HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti)
Subject: sci.physics as group therapy for mad physicists
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 1992 10:01:56 GMT


sci.physics is becoming a real looney bin.

It's amazing how the idea that the future causes the past makes people
crazy and angry.

The National University of Singapore seems to be a hotbed of cynics and
naive realists.  I suppose they do an adequate job teaching the
Singaporeans how to manufacture computer chips and cellular telephones etc.
One of them sent me a note saying "HAHAHAHAHA" is that Malay - or a or an
epileptic fit?

The Aussies seem to be a decent interesting bunch open to new ideas.

I am flattered that John Mc Carthy of Stanford called my "Mind of God" a
poem.

Baez seems to be on vacation - his stuff is generally quite good when he is
not trying to put me down.
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: sidles@stein.u.washington.edu (John Sidles)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: moderating sci.physics
Summary: vote "no"
Date: 23 Dec 92 01:58:41 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Dec23.015841.11925
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle

Why impose extra constraints by moderating sci.physics?  Is
the extra bandwidth imposed by eccentric postings really a
significant burden?

In my view, all persons of libertarian inclination should vote "no".
The present mild anarchy is quite tolerable, even enjoyable.

Not that sci.physics is perfect... it just isn't clear that
moderation will improve it.  The main problem seems to be a
paucity of well thought out, interesting & informative postings,
not an excess of eccentric ones.

Also, consider the humanitarian aspects... why exclude people
with ideas that seem strange, at what may be a considerable emotional
cost to them, in the absence of a compelling reason to do so?

Just sign me... John "Solidarity with the Loonies" Sidles
From: bhoughto@sedona.intel.com (Blair P. Houghton)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: APS Award for Outstanding Doctoral Thesis Research
Date: 22 Dec 1992 20:49:48 GMT
Organization: Intel Corp., Chandler, Arizona
NNTP-Posting-Host: stealth.intel.com

In article <1992Dec22.054323.22949@udel.edu> berryh@huey.udel.edu (John Berryhill, Ph.D.) writes:
>Wow, a whole $1000, a certificate suitable for framing, and a resume' line.
>And if you don't win, just remember - Hustler magazine will still pay
>you $50 for a picture of your girlfriend naked.  And you don't have to
>submit an essay or any nomination letters either.  What a bargain!

And if, like the average PhD candidate, you have 21
girlfriends and a whole roll of Ektachrome...

				--Blair
				  "No problem getting it peer-reviewed."
From: bhoughto@sedona.intel.com (Blair P. Houghton)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Kapor (Re: Boswell ...)
Date: 30 Dec 1992 20:46:37 GMT
Organization: Intel Corp., Chandler, Arizona
NNTP-Posting-Host: stealth.intel.com

In article <C01EpG.2nz@well.sf.ca.us> sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti) writes:
>Yes, I am like Richard Nixon at times 

No, we have no ba-na-naaaaas...

>I have sent a copy of Boswell's post to
>his alleged employer Mitch Kapor the owner of LOTUS.

That's funny, I thought Kapor had quit Lotus and was now
pretending to be the doyenne of the internet...

				--Blair
				  "There's lots of icky shit in The Well..."
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.religion.emacs
From: zowie@daedalus.stanford.edu (Craig "Powderkeg" DeForest)
Subject: Re: New Words
Organization: Stanford Center for Space Science and Astrophysics
Date: 23 Dec 92 01:06:25

In article <foo> in sci.physics, rsf1@Ra.MsState.Edu writes:
   Got a new concept (like non-chaotic chaos) and can't think up a word
   for it?  Here are some new words generated(*) by a schizophrenic Markov
   chain.

   accomis     actir       adilint     apide       argenic     arnic
   aroxide     auding      audivist    barm        bartive     chandivity
   charide     chatory     coluted     contomic    cycleus     dion
		
	...

   (*) Brief snippets of scientific text were read by a natural language
   processing (NLP) computer program called BABBLER.  (The progam in this
   case was assigned a three-letter attention span.)  BABBLER was then allowed
   to generate a "free-association" thought stream.  Words in the list above
   were manually extracted from the printed thought stream, a sample of which
   follows:

	[deleted]

Sounds like Dissociated Press to me.  Emacs, anyone?
--
DON'T DRINK SOAP! DILUTE DILUTE! OK!
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: an4405@anon.penet.fi
Subject: String theory, GR, QG comment
Organization: Anonymous contact service
X-Anonymously-To: sci.physics
Date: Sun, 3 Jan 1993 20:03:22 GMT

Smurfy greetings for 1993!

