Yes, because only humans were able to do them. But a computer can count much faster and much more accurately than a human, BECAUSE it is consistent and predictable. In practice the relationship is:
human brains are very good at generating algorithms to solve specific problems.
computers are very good at applying the algorithm.
there are still people who try to build perpetual motion machines, so there will still be people trying to come up with fast algorithms for hard problems. and then there'll be quantum computers, and NP problems won't be hard anymore.
hm. by now, I gotta go back to my perpetuum mobile.
Like Vellmont says, special relativity was published in 1905. So was the article on the photoelectric effect (his crucial contribution to quantum physics). What is true is that he continued to work, and still made important research (even if he did oppose the accepted interpretation of quantum physics --- his opposition helped). What I think you're trying to say is that many great scientists have good ideas when they're young, they recognise them as good, and then they are willing to work a lifetime in order to prove it.
lawmakers and everyday people live in different worlds. what they refuse to understand is that if people can get something for free, they will get it for free. period.
another important issue is that it's very dangerous to try to forbid something that you can't actually stop. that's when you lose all authority.
offtopic: http://xkcd.com/137/ . we shouldn't be afraid to say the truth about what we want.
do you *really* think that the laws of physics will ever be less important?:) Personally, I don't have a tattoo and I never really thought of getting one. But if someones' gonna do it, I think math and physics are perfect.
so why don't some slashdotters get together and do it? I mean, there are so many around here ready to draw Mohammed, at least some of them should have some reasonable skills that are of use in this case. I'm a physicist. I don't know enough, and in this thing you can't allow for mistakes; some people get caught and die.
I think that depends on the algorithm. For some specific problems, you can probably use less than what is already available. You do have a point, and I would be interested to know how FFT computations are affected by "slow" memory access.
wow. these people pay to install a python distribution? check the umpteenth proof that the economy went bad because stupid people are in charge. seriously now... I use all these, and they're free, and in ubuntu I just had to click install to get them.
it's kind of sad, but in today's big cities you can't see stars. Light pollution, smog, whatever. personally, at some point I am going to miss them enough to go to a website where they want me to watch starry skies.
indeed, I'm in stupid situation. Thank you for pointing out their source. I tried to get the article, but I don't have access to it. Furthermore, I don't have access to a list of citing articles (and I can't find the American Journal of Physics on JSTOR). I was hoping that I could find a citing article that I could download and go through (I'm at the University, and I expected to find something usable).
Anyway, I'm giving up because I don't have the time. I can't really decide what to think, because I'm pretty confident my teacher was aware of the state of the art in this domain (and with such a title, this article couldn't have been unknown 4 years ago).
So my lesson for today is to listen first and argue later if I can.
actually, the term "glass" is used in thermodynamics for liquids that have been frozen too fast to transition into their solid states. A glass state is NOT a solid state. I took the respective course in french, so I know that they're also called "liquides frustres" (I don't have the patience to look this up in english). Anyway, if you go to old churches and cathedrals, you will see that the glasses at the window are thicker towards the bottom, because the glass flowed over the years. It is true that modern techniques generate much better glasses than a few hundred years ago, but they're still not in a solid state.
nothing should be kept a secret. if you have an example of a situation where society would react stupidly, I say that's a situation where we need better education, not secrecy. I do agree that this kind of education takes time, but this should be the general idea.
In fluid dynamics simulations (which include weather stuff), there are huge computational problems. I work in the field, so bear with me a little.
The best model we have so far for fluids is to use balance equations (look up the Navier Stokes equations). This means that in order to describe the evolution of a fluid in a given domain, we need to split the domain into small cells, and then integrate numerically the balance equations. To put it simply, you have to integrate numerically a system of ordinary differential equations with many many variables (degrees of freedom). For a simple but "correct" Navier Stokes simulation, the number of degrees of freedom is proportional to Re^(9/4), where Re is the Reynolds number (the memory requirements are proportional to the number of degrees of freedom). This Reynolds number, for typical systems (like the atmosphere) is of the order of at least 10^4-10^6 (you can look up typical values on wikipedia if you're interested). Furthermore, the number of timesteps needed for a "correct" simulation is proportional to Re^(3/4).
But these are not the most complicated simulations that are to be run on such machines. Research for issues like controled nuclear fusion needs to address much more demanding problems.
