July 2005 Archives

Being at a nerd camp, there are a few select people here possessing egos so large that--when they can fit their egos through the doorway--their mere presence in a medium-sized room can occasionally suffocate everyone else inside. For some, this is manifested in behaviour by using exccessively obfuscatory verbiage (and you thought I was bad...). Others just attempt to constantly ask questions about the most arcane and technical topics possible, regardless of whether it is actually applicable to the topic of dicussion in the classroom--much to the annoyance of our resident Italian, Guglielmo. And finally, there are others who try to sound smart by trying to ask obscure and probing questions, but who fall flat on their face every single time. I realized the other day that these pointless questions and needlessly complicated phrases are nothing short of priceless. I'm trying to compile a list of all of these laughable snippets that I can, plus other funny quotes and questions from SSP that demonstrate clearly that even the "nerd" is really quite an ignorant beast. Please submit them if you have any, and don't feel bad if you are quoted. We all have our moments of weakness... just some more than others. Here is the beginning:

"utilize" = use (there's only one time that anyone can remember when this person actually said "use" not "utilize")

"interior locking mechanism" = lock

"So, how exactly would air resistance affect that?" -- A question asked during a brief review of the kinematics of freely falling bodies

"So, if its traveling at a constant velocity, does that mean that it's at terminal velocity?" -- Again, while talking about freely falling bodies

-A Brief Dialogue-
TA: "I really only feel like eating half of a piece of pizza."

Student: [Dead serious] "Well, that depends on how you define "half". If you cut a piece of pizza in half, each half is still technically a piece of pizza."
--

-Another Brief Dialogue-
Prof: "Can anyone identify this person?"

Student: "Benjamin Franklin?"

Prof: "No, Bach"

Student: "Damn"
--

"Gamma rays and x-rays...they have different properties right?"

"Is it possible to see the past?"

"Is it possible to have negative civilization?" -- with regard to Drake equation

"Are you bassing NASHA?"

"So, what exactly qualifies as 'dating'?"

"Do you doubt that you doubt...?"

"When have I ever asked a stupid question?"

... And now I must go give a lecture on cold fusion.

We finally finished the determination of our orbital elements, and my data is okay. I might almost call it reasonable. Certainly, there are inaccuracies, especially in the argument of the perihelion and the mean anomaly, but these are probably due to the fact that we are using the Laplacian method of orbital determination with only three data points. The Laplacian method is apparently one of the worst methods of orbit determination, but it is one of the simpler methods and can produce an orbit given only three observation. A fourth observation would improve matters, but unfortunately we didn't have the time or weather to get four good, evenly spaced observations. And so the orbital elements of the 72 Feronia--the great Roman goddess of fertility--are:

Orbital Element	Our Values	Published JPL values
Semi-Major Axis	2.2188835 AU	2.26612185 AU
Eccentricity	0.13323770	0.12031397
Orbital Inclination	5.4724694°	5.417335°
Longitude of the Ascending Node	203.56656°	208.14026°
Argument of the Perihelion	145.22574°	102.59329°
Mean Anomaly	333.23458°	2.5335805°

Not great, but good enough to generate an ephemeris within about 10m RA and 1° dec. of the actual position for the dates we tested. And if anyone knows why there is that huge space between the first paragraph and the table, be sure to let me know.

I've been spending a lot of time thinking. I done some arguing recently, not as much as usual considering that I don't have Leeor or Ted around, but it has been very interesting, and I've come to a realization. When I argue with Ted or Leeor, there is a fundamental common basis of certain values and ideas, which are accepted implicitly and form a basis for mutual understanding of the argument. This is not to say that we agree on everything--quite the contrary, we disagree at least as much as we agree. Yet these fundamental and subliminal ideas and values play a vital role in the basis of argument formation. For instance, the notion that policy decisions should be made with regard to the implications that they will have on future generations is one of these many basic and unspoken axioms of our discourse. Being with a group of people with a much more diverse set of experiences and backgrounds than my own group of friends demonstrates how these seemingly constant "axioms" are in fact completely arbitrary constructs of our cultural identity. Take for instance my argument about recycling with a certain someone. He has held consistently that it is actually less energy efficient and environmentally beneficial to recycle than it is to throw things away. He also maintains that even if it were beneficial environmentally or economically, he still wouldn't do it because he maintains that it would only benefit future generations. Without a common philosophical context in which to make judgements there can be no common basis for argumentation and any conclusion whatsoever. In such a situation, no conclusions can be reached and no one can be convinced of anything else, which is precisely why arguing about politics is always so fruitless. And now, I am exhausted and must sleep.