String theory incorporates GR through its long wavelength (or low energy)
limit. It interprets fundamental particles as different excitations of a
single generic string. Strings can be closed or open. In any case, the string
is of Planck dimensions. Although a particle might seem pointlike at Fermi
scales, at Planck scales it behaves as if it were an extended object.
One mode of excitation of a closed string can be interpreted as a massless,
spin-2 particle. This is identified as the `graviton'. The graviton is
a quantum excitation of the gravitational field. The point is that the
graviton concept only makes sense if you consider the linearised field
equations of GR. It only makes sense if you make a perturbative expansion
of the space-time metric, around a flat-space solution. In other words,
if space-time is highly curved (like around an very massive object), then
the graviton concept fails to hold. After all, how can you interpret a
small excitation of space-time (the graviton) against a larger background
curvature? In its present form, string theory makes use of perturbation
theory. Nobody has yet found a nonperturbative formulation of it.
The fact that string theory claims to be a theory of quantum gravity must
be tempered against the above argument. That's why quantum gravity should
be a nonperturbative theory. Smurfy leep in logic.

The Physics Telnet Hacker Smurf.

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Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: rpurman@nhgs.vak12ed.edu (Richard I. Purman)
Subject: vitual lab -please respond
Organization: Virginia's Public Education Network (Hampton)
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 92 15:21:18 GMT

Dear fellow scientist:

I apologize if I am not following network protocal but if you
have not responded to my inquiry on this sci.physics titled:
"VIRTUAL PHYSICS LAB -need ideas please", I would GREATLY
APPRECIATE further responses.

I have received about 10 responses from around the nation but
would like to have more input from a variety of sources.
To all those who have responded, I thank you VERY MUCH.


THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR HELP.
Dec. 21

---
Richard I. Purman
Physics Instructor
Governor's School for Science and Technology
New Horizons Technical Center, 520 Butler Farm Road, Hampton, VA  23666
tele: (804) 766-1100    FAX: 766-2458
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: roland@sics.se (Roland Karlsson)
Subject: Re: Why does sticky tape glow?
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Kista
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1992 14:28:18 GMT


> There was an explanation of this in the "Amateur Scientist" column in 
> Scientific American several years ago.
>                                                     - John

Please John, I want to know why.  Tell us, it can not be something
complicated.  Finding it in some several years old "Scientific
American" is hard work if I have to look for it in some library.


--
Roland Karlsson             SICS, PO Box 1263, S-164 28 KISTA, SWEDEN
Internet: roland@sics.se    Tel: +46 8 752 15 40          Fax: +46 8 751 72 30
Telex: 812 6154 7011 SICS   Ttx: 2401-812 6154 7011=SICS
From: bhoughto@sedona.intel.com (Blair P. Houghton)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Magnetic question (again!)
Date: 22 Dec 1992 17:52:34 GMT
Organization: Intel Corp., Chandler, Arizona
NNTP-Posting-Host: stealth.intel.com

In article <1992Dec19.191427.2941@gacvx2.gac.edu> kiran@gacvx2.gac.edu writes:
>In article <1992Dec17.183821.13124@topaz.ucq.edu.au>, freeman_l@topaz.ucq.edu.au writes:
>> A magnetic field can move around in space. This seems at first thought to be
>> a pretty obvious statement, but.... WHAT is actaually moving? Has a magnetic
>> field got some fine internal structure, like the Classical lines of Force,
>> so that you can say: THIS bit of the magnetic field is now over HERE!

A magnetic field is a vector field giving a spatio-
temporal (and relativistic) relation for a moving charge.
The existence of the field in the absence of other charges
is a question akin to the sound of a tree that falls in an
uninhabited forest.

I don't think you can move "bits of the magnetic field" around
unless you plan to curve space.  You can "move" the field,
i.e., reconfigure it, simply by moving charges.