Numerical simulations of physical systems are inherently hard, because they scale polynomially with their complexity. However, they are generally cheaper than actual experiments, and you have access to more data.
funny. here we have a game, that works on a specific type of hardware, and a guy saying that we should wrap this game into a virtual machine and make everything readable by a generic computer (basically, pack the source of the virtual machine with the source of the game). and your best idea is to print on paper, and keep the paper. i can see through your infinite wisdom:)
I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. But seriously now, you missed the point... they want to preserve the information in a medium independent way, not the medium.
I know that all over Europe people are beginning to heat water with the sun, and it's pretty efficient. But in Sahara there is no water. Also, if you take energy with solar panels, or you take it with heated water, what is the difference?
You do have a good point, and they should maybe make a few estimates --- solar panels versus water heating. But, whatever the way of turning sunlight into electricity, we still need the cables from Africa to Europe.
A little math history: once upon a time, there were these guys trying to deal with mathematical analysis and calculus and stuff. and one of them had the idea to call sets of functions spaces, and to use concepts from euclidian geometry when dealing with them. even now, if you try to talk to someone working in quantum physics, they'll start going on about hilbert spaces, scalar products between functions and stuff like that. and instead of working with numbers and functions on these numbers, they will prove theorems by using distances and angles between functions. the human mind was developed by playing in trees, hunting, swimming, and stuff like that. The most important scientific achievements are made by people who succeed in using simple childish concepts when dealing with complex problems (have you ever heard of Feynman diagrams?).
Yes, it is fun. Yes, it is funny. but it is not dicking around, it is simply the mind of a primate trying to deal with complicated math problems. do you even know what MHD turbulence actually means in terms of "complicatedness"?
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, because only humans were able to do them. But a computer can count much faster and much more accurately than a human, BECAUSE it is consistent and predictable.
In practice the relationship is:
human brains are very good at generating algorithms to solve specific problems.
computers are very good at applying the algorithm.
there are still people who try to build perpetual motion machines, so there will still be people trying to come up with fast algorithms for hard problems.
and then there'll be quantum computers, and NP problems won't be hard anymore.
hm. by now, I gotta go back to my perpetuum mobile.
Like Vellmont says, special relativity was published in 1905. So was the article on the photoelectric effect (his crucial contribution to quantum physics).
What is true is that he continued to work, and still made important research (even if he did oppose the accepted interpretation of quantum physics --- his opposition helped).
What I think you're trying to say is that many great scientists have good ideas when they're young, they recognise them as good, and then they are willing to work a lifetime in order to prove it.
lawmakers and everyday people live in different worlds. what they refuse to understand is that if people can get something for free, they will get it for free. period.
another important issue is that it's very dangerous to try to forbid something that you can't actually stop. that's when you lose all authority.
offtopic: http://xkcd.com/137/ . we shouldn't be afraid to say the truth about what we want.
so where's the surprize?
I agree with the 72 point font thing. which base?
yes, but it doesn't have negative numbers. I always loved the fact that there was a negative number too...
I get your point though.
it was $e^{i\pi}$. it's called (La)TeX, where "\word" is the command "word", and "\pi" is the command pi, that shows the greek letter pi.
you mean $e^{i\pi} = -1$, http://xkcd.com/179/ , of course.
do you *really* think that the laws of physics will ever be less important? :)
Personally, I don't have a tattoo and I never really thought of getting one. But if someones' gonna do it, I think math and physics are perfect.
so why don't some slashdotters get together and do it? I mean, there are so many around here ready to draw Mohammed, at least some of them should have some reasonable skills that are of use in this case.
I'm a physicist. I don't know enough, and in this thing you can't allow for mistakes; some people get caught and die.
thanks for the link.
I think that depends on the algorithm. For some specific problems, you can probably use less than what is already available.
You do have a point, and I would be interested to know how FFT computations are affected by "slow" memory access.
