Author Archives: Clifford

Hope

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Hope. This word has been used a lot in the last year or more. Sometimes it felt to me like it was overused, but now that the dust has settled, I think I’m quite sure that it is a good word to describe where we are, or what we have. Beginning early today, there will be a new President of the United States, Barack Obama. He’ll be bringing in a whole new regime that seems, given what we’ve seen so far with the work of the transition team and the various appointments to key positions, determined to do some truly good things. (See several related posts listed below.) There’ll be several huge obstacles to fulfilling the promise and potential of the new regime, some known, and some unknown. It’ll be hard to firmly move forward, but it is hugely encouraging to see the looks of delight and joy on people’s faces during these days of celebration, and to hear about their engagement with the idea that we can pull together and move forward on so many fronts on so many vital issues. We don’t know what will come to pass, but one thing we do know is that there is a marvellous window of opportunity. There is Hope.

Since the election result on the night of 4th November 2008, with all that had been achieved and overcome still fresh in the air, right up until today, there’s actually been a rather fitting song ringing in my head when I think about all of this. I find the chorus from the song “I Live In Hope”, by a musician friend of mine, Libby Lavella (you may recall her from posts here and here) extremely evocative of the mood. With […] Click to continue reading this post →

Weinberg on BCS

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For some reason I don’t understand, I occasionally get a copy of some random (as far as I can tell) issue the International Journal of Modern Physics A in the post. It just arrives. The people at World Scientific are presumably hoping I’ll get hooked by it and take out a personal subscription or something. Not sure. Well, it has not happened yet (just as it did not with the unsolicited regular arrivals of Angeleno a while back). But you never know.

Anyway, before putting the one that arrived recently on to my shelf (I can’t easily throw things like that away… it’s a problem, I know) I glanced through the contents to see if there were clues as to why this one was sent to me. I found no obvious ones, but the very first article caught my eye. It was a rather good essay by Steven Weinberg (1979 Nobel Prize in Physics) on BCS (J Bardeen, L N Cooper and J R Schrieffer – No, nothing to do with College Football’s BCS.) theory of superconductivity and the importance of the idea of spontaneously broken symmetry in condensed matter physics and then in particle physics (see last year’s Physics Nobel, by the way). I thought I’d point it out to you, since it is rather nicely written and very instructive (whether or not you’re already familiar with the phenomenon/idea).

He begins with some overstatement, however. He expounds upon the difference between particle physicists and condensed matter physicists and although it is amusingly written in parts (I assume intentionally) he really over-eggs the pudding, in my opinion. Look at this: […] Click to continue reading this post →

The Chronophage

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I’m back home in Los Angeles now, after four days in Cambridge (UK) trying to pay attention to several interesting talks and meetings while being eight hours out of sync with my sleep. It has been interesting, but it is good to be back and getting on with the business of starting the new semester. I gave my first class of the season yesterday (upper division electromagnetism), and it looks to be a good group of students. I expect we’ll have fun! Additionally, two research meetings with graduate students meant for a nicely balanced first day back.

It’s (of course) 5:18am, and so while I sit here, wide awake, I’ll tell you about something I saw earlier in the week. chronophage_corpus_clockWhile wandering around for a bit in Cambridge on Monday, I stumbled across the Corpus Clock and the Chronophage. It’d been mentioned to me about half an hour before by a friend, and I made a mental note to ask about it, but did not realize I’d stumble upon it so easily. Did you hear about it last year? I must confess that all the fuss about it totally passed me by. There’s been a lot of silly stuff said about it, including the usual sensational things about time and so forth, but at the core, the whole thing is quite marvellous. I’ve an old-fashioned streak to me, as you know by now, and so that it is essentially a traditional mechanical clock (despite the presence of LEDs to show the time – they are not controlled electronically, but are on all the time and the mechanical works moves slits to make them appear to go on and off) appeals to me immensely. The whole effect of using modern technology to […] Click to continue reading this post →

Galileoscopes and More

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This year is not all about Darwin. There’s even more fun to be had. It is the International Year of Astronomy. It is 400 years since Galileo Galilei looked at the night sky using a telescope, and this is regarded by some as the birth of modern astronomy. There’ll be lots of celebratory events and discussions taking place under this banner, and of course it is a wonderful opportunity to highlight and kindle interest in Astronomy, so keep your eye out for lots of such events. The theme is “The Universe: Yours To Discover”, which I think is rather good, don’t you? See the official website of IYA2009 for more information. Here’s a BBC World service piece about it, in the form of an interview with Astronomer Royal, Sir Martin Rees. (That same page has an audio visit to the Vatican’s Observatory, Castel Gandolfo (a facility previously mentioned on the blog here), which might be of interest.)

