edu

No Dale I did not see the information about the AI system from Iowa state
until you e-mailed me the above information. What actually happened was that
as soon as I glanced at an ABIAN piece the idea that it was an AI program
instantly flashed into my awareness - like a telepatype from the future - as
I fantasize them to be - a kind of mini-Divine Inspiration - Muse as Imp.
So, perhaps, your message to me above was the future cause whose past effect
was my posting that ABIAN may be an AI program whose author is that
modern-day Professor Moriarty - Alexander Abian! It's elementary, my dear
Atems!
Newsgroups: sci.physics,rec.arts.startrek.tech
From: draper@sscvx1.ssc.gov
Subject: Re: Accellerating Spaceship (yet another bird in a plane)
Organization: Superconducting Super Collider Laboratory
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 1992 17:37:19 GMT

> In article <ewright.725660501@convex.convex.com> ewright@convex.com (Edward V. Wright) writes:
>For example, if you had two chunks of matter, one negative and
>one positive, the negative chunk would move away from the positive
>chunk because of repulsion.  However, the positive chunk would move
>toward the negative chunk, trying to catch up.  So, toss a chunk of
>negative matter out the door of your spaceship, and away you go!
>
I think, strictly speaking, this only happens if there is a distinction made
between inertial mass and gravitational mass. What is assumed in the above is
that the gravitational mass is unchanged, so that the direction of the force is
attractive, but the sign of the inertial mass is flipped, so that the response
to the force is repulsive. If there is no distinction between inertial and
gravitational mass, then the situation would be almost exactly like classical
electrostatics: unlike masses would attract and like masses would repel, but
Newton's law of equal and opposite reactions would hold in either case. In the
latter case there would be no "chasing" and no manufacturing net motion.

Paul Draper
University of Texas at Arlington
Mythink, not UTAthink, not SSCthink, not GOVthink.
Newsgroups: sci.physics