HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: sasghm@theseus.unx.sas.com (Gary Merrill)
Subject: Re: What is a wood-duck
Originator: sasghm@theseus.unx.sas.com
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 12:36:04 GMT
Organization: SAS Institute Inc.


In article <winer.719000806@husc10>, winer@husc10.harvard.edu (Adam Winer) writes:
|> rusin@mp.cs.niu.edu (David Rusin) writes:
|> 
|> >In article <1992Oct13.191914.90326@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au> kevin@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au writes:
|> >>What is a wood-duck?
|> >>Ans: In many amusement parks, there are stalls where you pay money to take
|> 
|> >wood = crazy. Does no one read Chaucer anymore?
|> >(OK, so I use slightly out of date language. Methinks it behooves me to get
|> >more hip ere I be thought antediluvian).
|> 
|> I'm sure it's not pertinent, but the Wood Duck (Aix sponsa) is a North
|> American species of waterfowl.  Rather beautiful.
|> -- 
|> Adam Winer		| The number you have reached is imaginary.
|> WINER@HARVARD.EDU	| Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and
|>                         | try again.

Perhaps it is not possible to make the distinction between a wood
duck and a wooden duck in Australian (though I note that the last
posting from that venue appears to have introduced the technical
term 'wood-duck').
-- 
Gary H. Merrill  [Principal Systems Developer, C Compiler Development]
SAS Institute Inc. / SAS Campus Dr. / Cary, NC  27513 / (919) 677-8000
sasghm@theseus.unx.sas.com ... !mcnc!sas!sasghm
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: jmack@surf.rice.edu (Jeffrey Mackey)
Subject: Re: 1992 Nobel Prizes
Organization: Physics
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 14:21:27 GMT

Roy Smalley doesn't have a chance at the Chemistry Nobel prize,
mostly because your probably talking about Rick Smalley, who
probably does have a chance. In any case, he would mostly
likely share such a prize with Robert Curl and Harry Kroto,
the other principle investigators in the early bucky business.
This is not meant to be a spelling flame.
-J
From: snarfy@cruzio.santa-cruz.ca.us
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Private Nukes
Keywords: Dangerous Garage Assembled Devices
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 92 08:26:40 PDT
Reply-To: snarfy@cruzio.santa-cruz.ca.us



 In   message-ID:  <1992Oct12.215124.26059@netcom.com>  (Thomas  H.  Kunich)
 writes:


>Now if you want to compare this to your automatic experience let's just
>put this into proper perspective: try to completely build an automatic
>transmission without ever having seen one and with only the knowledge of
>how one would theoretically work. You have to cast and machine all of the
>pieces, obtain all of the required material and put it together and bolt
>it in a car and then try it out.

>This _is_ the problem of backyard fusion device makers. Enough of this
>stupid conversation.

   This  is  a  thread  that I would not usually participate in , but I just
   want to add that we should not forget about the supposed end of the "Cold
   War" and the Russian's pressing need for cash. I would  estimate  that  a
   sufficiently  motivated  "  Drug  Overlord  "  could  afford  some of the
   necessary pre - machined material in the not too distant future.

    I think that from an historical perspective it is interesting  that  the
   enemy  that  we  supposedly "defeated" was never forced to surrender it's
   armaments. I don't want this to devolve into a political discussion which
   should be pursued elswhere, but it's naive to just dismiss  the  idea  of
   nuclear proliferation into the private sector as "stupid".

   snarfy

Xref: sparky sci.physics:16160 sci.chem:3870
From: chaiken@cmsgee.llnl.gov (Alison Chaiken)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.chem
Subject: 1992 Nobel Prizes: a prediction
Date: 8 Oct 92 14:27:13 GMT
Followup-To: sci.physics
Organization: Chemistry and Materials Science, LLNL

Every year for the last 5 years or so I have predicted in this group
the winners of the physics and chemistry prizes.  So far I have an
unblemished record of being wrong every year.     Here are my
predictions for 1992:

Chemistry: Roy Smalley and Donald Huffman, for C60 discovery

Physics: Leonard Mandel and Alain Aspect, for fundamental tests
in QED

Okay netters, who do you think will win?   Hurry up and record your
predictions before the winners are announced!

Alison Chaiken				chaiken@cmsgee.llnl.gov
(510) 422-7129				OR alison@wsrcc.com
(510) 422-7300 (FAX)			
Live fast, die young, leave a long publication list.
From: prim!dave@germany.eu.net (Dave Griffiths)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Questions of transparency
Date: 10 Oct 92 23:41:01 GMT
Organization: Primitive Software Ltd.

