Book Review: "The Quantum Universe" by Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw

Okaaaay. They say it's not a textbook. I would beg to differ.
Slightly.

I'd say that for anyone doing a degree course in physics with Quantum Mechanics, then it would be considered a 'primer.' And a bloody good one at that.

It's not that it's not easy to read.
Not for me. But then I do have a history of delving into Quantum Mechanics. And I don't have any serious mathematical knowledge. But I'm somewhat familiar with the history and maths of some of the equations.

I would just say this:

"If you have a casual interest in Quantum Mechanics, then I suggest that you'll be lost in 5 seconds from starting the book."

If you have any sense of the scale of the issues involved in trying to accurately model a single hydrogen atom, not a molecule I might add, but an atom, then you'll appreciate this book.

It wonderfully details how wave functions trap electrons in probability states such that they are unable to flit all over the universe, observable or not. It wonderfully explains how one can extrapolate from a single hydrogen atom to the death of stars, but one thing it is not, is a casual read. De Broglie and Schrodinger et al are called upon with regularity which will confound the casual reader.

Sometimes one has the impression that the writers proceed like this:

"First get your box of matches. Here they are. Now we use this equation. And Voila! Here's a box girder bridge."

Wait. What?

I loved it as it answered some thorny questions I had regarding quantum fluctuations, wave functions (standing waves and potential traps and so on) and what not. It also covered some of the possibilities of the Higgs field. It explained in exquisite detail how transistors work at the sub-atomic level.

What it didn't cover in detail, which I consider lamentable and saddening given the available literature, is the exact mechanism by which the 'fields', in particular, QFT, explain just exactly how an electron 'knows' how to flow in a path from one pole to another in a magnet. Is it 'spin?' Inflaton field? What? Maybe I just missed it.

What about the possibility that all 'electrons' are super-positions of a underlying 'inflaton' (or whatever) field such that all particles are but one shadow on the wall of a super dimensional wavicle? No FTL required if it exists in 13 dimensions... But I digress.

If you are versed in maths of physics, then by all means, go buy the book and bask in the reflected glory of two exceedingly bright physicists and very, very talented writers. If you think 'quantum mechanics' is a catchall for weird stuff in a vacuum, then don't buy this book. Otherwise it'll take pride of place next to that other book you bought "A Brief History of Time."

If you even vaguely understand what I've been blathering about, then go buy the book. It's waaaay cool.

Seems the Japanese do lego for pixies, goblins and orcs!

The Japanese seem to have a fascination with teensy tiny things. I appreciate that. And so does B given that he's now carved several chess sets out of wooden BBQ skewers...

Anyway, saw NanoBlocks in Mind Games Australia Fair. Had to get at least one. Here are photos before:

Those pieces are so frickin tiny. And after several immensely frustrating minutes where I found that my fingers where just too frickin' big... But I persevered... And built...

A grand piano! Few bits left over, but what the heck. All I can say is that this is an un-tapped market. For those people who are no more than 2 foot tall. Love it! Gunna get more!

Here's the link to the Japanese site: http://www.diablock.co.jp/nanoblock/

Parady of Rockstar by NickelBack - For Programmers...

(Sung to Nickelback's "Rockstar")

I'm through with going for jobs when I never get in
It's like not having a masters is a mortal sin
this job hasn't turned out quite the way I want it to be…
(tell me what you want)

I want a new laptop with an extra wide screen
I want unlimited access to the coffee machine
And a big pay rise and my parking paid for me
(so what ya need?)

I need an optical link thats got no limit,
And a brand new router with a firewall in it
Gonna piss off hackers that would love to take my source code from me
(Been there, done that)

I want a new VM full of ram and speed
The amazon cloud won't fulfil my needs
I need an enterprise solution not the crap you can get for free
(so how you gonna do it?)

<CHORUS>
 I'm gonna trade the job for fortune and fame
 Wear a t-shirt and jeans and design a game

 Cause we all just wanna be code rockstars
 Writing iPhone apps while at coffee bars

 The shares come easy and and the tools are cheap
 We're all more productive since we gave up sleep

 And we'll...