				--Blair
				  "I want my MTV."
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Nuclear Waste Disposal
Keywords: Accelerator Transmutation of Waste
Date: 28 Dec 92 03:22:48 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.1992Dec28.032248.6447
Organization: University of Rochester

In article <rsf1.725506659@Ra.MsState.Edu> rsf1@Ra.MsState.Edu (Robert S. Fritzius) writes:

>This responder stressed the idea of a high neutron flux density as being a
>central feature in the process.
> 
>Another responder, on this news group, intimated that the energy extraction
>process would *not* be able to power the whole setup.
> 
>Any further comments on these two issues?


Such reactors, which produce neutrons from spallation, have been
kicked around since 1950, when Lawrence proposed such a system to make
plutonium for military use.  What I've seen of that suggests that,
yes, the heat in the target (especially if the target is uranium)
would produce enough electricity to run the accelerator (a high
efficiency linear accelerator, possibly superconducting), as well as
produce enough plutonium to fuel a number of normal reactors.

The recent proposal at Los Alamos was to thermalize the neutrons from
a liquid lead spallation source.  The high flux is essential to
burning certain actinides (like some isotopes of neptunium).  In a low
flux, these isotopes undergo beta decay before they can capture
another neutron; in this regime these isotopes are net neutron sinks.
At high flux, they capture another neutron and fission before the beta
decay.  The flux being discussed is around 10^16 neutrons/(cm^2 s).
I don't know if this scheme would achieve enough gain to power
itself.

BTW, using gammas to try to excite nuclear reactions is a losing game.
Photons are much more likely to deposit their energy by scattering off
electrons.  The spallation reactors benefit from the fact that
energetic protons (~1 GeV) lose energy mostly by nuclear collisions,
not ionization.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: dseeman@novell.com (Daniel Seeman)
Subject: Re: bubble in container
Organization: Novell Inc., San Jose, Califonia
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 22:05:06 GMT

In article <29DEC199215373722@venus.tamu.edu> dwr2560@venus.tamu.edu (RING, DAVID WAYNE) writes:
>dseeman@novell.com (Daniel Seeman) writes...
>>But the sinking part is really not central to the problem.  One could just
>>anchor the bubble to the bottom of the container, fill the container with water,
>>and close it.  With the help of a friendly gremlin (that lives inside the con-
>>tainer, of course ;-) the bubble would get bursted.   After the system returns
>>to equilibrium, what are the differences between the initial and final pressures
>>in the container?
>
>Let's see if we can make the paradox a little clearer. Start with the
>sealed jar of incompressible fluid. Our gremlin builds a small sphere
>near the bottom of the container which naturally will contain a bit of
>fluid. Then through a tube he drains the sphere and fills it with
>air at the local fluid pressure. He then breaks the sphere and lets the
>bubble rise to the top, increasing the pressure everywhere. When the
>bubble reaches the top he reverses the procedure, surrounding it with
>a sphere, filling it with fluid, and breaking the sphere.
>
>The final state has the same fluid in the same volume but different
>pressure. In fact one can repeat the procedure ad infinitum to get
>as high a pressure as one likes.
>
>:-)
>
>Dave Ring
>dwr2560@zeus.tamu.edu

This is taking more twists than a bread tie!  Cool!

dks.
From: matt@physics2.berkeley.edu (Matt Austern)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: FEYNMAN GRAPH EXPANSION QUESTION
Date: 22 Dec 92 14:48:35
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (Theoretical Physics Group)
	<KILCUP.92Dec20145548@einstein.mps.ohio-state.edu>
	<MATT.92Dec20122038@physics.berkeley.edu>
	<1992Dec20.221840.27537@galois.mit.edu>
Reply-To: matt@physics.berkeley.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: physics2.berkeley.edu
In-reply-to: jbaez@riesz.mit.edu's message of Sun, 20 Dec 92 22:18:40 GMT

In article <1992Dec20.221840.27537@galois.mit.edu> jbaez@riesz.mit.edu (John C. Baez) writes:

> Could you answer a question that I find to be utterly crucial here?  Is
> this a matter of ingeniously evaluating well-defined expressions or is
> there actually some freedom of choice involved?  In the
> former case, even if ingenuity is required to do the integral, one is
> essentially solving a well-posed *math* problem.  In the latter case,
> one could imagine actual disagreement over the right answer - in which
> case one is really adding extra fine print to the description of the
> physical theory, not just calculating within a precisely specified theory.

