Dear Long Live Yorke

[Ouch-8s 4]

One of my professors who went to CalTech said that Feynman taught him how to blow smoke rings, as he readily demonstrated to us in class.

Dear LLY,42?Sincerely,Damn I miss smoking.

[Actuary 3]

nm.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

The question I pose is this; Is this type of behavior standard at most colleges, because I feel I am getting jipped for what I'm paying in tuition? I've definitely learned more by doing my own study schedule as opposed to just the professor lecturing, but maybe that's how it's supposed to be. However, I feel that there should be more guidance than the professors are giving. I'm kind of rambling.

I've had two classes that were taught with power point, and I've discovered that it's a pretty terrible teaching technique. In class, it's bad enough that students aren't active, but with a power point class, even the teacher isn't active, so really nobody is doing anything at all. For many types of classes, it is often the case that one can learn as much simply by reading the book than by actually going to class. If a teacher is really simply regurgitating the book, then it's probably best to use the class simply as a syllabus and as motivation to learn the material yourself. If the teacher is using power point, you may not be quite as lucky since the presentation isn't likely to be as complete and self sufficient as a textbook, and is likely to be even more boring. So, again, that sucks.The best classes that I've had do one of two things:- They have a very good understanding of the relationship between a book and a course. They encourage the student to regularly read the book and their lectures serve not to repeat what is said in the book but rather to clarify, supplement, and to attack from a different angle.or-They don't use a book at all, design their own course, recommend other books as supplements, but teach out of their own head and create their own syllabus. This can be extremely effective if the right teacher does it since it is extremely often the case that no textbook is perfect and understanding a course requires many sources coming together.I've never taken a finance or accounting course, so I'm not sure what the norm in that territory is, but over my course as a student, I've had a mixture of the "repeat the book" types, the "power point" types, as well as a (thankfully) large amount of really good teachers. I would guess that your situation isn't unusual, but that doesn't mean that it's right.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

Now there is allot of water on that bridge. Considering that 1 cubic meter weights 1000kg ( 2200 lbs) there is alot of dead weight that the bridge has to be able to withstand.Question: did the engineers who designed it have to calculate the added weight of boats ridding over it?

Wow, that's a pretty sick picture. Never underestimate the ingenuity of the Chinese.Of course, they had to take into account the weight of the boats going over the bridge, but not in the way you're suggesting.When a boat goes over the bridge, it displaces water equal to it's mass. So, the overall weight of on the bridge will not change, only what constitutes that weight. The boat going over the bridge will just make some of the weight come from boat instead of all of it coming from water.However, for this to work, there must be enough water to support the boat and allow it to float. If there isn't enough water in the first place to be displaced by a boat such that the mass of the water displaced is equal to the mass of the boat, then the boat won't float and will scrape the ground when it goes over the bridge.

[ShakeZuma 585]

Okay, here's one to bake your noodle:Let's say that one of the gods is playing a game in whatever unphysical realm in which he dwells. There, time exists but certain laws of physics don't.Now, this god owns a lamp and he plays the following game:At time 0, he turns the lamp on, at time 1, he turns the lamp off, at time 1.5 he turns the lamp on, at time 1.75 he turns the lamp off, at time 1.857 he turns it on, and so on.So, after each instance of hitting the light switch, he waits half the time he waited before to hit it again. Assume that the light turns on and off instantly.At time 2, is the light on or off?

ok, its on before he flips it off at the 2 mark.

[ShakeZuma 585]

Now there is allot of water on that bridge. Considering that 1 cubic meter weights 1000kg ( 2200 lbs) there is alot of dead weight that the bridge has to be able to withstand.Question: did the engineers who designed it have to calculate the added weight of boats ridding over it?

my answer for this would be: they didn't have to, but I hope they did.

[hblask 1]

I've definitely learned more by doing my own study schedule as opposed to just the professor lecturing

This may be the most important thing anyone can learn in college. Nice job.

[hblask 1]

Okay, here's one to bake your noodle:Let's say that one of the gods is playing a game in whatever unphysical realm in which he dwells. There, time exists but certain laws of physics don't.<br /><br />Now, this god owns a lamp and he plays the following game:At time 0, he turns the lamp on, at time 1, he turns the lamp off, at time 1.5 he turns the lamp on, at time 1.75 he turns the lamp off, at time 1.857 he turns it on, and so on.So, after each instance of hitting the light switch, he waits half the time he waited before to hit it again. Assume that the light turns on and off instantly.At time 2, is the light on or off?<br />

I think this is one of those trick questions that force us to ask "what is the nature of time?" Is time infinitely divisible?I've seen a theory that time is made up of "chronons", some fundamental unit of time, just like matter has some fundamental unit. I'm not sure if it's a real theory or just some kook, but really that's what your question comes down to. Is there some unit of time that is just too small to divide again?If you believe time is infinitely divisible, there is no answer. It's Schroedinger's lightswitch. You'll know when you get there.If you believe time is not infinitely divisible, then the answer is "whichever state it happen to be in when we reached the chronon level".

