Via His Holiness, there is an aggressively stupid paragraph in a New York Times movie review today: Did you hear the one about the guy who lived in the land of Uz, who was perfect and upright and feared God? His name was Job. In the new movie version, “A Serious Man,” some details have… Continue reading A. O. Scott Is an Ignoramus
Category: Physics
Swashbuckling Through Quantum Optics
I’m teaching my Quantum Optics class again this term, out of a completely different textbook than last time around– I’m using Mark Fox’s Quantum Optics from the Oxford Master Series in AMO Physics, which is more of a regular textbook. I’ve got six students– four junior and senior physics majors, one senior chemistry major, and… Continue reading Swashbuckling Through Quantum Optics
Nobel Prize Betting Pool
It’s that time of year again, when the Nobel Prizes are announced– the official announcements will be made starting next Monday. And, as usual, people are speculating about who will win, on both an amateur and professional basis. Meanwhile, as we’ve done in the past, I will offer a valuable prize to anyone who predicts… Continue reading Nobel Prize Betting Pool
The Strangest Man by Graham Farmelo
There has been a fair amount of discussion of Graham Farmelo’s The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Mystic of the Atom— Peter Woit reviewed it on his blog, the New York Times reviewed it a couple of Sundays ago, Barnes and Noble’s online review did a piece on it, etc.. Nearly all… Continue reading The Strangest Man by Graham Farmelo
Historical Physicist Smackdown Explained: Electric Theory
So, who are the people in yesterday’s poll about theoretical physicists, and why should you know them?
Volume Packing of Breakfast Cereal
We’re working on moving SteelyKid from formula to milk (which isn’t going all that well– dairy seems to make her gassy). This has led me to switch over to cereal in the mornings, since we’re buying milk anyway, which frees up the time otherwise spent waiting for the toaster. Cereal-wise, I tend to alternate between… Continue reading Volume Packing of Breakfast Cereal
Historical Physicist Smackdown: Electric Theory
I’m nearly done with Graham Farmelo’s biography of Dirac (honest), which discusses the major attempts to understand the behavior of electrons in quantum mechanics. this calls for a dorky poll: Which theorist of the electron was the best?(poll) Try not to base your selection on which of these historical physicists has the best biography written… Continue reading Historical Physicist Smackdown: Electric Theory
Early Review of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog
One of the photo caption contest winners, Nick O’Neill, has finished his galley proof, and posted an early review of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog: Casual physics intro books are quite possibly the hardest subgenre of physics books to write. Textbooks and further upper-level reading have expectations both of what you already know… Continue reading Early Review of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog
Ask a Physicist’s Dog
The scheduled release of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog is three months from today. This is, as you most likely know, a book based on the frequent conversations Emmy and I have about physics: To mark the pre-anniversary, Emmy has decided to use social media to showcase her physics knowledge: She’s answering physics… Continue reading Ask a Physicist’s Dog
The Early Days of Quantum Engineering
Buried in the weekend links dump at the arxiv blog was Scalable ion traps for quantum information processing: We report on the design, fabrication, and preliminary testing of a 150 zone array built in a `surface-electrode’ geometry microfabricated on a single substrate. We demonstrate transport of atomic ions between legs of a `Y’-type junction and… Continue reading The Early Days of Quantum Engineering