In most cases, it's the former---but with a few caveats.  First, there
are some annoying definitional problems involving gamma_5 in
dimensions other than four.  In that case, then (if you're doing
dimensional regularization), you really do need a bit of physical
input to decide what the correct answer is.  If you're not doing
dimensional regularization, the same problem will crop up in slightly
different ways.

Second, there are different regularization prescriptions---again, for
example: in dimensional regularization, there's a good deal of
arbitrariness in deciding how to continue expressions from their known
values at n=4 to an arbitrary complex n.  Depending on the choice you
make, you will end up getting a different finite piece from the
integration; the divergent piece, though, will remain the same.  What
this comes down to, essentially, is choosing between several
renormalization schemes.  It's essential to work consistently within a
particular scheme, but physical quantitites can't depend on your
choice.

I hope that's more or less clear...
--
Matthew Austern                   Just keep yelling until you attract a
(510) 644-2618                    crowd, then a constituency, a movement, a
austern@lbl.bitnet                faction, an army!  If you don't have any
matt@physics.berkeley.edu         solutions, become a part of the problem!
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories,alt.paranormal,sci.skeptic
From: kring@efes.physik.uni-kl.de (Thomas Kettenring)
Subject: Re: Dale Bass on The Good, the Bad, and The Bogus
Organization: FB Physik, Universitaet Kaiserslautern, Germany
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 20:04:50 GMT

In article <1992Dec29.182709.19996@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>, crb7q@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Cameron Randale Bass) writes:
>In article <1992Dec29.044456.3985@syacus.acus.oz.au>ron@syacus.acus.oz.au (Ron Williams) writes:
[..]
>>Sarfatti's articles and the replies to them have so far constituted the
>>_only_ postings I have seen in this group which have tackled advanced
                                 ^^^^^^^^^^ 
>>theoretical ideas.
[..]
>     [..]  However, even this is not quite as amusing as
>     a) the assertion that Sarfatti's postings constitute 'the _only_ postings
>     in this group which have tackled advanced theoretical ideas',
         ^^^^^^^^^^

I think you should all set your internal alarm clocks at the phrase "this
group".  I mean, every time I read those two words I automatically look at the
Newsgroups line:

Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories,alt.paranormal,sci.skeptic

--
thomas kettenring, 3 dan, kaiserslautern, germany
"Every three months I tell all of the new recruits that they are supposed to
stand here and not there to get their uniforms, but they just don't learn!"
From: allenk@ugcs.caltech.edu (Allen Knutson)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: can sound waves boil water?
Date: 22 Dec 1992 18:45:37 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: torment.ugcs.caltech.edu

This isn't really relevant to the original question (which is why I haven't
quoted it), but it amused me to read about, so I'll share it with the net.
A friend of mine found in our Hovse Library a several-decade-old article on
effects associated to very high frequency sound in water. For one thing,
it would injure fish. Nonetheless, the scientists stuck their hands in the
water to feel for themselves, and at lower (less painful) intensities, found
a series of boundary layers, evenly spaced every couple of centimeters,
that were hard to push through. (No doubt someone will repost with bounds
on the frequency used.)						Allen K.
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories
From: jbaez@riesz.mit.edu (John C. Baez)
Subject: Re: Reluctant call for moderation of sci.physics
Organization: MIT Department of Mathematics, Cambridge, MA
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 92 20:07:58 GMT

>If this call for moderation of this group succeeds it will be a 
>sad day for freedom of thought.

Nobody is calling for moderation of this group, in case you hadn't
noticed!  People are calling for creation of a *new* group that will be
moderated.  All your favorite crackpots will still be available on good
old sci.physics.  

It is not censorship to create an additional, moderated forum; some
physicists claim that they would read sci.physics.moderated and post
there, while they find the current forum too noisy.  