[Balloon guy 158]

Switch the lightSwitch the envelopeMan just stick to one thing already

[speedz99 145]

Okay, here's one to bake your noodle:Let's say that one of the gods is playing a game in whatever unphysical realm in which he dwells. There, time exists but certain laws of physics don't.Now, this god owns a lamp and he plays the following game:At time 0, he turns the lamp on, at time 1, he turns the lamp off, at time 1.5 he turns the lamp on, at time 1.75 he turns the lamp off, at time 1.857 he turns it on, and so on.So, after each instance of hitting the light switch, he waits half the time he waited before to hit it again. Assume that the light turns on and off instantly.At time 2, is the light on or off?

That depends...who's looking at the light? Me, or a God that's capable of detecting infinitely small portions of time between photons?

PARTICLES IN THE UNIVERSE!!

Is there supposed to be a type of particle involved in gravity?

[vbnautilus 48]

The question I pose is this; Is this type of behavior standard at most colleges, because I feel I am getting jipped for what I'm paying in tuition? I've definitely learned more by doing my own study schedule as opposed to just the professor lecturing, but maybe that's how it's supposed to be. However, I feel that there should be more guidance than the professors are giving. I'm kind of rambling. I hope this makes sensel

I'd like to jump in and speak to this one if you don't mind, since I teach at a University and have in past years been responsible for the teacher training program on campus. Where I work one of the major problems is that professors are hired for their research record with little regard for teaching skill. As a result, most of them are very bad teachers. Many smart people believe that teaching does not require much skill and think they can just stand up and say what they know. This is a big mistake. The old style "lecture" is really not optimal from a learning perspective; people really only learn when they are actively involved with the material, passive listening does very little. Personally, I use powerpoint slides because I have a lot of things I like to show the students, but the point of giving them the files beforehand is so that they can concentrate less on writing everything down and more on participating in the class. Participation means thinking, asking questions, responding, etc. This becomes more and more difficult to achieve as class sizes grow, so unfortunately teaching usually suffers at large universities.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

I think this is one of those trick questions that force us to ask "what is the nature of time?" Is time infinitely divisible?I've seen a theory that time is made up of "chronons", some fundamental unit of time, just like matter has some fundamental unit. I'm not sure if it's a real theory or just some kook, but really that's what your question comes down to. Is there some unit of time that is just too small to divide again?If you believe time is infinitely divisible, there is no answer. It's Schroedinger's lightswitch. You'll know when you get there.If you believe time is not infinitely divisible, then the answer is "whichever state it happen to be in when we reached the chronon level".

Yeah, this is probably the closest thing to an answer there is. His rate of switching is only defined up to but not including time 2, so really the answer is indetermined. His switching simply infinitely oscillates.This is related to what is called a Supertask. It is basically something that is done (countably) infinitely many times, and there's a lot of philosophical talk about it. I think most mathematicians would simply say that the problem itself doesn't give rise to an absolute answer.Even though it has no real answer, I enjoy questions like this. They make me think a bit. It's sort of the mathematical equivalent of a Zen Koan.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

Is there supposed to be a type of particle involved in gravity?

Well, gravity is a field, like everything else in the universe. According to quantum mechanics, fields can be broken down into their smallest components, called quantum of those fields. We call these quantum of fields "particles." So, we would expect that gravity, like anything else, at some level comes from particles, or minimum energy packets of the field.

[hblask 1]

Well, gravity is a field, like everything else in the universe. According to quantum mechanics, fields can be broken down into their smallest components, called quantum of those fields. We call these quantum of fields "particles." So, we would expect that gravity, like anything else, at some level comes from particles, or minimum energy packets of the field.

I believe this is where the idea I mention above, of some basic unit of time, comes from. Nobody quite knows what time is. The classic question is "why don't eggs spontaneously unbreak?". And one speculative answer is that time is another type of matter, and therefore should have fundamental particles like other matter. It certainly doesn't look like our traditional definitions of matter, but maybe we're just not smart enough to grasp the connection. Maybe certain subatomic particles only last for tiny tiny fractions of a second because they are being converted to this other form of matter, a chronon. Of course, that would require some energy loss, so it'd have to below thresholds that can currently be measured, I guess. But if chronons (I just like saying that word) were fundamental, perhaps nature tends toward forming time, and that's what entropy is -- the decay of matter particles into time particles.Or I could just be making this up.I'm not sure. I may need to get high to further clarify my position.

[Jeepster80125 0]

Boats made of ice.

[Max_Powers 0]

Ever since I heard about the Hadron Collider and the possibility of it forming a mini-black hole I have been fascinated by the idea. I realize this is extremely improbable --- but it’s interesting to ponder.Suppose some earth-gobbling mini-black hole did form. What would it look like to those of us riding this planet to our doom? Instant death or do we have some time to realize what is happening?I picture driving down the interstate, in the distance the landscape crushing forward into blackness, light poles and over-passes warped and annihilated, front of the car now, China to my immediate right. Then I guess its over. Or, more likely, I'm ripped apart before I'm conscious of any of this.What do you think would happen?