In article <1992Oct1.044856.28568@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> crb7q@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Cameron Randale Bass) writes:
>In article <1992Oct1.010445.13988@u.washington.edu> whit@milton.u.washington.edu (John Whitmore) writes:
>>In article <1992Sep25.073432.29995@hplb.hpl.hp.com> davids@spira.bri.hp.com (david sixsmith (contractor)) writes:
>
>>>2. What is the mechanism which makes the speed of light lower when travelling
>>>in such a medium as opposed to traveling in a vacuum ?
>>
>>	Entrainment of charge.  Free (or nearly free) charges are
>>moving inside the medium in response to the electric excitation,
>>so that the energy in the wave is not entirely field energy,
>>but includes kinetic energy and binding energy of the charges,
>>so that the wave equation is significantly altered.
>>	One could (equivalently) note that excitations of the
>>charge give rise to a phase-shifted response wave, and the sum
>>of the incident wave and the response is a slower-moving
>>composite wave.
>
>    I always found it interesting that "The incident wave may therefore 
>    be regarded as extinguished at any point within the medium by 
>    interference with the dipole field and replaced by another wave with 
>    a different velocity (and generally also with a different
>    direction) of propagation (Born and Wolf, p. 100)."  So actually, 
>    there 'aint' no incident wave inside the medium since the medium
>    conspires to identically cancel the incident wave.
>

If a beam of light passes through a glass block, are the majority of the
photons which emerge on the other side the very same ones that entered? Or
are the photons absorbed and retransmitted?

If the light is considered to be transmitted by excitation of free charges
then one would expect that if two light beams at different angles interesected
half way through the glass block they would intefere with each other. Yet if
I look out through the window, despite the fact there are billions of
different light paths all pulling these charges in different directions, no
distortion is observed.

Dave Griffiths
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: bhv@areaplg2.corp.mot.com (Bronis Vidugiris)
Subject: Re: TIME HAS INERTIA AND THE PRINCIPLE OF TENDENCY OF MAINTAINING THE
Organization: Motorola, CCR&D, CORP, Schaumburg, IL
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 22:29:31 GMT

In article <1992Oct16.123737.28771@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> crb7q@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Cameron Randale Bass) writes:

)     Typical misuse of the language to make a point that is 
)     tenuous at best.   Numerical integration of the solar system
)     out to 100 million years 'confirms' little.  One interesting quotation is
)     'additional numerical experiments indicate that the Jovian planet
)     subsystem is chaotic, although some small variations in the model
)     can yield quasiperiodic motion'.  

IMO, the context of 'confirms' was wrt the other mathematical studies that
were previously mentoned that also indicated the solar system was chaotic. 
This study agreed with the other ones (cited in the article) - hence, it
'confirms' them.

I can't think of any way that the chaotic nature of the actual solar system
could be confirmed by physical experiment, as we only have one solar system
and don't have another to test the effects of small disturbances on :-)

However, it is an interesting mathematical feature of the models used.  I
suppose you could call the above a 'mathematical experiment'.  (Come to think
of it, that's what the authors did do according to your quote above).  One
does has to have confidence in the models used (as well as the numerical
methods used to solve them) to believe that the results will apply to the
physical solar system.  The paper did compare their results with the results
of other simulations.  There is not all that surprisingly a trade-off
between rigor of the mathematical simulation and computational speed.

The sensitivity of the chaotic vs. quasiperiodic behavior to initial
conditions mentioned in the paper is definitely a point worth mentioning, as
is the lack of understanding of a mechanism to explain the simulated
behavior.
From: lordSnooty@cup.portal.com (Andrew - Palfreyman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Night Thoughts on Bell's Inequality
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 92 12:15:35 PDT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Distribution: world
  <1992Oct9.200550.24404@riacs.edu> <312@mtnmath.UUCP>

The eternal Quantum Representation thread always seems to end
up with "until we do the experiment, and fix the loopholes left
by Aspect or follow Sarfatti's experimental suggestions".