I wonder whether you’ve heard of the Galileoscope. It is one of the “cornerstone […] Click to continue reading this post →

Complex

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So where am I and what am I doing? I’m in chilly Cambridge. The one in the UK. It is super cold over here. When we landed in Heathrow at lunchtime yesterday it was below freezing, and the thick cloud of the London sky was right down to the tops of the airport terminals. Everybody seemed to be talking about how cold it was. My wandering in central London for a few hours dragging my suitcase (before heading to Kings Cross and the train to Cambridge) was quite a bit uncomfortable – at least until I realized that a key mission should be to find on Oxford Street a branch of Marks and Spencer’s (now called M&S it seems… interestingly across the street from an H&M, and not so far from where the doomed C&A store used to be…) and buy some long thermal underwear. A bit elderly, perhaps, but very snug and warm against the icy winds and snow flurries, so I don’t care. (Yes, that probably falls under the category of “oversharing”, one of the words of the year 2008….)

icam board of governers meeting

One of the various governance boards I managed to accept to be on last year (despite trying hard to try to say “no” more last year) was that of ICAM, the Institute for Complex Adaptive Matter. For the first time in ICAM’s ten year history, its […] Click to continue reading this post →

Not All Academic

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I just have to say…Slumdog Millionaire is indeed a fantastic film. In case you were wondering if you should go…. just go. It is well written, acted, and beautifully photographed and directed. I’m pleasantly surprised that Danny Boyle could make a film that feels quite so authentic (while at the same time being essentially a fairy tale) as an Indian film. Quite splendid.

Speaking of excellent films of 2008, and turning to a more academic context, I’d like to urge you to take a second look at The Visitor, if you’ve not yet seen it. It’s nice, from time to time, to see films where the principal characters are academics, and this one does a very good job at having a good feel to it – in the sense that the lead (played wonderfully by Richard Jenkins) felt believable as a professor going through a strange time in his life, and then finding himself increasingly falling into an unfamiliar world. It is one of my favourite films of the year, and it seems that few people I know have even heard of it.

While on the subject of 2008 films featuring academics, I’d like to mention Smart People. I really did not like it at all. It is not that most of the principal characters […] Click to continue reading this post →

Darwin in the Air

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You’ll begin to notice a lot of discussion of Charles Darwin soon. Why? It is his 200th anniversary, and also 150 years since his Origin of Species was published, and so many people and organizations will be celebrating those landmarks. I did a couple of posts last year on Darwin that are worth a look, one about Darwin’s presentation of the evolution idea to the Linnean Society (150th anniversary of that last year) and the other about the wonderful Darwin Online project. See here and here.

Earlier this week I noticed that BBC Radio 4’s excellent series In Our Time (which I’ve mentioned a number of times here and will again) did a four part special documentary on Darwin. I’ve not listened to it yet, but I’ve a feeling it’ll be good. (I’ll be dropping all four parts onto my phone for listening to in those idle moments on some travel I’m about to embark upon.)

Snipping some of the synopses: […] Click to continue reading this post →

Presidential Poetry

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More encouragement (see my earlier piece about education and about science and more science) comes around the matter of poetry and the presidency. Larissa Anderson, on Weekend America this Saturday, reported on the president-elect’s evident interest in poetry. Derek Walcott was featured in the piece as well (I was pleased to hear this since I like his work, and it is also good to hear about the work of a Caribbean thinker on the national stage – it does not happen often enough for my liking) and had some very interesting things to say. From the transcript of the piece (see that link for audio):

Walcott says it’s good for people in power to read poetry because human beings are complex and contradictory, and poetry can capture that. Like in Langston Hughes’ poem “Theme for English B” when the black student writes to his white teacher, “Sometimes perhaps you don’t want to be a part of me. / Nor do I often want to be a part of you. / But we are, that’s true!” Or in Walt Whitman’s line, “I am large — I contain multitudes.”