10^9 = 1 000 000 000 IS a billion
10^18 = 1 000 000 000 000 000 000 = 1 BILLION billions = 1 million trillions = 1 thousand quadrillions = 1 quintilion
and that's about it.
will they also block the church of the true creator ? (http://www.venganza.org/)
wow. these people pay to install a python distribution? check the umpteenth proof that the economy went bad because stupid people are in charge.
seriously now... I use all these, and they're free, and in ubuntu I just had to click install to get them.
it's kind of sad, but in today's big cities you can't see stars. Light pollution, smog, whatever.
personally, at some point I am going to miss them enough to go to a website where they want me to watch starry skies.
indeed, I'm in stupid situation. Thank you for pointing out their source.
I tried to get the article, but I don't have access to it. Furthermore, I don't have access to a list of citing articles (and I can't find the American Journal of Physics on JSTOR). I was hoping that I could find a citing article that I could download and go through (I'm at the University, and I expected to find something usable).
Anyway, I'm giving up because I don't have the time. I can't really decide what to think, because I'm pretty confident my teacher was aware of the state of the art in this domain (and with such a title, this article couldn't have been unknown 4 years ago).
So my lesson for today is to listen first and argue later if I can.
actually, the term "glass" is used in thermodynamics for liquids that have been frozen too fast to transition into their solid states. A glass state is NOT a solid state. I took the respective course in french, so I know that they're also called "liquides frustres" (I don't have the patience to look this up in english).
Anyway, if you go to old churches and cathedrals, you will see that the glasses at the window are thicker towards the bottom, because the glass flowed over the years.
It is true that modern techniques generate much better glasses than a few hundred years ago, but they're still not in a solid state.
nothing should be kept a secret. if you have an example of a situation where society would react stupidly, I say that's a situation where we need better education, not secrecy.
I do agree that this kind of education takes time, but this should be the general idea.
you mean a virtual catastrophe?
In fluid dynamics simulations (which include weather stuff), there are huge computational problems. I work in the field, so bear with me a little.
The best model we have so far for fluids is to use balance equations (look up the Navier Stokes equations). This means that in order to describe the evolution of a fluid in a given domain, we need to split the domain into small cells, and then integrate numerically the balance equations. To put it simply, you have to integrate numerically a system of ordinary differential equations with many many variables (degrees of freedom).
For a simple but "correct" Navier Stokes simulation, the number of degrees of freedom is proportional to Re^(9/4), where Re is the Reynolds number (the memory requirements are proportional to the number of degrees of freedom). This Reynolds number, for typical systems (like the atmosphere) is of the order of at least 10^4-10^6 (you can look up typical values on wikipedia if you're interested). Furthermore, the number of timesteps needed for a "correct" simulation is proportional to Re^(3/4).
But these are not the most complicated simulations that are to be run on such machines. Research for issues like controled nuclear fusion needs to address much more demanding problems.
Numerical simulations of physical systems are inherently hard, because they scale polynomially with their complexity. However, they are generally cheaper than actual experiments, and you have access to more data.
funny. here we have a game, that works on a specific type of hardware, and a guy saying that we should wrap this game into a virtual machine and make everything readable by a generic computer (basically, pack the source of the virtual machine with the source of the game). and your best idea is to print on paper, and keep the paper. :)
i can see through your infinite wisdom
I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. But seriously now, you missed the point... they want to preserve the information in a medium independent way, not the medium.
I know that all over Europe people are beginning to heat water with the sun, and it's pretty efficient. But in Sahara there is no water. Also, if you take energy with solar panels, or you take it with heated water, what is the difference?
You do have a good point, and they should maybe make a few estimates --- solar panels versus water heating.
But, whatever the way of turning sunlight into electricity, we still need the cables from Africa to Europe.
A little math history:
once upon a time, there were these guys trying to deal with mathematical analysis and calculus and stuff. and one of them had the idea to call sets of functions spaces, and to use concepts from euclidian geometry when dealing with them. even now, if you try to talk to someone working in quantum physics, they'll start going on about hilbert spaces, scalar products between functions and stuff like that. and instead of working with numbers and functions on these numbers, they will prove theorems by using distances and angles between functions.
the human mind was developed by playing in trees, hunting, swimming, and stuff like that. The most important scientific achievements are made by people who succeed in using simple childish concepts when dealing with complex problems (have you ever heard of Feynman diagrams?).
Yes, it is fun. Yes, it is funny. but it is not dicking around, it is simply the mind of a primate trying to deal with complicated math problems. do you even know what MHD turbulence actually means in terms of "complicatedness"?