My previous entry generated a rather virulent debate in which my adversary repeatedly and vulgarly insulted me after he expressed his viewpoints. I would just like to offer a rebuttal to this dispute. I think that there is a slight ambiguity with regards to the grounds of the debate. It may indeed be inevitable that private development will yield space colonization. That is not the argument. The argument should be whether the government should actively pursue the colonization of space, and whether the human race should be colonizing space. I personally don't think that space colonization will occur by private entities, at least not for an extremely long time. The energy requirements for reaching any place in the solar system are enormous, and the requirements for transporting anything back are even greater. I also don't think that we should be colonizing space period, primarily because of the fact that I asserted earlier: there is not that much to gain from space. Let me confront this through two prongs of attack.

The most important issue of contention in this argument is with regards to the human population and consumption. My adversary claims that I have no proof that the global population will level off according roughly to a logistics curve. On the contrary, I have 200 years of population dynamics and the best current statistical projections to back up my claims. In every single case of industrialization recorded in human history, the population undergoes two primary changes. Naturally, the human population is equilibrium with deaths balancing births. Both rates are at about 50 per 1000 people. Then, the deathrate is reduced through the introduction of modern medicine and sanitation. Some time later (usually about 50 years, I think) economic development due to the rise of industrialism leads to lower birthrates, as more women become educated and more affluent. By this time, birth and deathrates are brought back into equilibrium at about 10 to 15 per 1000. There is no question that the developing nations of the world are undergoing this demographic transition. Statistics show declining deathrates that lead declining birthrates. UN statisticians also show a decline in the growth rate of the global population. There is every indication, both empirical and theoretical to suggest that the global population will follow a logistics curve--leveling out at a certain maximum. If we can aggressively limit global birthrates, then the population will plateau and hopefully decline. Some say that it is not population, but rather overconsumption that is the cause of resource depletion. They are both equally problematic. However, technological improvements in efficiency are capable of partially offsetting overconsumption. Some would say that technology can compensate for all increases in consumption. I disagree, but it is inevitable that it can compensate for some increase in consumption. But alas, I'm going to state unequivocally that overconsumption is a huge problem that is driving resource depletion, and is not likely to end in the future. The real question is, is space colonization a solution? I contend that it is not.

Again we must consider the resources that we can obtain from space: perhaps some low-grade ore and possibly hydrocarbons. I'm going to posit that it is not economically viable in the least to actually refine and transport these resources across the vast solar distances. I can't deny that the future might bring some new technology that would enable this, but it would necessarily be very, very, very far off. The skeptics are accusing me of hand-waving right now, so I'm going to make a computation of the energy requirements of moving various amounts of these "resources" around the solar system. Some would say that nuclear energy is the answer, but fissionable uranium supplies are estimated to only last another 40 years at best. I'm getting tired of typing so I'll continue this sometime later on...

I just finished debugging a really stupid program that generates and ephemeris from a series of orbital elements. It took me about 6 solid hours to realize that I has written "tan(..." instead of "atan(..." Talk about a waste of time.

The reason for my blogging is not to complain about this silly, mindless, and trivial program, but rather to begin to refute a number of--in my mind--highly irrational beliefs. The first of these came out when I was talking to someone after an interesting lecture on NASAs Messenger mission to Mercury. It turns out that he is a firm believer in the future of space colonization, on the grounds that we will need additional resources and that the human race is exhausting the ability of the earth to provide these resources. These are certainly true statements, but I strongly disagree that they are a justification for space colonization. The simplest refutation of these assertations is to ask the question "how?". How exactly is colonizing space going to provide these resources that are essential for our survival? There is a lot of iron in space. There is also a fair amount of water and a few other metals and minerals. The patterns of resource depletion here on earth, however, involve far different resources than we would easily find in space. The depletion of fossil fuels is the most immenant danger, and I can guarantee that space is not going to provide a solution to this dillema. To my knowledge, the most predominant hydrocarbon in the solar system is methane, which is mostly concentrated in the outer solar system. There is virtually no possibility of near-earth extraterrestrial oil or coal reserves. The other resources that are in danger of depletion in our world are things like forests, clean air and water, arable land, and biodiversity, none of which exist appreciably in the rest of the solar system. It therefore makes far more sense to attempt to develop a sustainable existance on the Earth before espousing "space colonization" as a solution to resource depletion, because it's not a solution at all.