What is the difficulty in doing this much-desired-by-some experiment
and is the apparatus necessarily very expensive?
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
| lord snooty @the giant |  Would You Like Space Potatoes With That?       |
| poisoned electric head |              andrew_-_palfreyman@cup.portal.com |
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: jbaez@riesz.mit.edu (John C. Baez)
Subject: Re: VERY fundamental question
Organization: MIT Department of Mathematics, Cambridge, MA
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 92 20:05:55 GMT

In article <1992Oct14.084233.6403@dde.dk> ct@dde.dk (Claus Tondering) writes:
>First, an apology: I realize that this is very likely an extremely
>fundamental question, one that might not belong in this group.  Or it
>may be a frequently asked question; I don't read this newsgroup regularly,
>so I don't know. In any case apologies if I'm being stupid.
>
>But here goes... Consider the following conversation between two people:
>
>A: Would you explain something, please?
>
>B: Certainly, what is it?
>
>A: How does a magnet work? I mean, when I place a magnet close to, say,
>   a needle, the needles moves. What makes it move? How can the magnet
>   exert a force on the needle over a distance? It seems like magic to
>   me.

....

>What should be B's answer?

"Yes, it's magic, but we have theories that describe very well what this
magic does under a wide range of conditions; far from being whimsical,
this magic appears to obey very precise mathematical laws.  Using these
laws, we can put this magic to practical use.  Thus it no longer seems 
like magic."

Xref: sparky sci.physics:16141 sci.math:12883
From: stieger@cco.caltech.edu (Ronald David Stieger)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.math
Subject: Re: How do you draw a straight line?
Date: 8 Oct 1992 03:01:30 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: punisher.caltech.edu

chrisman@wheatena.berkeley.edu (chrisman) writes:

>Indeed, a stretched string won't be completely straight, because
>of the influence of gravity (gusts of wind, Brownian motion, ...)
>no matter what the tension on the string.

But what is a straight line, anyway?  General relativity postulates that
the universe is not Euclidean, instead it is analogous to a curved surface,
How would you define a straight line on a balloon?  

>Besides, if we want a machine that uses the "definition" to get
>a straight line, how about a laser?  For the physicist (not the
>mathematician), I suppose that the path followed by a beam o
>light is the closest thing to a definition of a straight line.

This is in fact how a straight line, or rather a geodesic, would be defined
in physics: the path a photon would follow.  Of course, this isn't very 
useful in trying to draw a line, but one can check to see if it is in fact
"straight."  This path is also the shortest distance between two points, if
one remembers that relativistically, distances can contract depending on 
velocity  and acceleration (or gravitational curvature).  In fact, on a 
spinning merry-go-round the shortest distance, or the path followed by a
photon, would appear curved to an observer standing on the ground.  Of
course, the curvature is negligible unless it's spinning really fast.

-- 
--Ron Stieger                      **** JUST VOTE NO. ****
  stieger@cco.caltech.edu
"For some, it's simply something you wear around your neck. Just a chain.
It means a lot more than that to me."--Michael W. Smith, "Cross of Gold"
Xref: sparky sci.physics:16457 sci.math:13151
From: gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk (G.J. McCaughan)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.math
Subject: Re: Nobel Prize
Date: 14 Oct 92 04:09:27 GMT
Organization: U of Cambridge, England

In article <1992Oct14.001851.1933@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> court@newton.physics.mun.ca (J. Lewis) writes:

>I have also heard three different sets of reasons for Ludwig Boltzmann's
>suicide.

Well go on then, tell us...

-- 
Gareth McCaughan     Dept. of Pure Mathematics & Mathematical Statistics,
gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk  Cambridge University, England.    [Research student]
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: krenzien@rrzn.uni-hannover.dbp.de (Elisabeth Krenzien)
Subject: Re: Question on aerodynamics........
Organization: Regionales Rechenzentrum fr Niedersachsen
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 09:18:50 GMT

In article <1992Oct14.095739.1482@ccsvax.sfasu.edu> z_arthurjk@ccsvax.sfasu.edu writes:
>From: z_arthurjk@ccsvax.sfasu.edu
>Subject: Question on aerodynamics........
>Date: 14 Oct 92 09:57:39 CST
>Assuming it is thrown correctly, why exactly does a frisbee fly
>the way it does?  Why does it seem to float across the air
>without wobbling, and why does it slowly descend to the ground
>instead of just fall?
>
>Also, how does the aerobee disk fly so damn far?
>
>These are questions that have always intrigued me.
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: firth@sei.cmu.edu (Robert Firth)
Subject: Re: GROSS MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT PROBABILITY, DETERMINISM AND LOCALITY
Organization: Software Engineering Institute
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 14:19:54 GMT

In article <1992Oct12.133138.203071@uctvax.uct.ac.za> naturman@uctvax.uct.ac.za writes:

>From the responses to my postings on QM which I have received, it is clear to 
>me that many people are grossly ignorant of basic mathematics. Here are some 
>examples of the gross misconceptions regarding probability which I have 
>encountered:

The gross ignorance and misconceptions in your own postings can
perhaps be remedied by reading

	A N Kolmogorov: Foundations of the Theory of Probability
	(trans Nathan Morrison)
	Chelsea Publishing Co, New York, 1956

(Sorry, no ISBN - the unspeakably vile library database system at this
 establishment doesn't consider the ISBN a useful attribute)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: jbaez@riesz.mit.edu (John C. Baez)
Subject: How to get preprints in latex form electronically
Organization: MIT Department of Mathematics, Cambridge, MA
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 92 05:04:01 GMT

I was going to to refuse to tell anyone how to get things from 
gr-qc, since this has come up so often, but someone I like asked me
so I will post the recipe and save it in a file so I never have to type this
again.

To get things from hep-th@xxx.lanl.gov if you know the preprint number:

Send a message to hep-th@xxx.lanl.gov with subject header

get (preprint number)

and no message body.

The same sort of thing works for a number of preprint lists:

alg-geom@publications.math.duke.edu (algebraic geometry)
astro-ph@babbage.sissa.it           (astrophysics)
cond-mat@babbage.sissa.it           (condensed matter)
funct-an@babbage.sissa.it           (functional analysis)
hep-lat@ftp.scri.fsu.edu            (computational and lattice physics)
hep-ph@xxx.lanl.gov                 (high energy physics phenomenological)
hep-th@xxx.lanl.gov                 (high energy physics theoretical)
lc-om@alcom-p.cwru.edu              (liquid crystals, optical materials)
gr-qc@xxx.lanl.gov                  (general relativity, quantum cosmology)

If you *don't* know the preprint number, or want to get preprints regularly,
or want other information, send a message with subject header

help

and no message body.

If you screw up the system will punish you.
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.math
From: jim@cs.UAlberta.CA (Jim Easton)
Subject: Re: How do you draw a straight line?
Organization: University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 20:01:35 GMT

pratt@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Vaughan R. Pratt) writes:

>In article <jim.718586962@st-michael> jim@cs.UAlberta.CA (Jim Easton) writes:
>>Since it doesn't look like anyone else is going to answer this I
>>guess I will.  There is a linkage which will draw a straight line.

>Your diagram is exactly the Peaucellier cell that Jim Reeds mentioned
>(via John Baez) a few hours back.

Could be - you won't get an argument from me.

>So Jim, what has the little industry of 3-space linkages in robotics
>produced that will draw a straight line, other than those that already
>work in 2-space?

In the words of the great philosoper "I dunno".  If you replace
points A and O in my diagram with ball joints I would think it would
work.

	Jim
From: naturman@uctvax.uct.ac.za
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Schrodingers Dog
Date: 12 Oct 92 13:12:15 +0200
Keywords: woof woof
Organization: University of Cape Town

>  naturman@uctvax.uct.ac.za writes:
>>You are assuming non-determinism, a rather shakey philosophical idea. If I am
>>not mistaken, non-deterministic non-hidden variable interpretations result
>>in subjective reality paradoxes.
> 
> 1.  Non-determinism is not a shaky philosophical idea.  Or did I miss
> the World Conference of Philosophers' announcement that determinism
> is now accepted to be true by all philosophers?  

I suppose that it all depends on which philosophers you talk to. Most that I've
met have pretty strong arguments against non-determinism.
 
> 2.  You're mistaken.
> 
> OK, I'll amplify.  When you say "subjective reality paradoxes," I
> assume you mean EPR-style "paradoxes," which maybe should be called
> "objective reality paradoxes" since the QM prediction is in conflict
> with objective (local) realism, modulo Paul Budnik.  Another way of
> thinking about this is to believe that quantum mechanics as a 
> non-deterministic non-hidden variable theory is right and strict
> objective realism is wrong.

Actually if you have been following my posts, in one I pointed out that there
is a serious error in reasoning concerning the belief that the mean values in
the Bell Inequality should equal the QM expectation values. I have discussed
this with several colleagues and they agree. Although I haven't seen Paul
Budnik's arguments, he may have hit onto something similar.

 
> In other words, maybe objective realism is the shaky philosophical
> idea.

Maybe, but since non-realist theories certainly require some form of
non-locality and locality violation requires yet unknown interactions, we
should first consider any theory which does not require violation of locality.