Walcott likes the idea of a president who reads poetry and thinks about this kind of human truth. Someone who can see beyond the act of political posturing.

Then he read his recent poem, “40 Acres” that he wrote for Obama, which I thought was rather good. He also described some of the process of writing it – also excellent to hear. Finally, the piece reported on something he said that reflects my own […] Click to continue reading this post →

Thermodynamics and Gravity

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ads_ballI noticed that Robert Helling shared some thoughts about thermodynamics and gravity today on his blog. He is understandably confused about several aspects of the issue, especially when applied to cosmological issues. (What is the entropy of our universe? Does the Second Law really apply? Does equilibrium thermodynamics even apply here?)

I’ve nothing remarkable to add to the discussion at this time except to note that a blanket statement that thermodynamics and gravity don’t seem to go together (which I don’t think he’s strongly saying) is not one I’d make, since we have a major class of working counterexamples.

The context is the gauge/gravity duals I’ve talked about here a lot, starting with AdS/CFT and beyond. There we know that the gravitational systems are essentially able to display the more garden variety thermodynamics by being immersed in the (regulating-box-like) anti-De Sitter type backgrounds. Then we see that black holes […] Click to continue reading this post →

Merry New Year!

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pods on a tree at new year Yes, that’s right. You read Merry and not Happy.

I’m breaking the mould. I’m upping the stakes. I’m wishing one and all a year of merriment. I’m afraid it can’t be returned, so you’ll have to work with it as best you can. I’m certainly going to.

To achieve the mean of Happiness that the millions of Happy New Year wishes every year are evidently striving for, we need to be aiming for some Merriness from time to time to keep us on track at settling at this particular position on the multidimensional emotional landscape.

Someone has to take this important business in hand, and so I’m having a go, […] Click to continue reading this post →

As 2008 Draws to a Close…

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I thought I’d follow Janet and do a sort of end of year review or summary (or, really, snapshot) in the following style: List the first sentence of every first post of the month for all twelve months. I’ve no idea what this will produce, so here goes:

* * *

January
I’ll admit that I was quite surprised by this.

February
Lovely layers in the distance on a hike at Runyon Canyon this morning, looking North East.

March
A snapshot from last Friday night (a week ago).

April
Well, I learned recently* that the BBC wildlife program makers have done it again, breaking new ground in scientific discovery while making a new series.

May
Well, here’s a turn up for the books.

June
Well, you’ve probably guessed that I’ve been somewhat distracted for several days. […] Click to continue reading this post →

Moanin’

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freddie hubbard

One of my favourite trumpet players – one who helped transform the instrument – is Freddie Hubbard. He died on Monday morning. Sadly, this means that the last of a line of great trumpet giants of the middle period has passed. (I’m thinking of a line including Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown and Lee Morgan – Hubbard was the next. See my article on this from last year.) There’s a Herald Tribune obituary by Peter Keepnews here, and NPR has a reflection by Howard Mandel here.

There are a lot of YouTube clips of him playing, but sift carefully since (from a quick scan) what’s there is not a great mixture, I’d say. At least to my tastes there’s not enough stuff representative of his greatest periods as compared to the later work. I picked out a few bits for you below, but I’d recommend, if you are looking to more […] Click to continue reading this post →

Red, Yellow, Blue, Green…

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red yellow green blue…among other colours.

View of the day from the garden. (Winter. Number x in a limited series of y.) (Click for larger view.) The rains have gone for a while. The sun is back, with clear blue skies to close out the year.

I’m trying to rest. Well, I’m working on various projects at home, mostly. Colours are on my mind a bit in one of these projects, actually. Later today I’m going to be down in the (only slightly mad-scientist) workshop making a portable screen on which to project films.

Projecting onto the wall is good, but I want to make a silver-grey screen with a dark border that will really pop the colours out. Some of this is about not projecting onto […] Click to continue reading this post →