This brings be to a loosely connected topic of interest. The problem of resource depletion is driven primarily by the problem of overpopulation. While this is a definite concern, most models of the human population predict a global plateau of population around 9 or 10 billion people. Rather than resorting to human spaceflight and colonization as a solution to resource depletion, it makes more sense to spend billions of dollars on education and family planning services. The inverse relationship between female education and fertility is well-documented, and family planning services makes it possible to overcome age-old cultural paradigms encouraging high reproductive rates. So there it is. This business of space colonization is very wasteful and pointless. Exploration is good, but there's no good reason to colonize.

If you want to read an article containing classically awful quotes and incorrect facts from people here when we were interviewed at the Trinity Site by a French reporter, go here:

http://www3.turkishpress.com/w.asp?s=u&i=050711073841.fibk38o1

It's pretty much the worst article ever, with at least half of the facts being wrong. You can see me in the little picture.

Apparently I haven't updated in a while, which is true. I haven't had much time. I'm planning a rant though on economics. It's interesting to see the differences in opinion from people here who are from all over the country. Not politically speaking, but rather opinions that are part of a person's cultural identity. Take recycling for instance. In the northwest, essentially all people believe in the merits of recycling no matter what their political persuation is. But here it is different. This same patter is prevalent for other opinions, like economic theory. Specifically, I was getting really ticked off listening to some people argue about the Microsoft debaucle, and I'm going to rant... But I'm late for class.... must go...

For anyone who's interested, here's the first dump of someone's pictures from SSP:

http://dmitriy.snerdia.com/core.php?sect=gallery&id=5

And for clarification, all of the funny looking bottles in some of the pictures are Vanilla Creme soda...

... And this is neither my site not are these my pictures, so I take no responsibility for crappy quality, pictures, or site layout.

So, most of you probably remember that I was in complete shock after taking the AP Physics C examination, feeling that the test had raped me terribly. As it turns out, I may have still been raped, but the rest of the test taking population was raped in a far more miserable fashion. My AP scores came in the mail today, and I was, needless to say, in utter disbelief. I was in so much disbelief, in fact, that I had difficulty speaking coherently for about five minutes, as I tried to describe to the cool things (i.e. spectroscopy, CCD imaging, and more) that we can do with our C-14 telescope. And so here they are, in order of my taking them:

Calculus BC: 5
(AB subscore: 5)
Physics C Mechanics: 5
Physics C Electricity and Magnetism: 5
Environmental Science: 5
US Government and Politics: 5
Comparative Government and Politics: 5
Macroeconomics: 5
Microeconomics: 4

All were somewhat of a surprise except for Calc and Microeconomics. Calc is not difficult and the curve is extraordinarily generous. In Microeconomics, the classroom next door was being really loud during the test and I had a lot of trouble concentrating, so I did very poorly on the multiple choice but nailed the free-response. Unfortunately, the free-response is only worth one-third of the overall score on the economics tests.

"So, you can probably guess how we might find rho-hat-double-dot-naught."

--Dr. Hammergren

So after changing my academic plans for next year about sixty-five times, I think I've settled on something. I'm ditching Reed altogether at this point because their classes simply don't work out logistically. I'm taking E&M and calc III in the fall at Lewis and Clark, and Waves and Matter in the spring also at Lewis and Clark. For the winter term at Portland State I'm taking Intro to Group Theory and Applications, and then I'll take Intro to Ring and Field Theory. I have virtually no idea what either of these subjects are, but they sound cool, and are the only ones that work with my schedule.

Today is the day when we celebrate our nation's independence by blowing up little pieces of it.