  
*****************************************************************************
* Baby Doc Naturman                                                         *
* USS Enterprise                           "It's life Jim,                  *
* Final Frontier                                  but not as we know it."   *
* naturman@uctvax.uct.ac.za                                                 *
*                                                       Spock of Vulcan     *
*****************************************************************************
From: hall@vice.ICO.TEK.COM (Hal F Lillywhite)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Mattel Protest
Date: 8 Oct 92 23:22:56 GMT
Article-I.D.: vice.10508
Organization: Tektronix Inc., Beaverton, Or.

In article <1992Oct7.035603.3065@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> crb7q@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Cameron Randale Bass) writes:
>In article <1atigpINNsog@darkstar.UCSC.EDU> bafta@cats.ucsc.edu (Shari L Brooks) writes:
     
>>I also vaguely remember taking standardized tests on math & English skills,
>>[California requires that these be administered every other year, or did when
>>I was in school] and being told ahead of time that it was OK to do poorly
>>on the math parts cuz girls usually didn't do as well as the boys.

>     I suggest you contact the local school board with such outrageous
>     behavior.  This is not the way to encourage the performance of
>     either sex.

Unfortunately the school board may have a hard time dealing with
this.  Once a teacher gets tenure it is almost impossible to fire
him/her.  I've known of teachers comming to class drunk and between
the tenure laws and the unions the board doesn't think they can be
fired!  While there are some very competent and dedicated teachers
in our schools, there are a few of the other kind too.  It's almost
impossible to get rid of the bad ones or even get them to improve
unless they want to.  Better write your state legislators as well as
the school board.

BTW, I started school in a small rural school.  The situation there
was just about opposite from what people complain about today.
Girls were expected to be good students and boys were not.  Even
math was often considered a girl's subject.  Guess who did the best
in math?  Fortunately my parents had different expectations for me.

I suspect that even the rotten teachers will desist from making
remarks such as Shari heard if enough parents get on their case.
Maybe they can't be fired but it's not pleasant having parents on
your neck all the time.
Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: sawyer@utahep.uta.edu (Lee Sawyer)
Subject: Re: 1992 Nobel Prizes: a prediction
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: University of Texas at Arlington High Energy Physics Group
Distribution: na
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1992 03:03:00 GMT

In article <1992Oct9.050807.5302@fs7.ece.cmu.edu>, snyder@henry.ece.cmu.edu (John Snyder) writes...
>In article <92191@netnews.upenn.edu> weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) writes:
>>In article <8OCT199210452292@csa2.lbl.gov>, sichase@csa2 (SCOTT I CHASE) writes:
>>>but not complete yet.  They do, however, confirm the original work of 
>>>Ray Davis.  It's possible that he gets the prize for discovering the
>>>solar neutrino deficit.
>>
>>I think Davis and Bahcall are long overdue for a joint prize.  Not to
>>be shared with GALLEX or any other newcomers.
>>
>>>In physics they have an excellent record.  With few exceptions, (who ever
>>>heard of Jean Baptiste Perrin?)
>>
> 
>I believe that the one that fewest people have heard of is Dahlen,
>who go the prize for "improvements to coastal lighting" (I believe
>that was for some kind of gas flow regulator for use in the
>lights in lighthouses.) [Anyone know any more about this one?]
> 
>John
>snyder@henry.ece.cmu.edu
> 

  I also think (trivia from the depths of memory) that he is one
of only two Nobel physics laurates who did not have a PhD. The
other is not de Broglie (the work that he was cited for was
in his dissertation - a unique occurance as well, I believe).

       ================                           
         Lee Sawyer                                  

         Dept of Physics                          
         Univ. of Texas                            
               at Arlington                        

Newsgroups: sci.physics
From: marty@amaterasu.physics.uiuc.edu (Marty Gelfand)
Subject: Re: Question
Organization: Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Date: Sat, 17 Oct 1992 03:02:14 GMT

In article <1992Oct16.135358.90350@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au> phs503e@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au writes:
>
>What color is liquid carbon?
>
Why do you ask?  It's a difficult question, and not likely to
have a unique answer, since it might well depend on temperature and
pressure.  And even the question of where in the P,T phase diagram
carbon is liquid is controversial; the melting temperature
is around 4000K, so experiments are _tough_.  A recent theoretical
paper, G. Galli et al, Phys. Rev. B _42_, 7470-82 (1990), reviews
the experimental and theoretical status of liquid carbon nicely,
take a look at it.
--Marty Gelfand
marty@amaterasu.physics.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: sci.physics