As for whether newsgroups can ever become "research-level" and of
serious use to professionals, this is still an open question: on the one
hand, it's unlikely to happen soon, but on the other hand, it's hard to
believe that existing media are the final word on professional
communication.  One thing, however, is for sure: it will never happen if
there is no form of moderation (or some other form of filtering that's
vastly more intelligent than current kill-file and "hit n" methods).
Xref: sparky sci.physics:21691 alt.sci.physics.new-theories:2598
From: bhoughto@sedona.intel.com (Blair P. Houghton)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories
Subject: Re: Feynman 41 zero-point atomic Lamb shift
Date: 23 Dec 1992 21:03:55 GMT
Organization: Intel Corp., Chandler, Arizona
NNTP-Posting-Host: stealth.intel.com
Keywords: Jingle, Dashing, hahaha

In article <BzoDsL.q2@well.sf.ca.us> sarfatti@well.sf.ca.us (Jack Sarfatti) writes:
>Remember, the purpose of these "lectures" is to review the essentials of
>Feynman's pictures of the world so that we can more intelligently evaluate

That's cool, Jack, but can you turn your brain the size of
a planet to a much more pressing matter; i.e., that of
describing the aerodynamics and propulsion of herbivorous,
hooved mammals attached to railed cargo vessels being piloted
by gigantic elves of advanced age and altruistic mein?

				--Blair
				  "...with or without a shiny nose..."
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: markc@smsc.sony.com (Mark Corscadden)
Subject: Re: Are there plans to perform a quantum eraser type experiment?
Keywords: quantum,measurement
Organization: Sony Microsystems Corp, San Jose, CA
Date: Fri, 1 Jan 93 02:20:47 GMT

In article <C0045E.5w0@world.std.com> cdj@world.std.com (conrad d johnson) writes:
>If the "collapse" is not a physical event, what's going on?  The "many-
>worlds" interpretation doesn't help here.  The same difficulty applies
>to the "splitting up" of the universe as to the "collapse" of the wave-
>function -- if it's a real event ...

But it isn't a real event.  The universe doesn't "split up" according
to Everett.  The whole beauty of Everett's work is that "collapse" is
not a physical event and neither is some bizarre "splitting up" of the
universe.  Given the concerns you express in your article you should be
in love with this work, except that you currently have no clue as to what
it's really about.

Conrad, you seem pretty interested in the interpretation of QM.  Just
get up from the keyboard now, walk over to the library, and look up Hugh
Everett's book.  Take 20-30 *minutes* to read his introduction, and
then skip the rest if you want.  You'll already have improved your
understanding 100%, to the point where you won't talk anymore about the
"splitting up" of the universe as some kind of bizarre physical event.

Pretty good return on a half-hour investment, wouldn't you say?  Go for
it, you and Paul Budnik both.  What's a half-hour, if your interest in
QM interpretations is even mildly serious?  It's not like there's
thousands and thousands of interpretations which come as highly
recommended (and admittedly, criticized) as Everett's.


>I think then that the mystery of Quantum measurement probably comes down
>to this question:

(and that mystery question is ...)

"Why do people who are so interested in this subject fail to obtain even
 an elementary understanding of a major alternative like MWI before
 rejecting it out-of-hand?"

Mark Corscadden
markc@smsc.sony.com
work: (408)944-4086
From: sichase@csa3.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: need for FAQ (or EDO?) (was: QM non-causal?)
Date: 23 Dec 1992 11:18 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 <COLUMBUS.92Dec11124745@strident.think.com>, columbus@strident.think.com (Michael Weiss) writes...
>Joseph O'Rourke writes:
> 
>   >	This is a tangent, and will lower the technical level of the
>   >discussion, but:  What causes the worlds to split in Everett's
>   >interpretation? 
> 
>You know, this comes up so often, perhaps we need a FAQ on the various
>interpretations of QM.  Or maybe we need an EDO (Endlessly Debated
>Opinions)?
> 
>No, I'm not volunteering to write it.  (So flame me if you think there's
>something wrong with that.)

Hello world.  I have been out of town for a while, am am just now catching
up with the vast morasse that is sci.physics.  My apologies for responding
to this thread so slowly.  

I think that an entry on "interpretations of quantum mechanics" would be
useful if it were well written and sufficiently brief not to get bogged down
in endless detail.  However, since this is such a hotly debated topic, 
I will only accept an entry for inclusion if I consider it to be authoritative 
and complete.  And I doubt that I will try to write it myself any time soon.
I welcome anyone who wants to make a serious effort to assemble a summary
of standard descriptions of the various standard interpretations to try to 
do so.  Be forewarned that I will not include any material which I judge
to be biased, misleading, or unconventional.  This FAQ entry should establish
the ground-rules for future discussions on the subject, defining the 
language and parameters of the issue.  It should not attempt to adorn
one particular unconventional point-of-view with the cache of respectability
that unsuspecting readers might lend to such an article in the FAQ.

-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