[LongLiveYorke 38]

Ever since I heard about the Hadron Collider and the possibility of it forming a mini-black hole I have been fascinated by the idea. I realize this is extremely improbable --- but it’s interesting to ponder.Suppose some earth-gobbling mini-black hole did form. What would it look like to those of us riding this planet to our doom? Instant death or do we have some time to realize what is happening?I picture driving down the interstate, in the distance the landscape crushing forward into blackness, light poles and over-passes warped and annihilated, front of the car now, China to my immediate right. Then I guess its over. Or, more likely, I'm ripped apart before I'm conscious of any of this.What do you think would happen?

Well, if we are able to create black holes at the LHC, they're only going to last for an instant. Black holes have a strange property where they "leak." For big black holes, the leaking process is very slow, but for the small ones that could potentially be created at CERN, they would leak into nothingness before they could ever do any damage. This process is called Hawking Radiation.If we were to suddenly be confronted by a giant black hole that appeared near Earth, what would happen would depend on the nature of the black hole. Even though the name sounds scary, a black hole is no more threatening when you're outside of it than a star of the same mass, or any other object really. When outside of the Schwarzschild radius, the force of gravity from a black hole is the same as the force of gravity from a star or planet of equivalent mass. The difference is that black holes are so dense that you are able to get much closer to their center of mass and therefore feel a much stronger force of gravity. Anyway, if one were to fall into a black hole, one would feel as if they were falling for the majority of the time, which wouldn't feel like much at all. Only at the end would one really feel the effect. Toward the very end, and this would only last less than a second, the force of gravity at your feet would be significantly stronger than the force of gravity at your head due to your feet being closer to the black hole. So, your body would very quickly stretch apart until it failed. But this would only last a moment before you were pulled into the mass and were crushed.

[speedz99 145]

If we were to suddenly be confronted by a giant black hole that appeared near Earth, what would happen would depend on the nature of the black hole. Even though the name sounds scary, a black hole is no more threatening when you're outside of it than a star of the same mass, or any other object really. When outside of the Schwarzschild radius, the force of gravity from a black hole is the same as the force of gravity from a star or planet of equivalent mass. The difference is that black holes are so dense that you are able to get much closer to their center of mass and therefore feel a much stronger force of gravity. Anyway, if one were to fall into a black hole, one would feel as if they were falling for the majority of the time, which wouldn't feel like much at all. Only at the end would one really feel the effect. Toward the very end, and this would only last less than a second, the force of gravity at your feet would be significantly stronger than the force of gravity at your head due to your feet being closer to the black hole. So, your body would very quickly stretch apart until it failed. But this would only last a moment before you were pulled into the mass and were crushed.

:raises hand:If objects outside of the Schwartzenheimer Radium aren't any more attracted to black holes than other bodies of the same mass, why do we constantly hear stories about black holes "eating" entire regions of space over time? Is that just science fiction?Also, please add my favorite part about what would happen if someone was sucked into a black hole (from the perspective of someone watching the process).

[LongLiveYorke 38]

If objects outside of the Schwartzenheimer Radium aren't any more attracted to black holes than other bodies of the same mass, why do we constantly hear stories about black holes "eating" entire regions of space over time? Is that just science fiction?

Well, there are many sizes of black holes. Stars only live so long and are constantly spitting out mass before they eventually blow up. Black holes decay very slowly and are constantly absorbing mass, so they can become much larger and heavier than stars. But a black hole with the mass of the sun is no more threatening than the sun itself.

Also, please add my favorite part about what would happen if someone was sucked into a black hole (from the perspective of someone watching the process).

From the perspective of an observer, an object going into a black hole will appear to move slower, will become redder, and will become dimmer as he approaches the event horizon. This is due to time dilation, the doppler effect, and the strength of the gravitational field, respectively.You will never actually see them cross the event horizon. You will simply see them getting closer and closer forever until eventually they fade away and disappear.

[loogie 115]

You will never actually see them cross the event horizon. You will simply see them getting closer and closer forever until eventually they fade away and disappear.

Kurt Cobain wasn't going out like that.

[Actuary 3]

how do you know so much?how much of this is in your head vs looking it up.?what do you do for a living?how much schooling / degrees do you have?boxers or briefs?

[Nikki_N 17]

Dear LLY,42?Sincerely,Damn I miss smoking.

You're giving him the answer in the form of a question? What is this? Jeopardy?

[LongLiveYorke 38]

how do you know so much?

School and books.

how much of this is in your head vs looking it up.?

90% in my head. I look up whatever I can to make sure I'm right even if it's in my head to begin with.

what do you do for a living?

Experimental Physicist

how much schooling / degrees do you have?

I'm working my way through grad school right now.

boxers or briefs?

Boxers.

[Dirtydutch 8]

Yorke,A Gaylord says what?

[strategy 4]

Yorke,A Gaylord says what?

huh?