 Blog our thoughts on our own websites
 Send off random tweets at around midnight

 We'll give up soap and not wash our hair
 But our codes so cool that no-one will care

 And uh.. hay hey I'll be a code rockstar
 Hay hey I'll be a code rockstar
</CHORUS>

I wanna be great like Steve, without the glasses
I wanna lead the pack not be part of the masses
Sign a couple autographs so I can get my tools for free...
( well heres the deal)

I'm gonna style my code in the latest fashion
ganna turn down dinner at the Bill Gates mansion
Gonna get a big investor to fund my IPO for me
(so how you gonna do it?)

<CHORUS>
 I'm gonna trade the job for fortune and fame
 Wear a t-shirt and jeans and design a game

 Cause we all just wanna be code rockstars
 Writing iPhone apps while at coffee bars

 The shares come easy and and the tools are cheap
 We're all more productive since we gave up sleep

 And we'll...

 Blog our thoughts on our own websites
 Send off random tweets at around midnight

 We'll give up soap and not wash our hair,
 But our codes so cool that no-one will care

 And we'll chat online with the coolest dudes
 putting down any language that lacks attitude

 We'll bitch about the closing down of pirate bay
 And complain about the nazis at the RI double A

 Well... Hay hey I'll be a code rockstar
</CHORUS>

Using Node.js to hack up a service
Though it's performance claim really make me nervous

Get burned out hackers writing all my code
Then cry like a baby when it's slow to loooooad...

<CHORUS>
 Cause we all just wanna be code rockstars
 Writing iPhone apps while at coffee bars

 The shares come easy and and the tools are cheap
 We're all more productive since we gave up sleep

 And we'll...

 Blog our thoughts on our own websites
 Send off random tweets at around midnight

 We'll give up soap and not wash our hair,
 But our codes so cool that no-one will care

 And we'll chat online with the coolest dudes
 putting down any language that lacks attitude

 We'll bitch about the closing down of pirate bay
 And complain about the nazis a that RI double A

 Well... Hay hey I'll be a code rockstar.

 Yeah... Hay hey I'll be a code rockstar.

</CHORUS>

(you suck!)

Mambo Number 5 for Programmers - Rebuild Number 5

(Sung to Mambo #5)

1… 2… 3,4,5
Everybody in the team said to put it live
To the big server that we host on
The boys say they want the latest build
But I think there's a problem

With the code that we wrote last week
I think it's a loop or a memory leak...

We fixed dependencies, comments, var names and indents
But now I think about it, some testing would have made sense.

So what can I do I really beg you my lord
Cause re-coding is just like a sport

Anything I have have coded let me dump it
And please let me rebuild it

A little bit of coding in my life
A little bit of hacking on the side
A little bit of debugging is all it needs
A little bit of open source keeps it free
A little bit of Java thanks to sun
A little bit of shell script helps it run
A little bit of tuning while it ran
A little bit of joy spread across the LAN

The site is Up and Down, the home page isn't found
Through your hands in the air, stamp your feet on the ground

Take the javascript out and clear the css height
Shut your browser down and try to load the site

Hit refresh once and clear the cache out twice
And if it still wont load then we're working all night

A little bit of coding in my life
A little bit of hacking on the side
A little bit of debugging all it needs
A little bit of open source keeps it free
A little bit of Java thanks to sun
A little bit of shell script helps it run
A little bit of tuning while it ran
A little bit of joy spread across the LAN

Dump it, rebuild it!
Rebuild number 5

A little bit of coding in my life
A little bit of hacking on the side
A little bit of debugging all it needs
A little bit of open source keeps it free
A little bit of Java thanks to sun
A little bit of shell script helps it run
A little bit of tuning while it ran
A little bit of joy spread across the LAN

I'll do
All to
Fix my code so it works for you
Don't try yet to load the site, one more build and we'll have it right

Portal for Programmers - Still Have a Job

(Sung to the song from Portal Still Alive)

Project management
I'm making a note here: No success
In all my years, I've mostly just seen failures

They call it a science
We do what we must because they say
For the good of all them
Except the ones who have quit

But there's no use crying over every deadline
We just keep on trying to get it done on time
And you claim that it's done when you get it to run
For the people who still have a job

I'm very angry
It's hard to be happy right now
Even though we put it live this morning
And managed a demo
And passed the quality testing
We all know it's gonna fail cause we cut so many corners
Now the bugs are piling faster all of the time
We skipped over beta, that was the first bad sign
While the employees churn
We forget what we learned
For the people who still have a job

Go ahead and fire me
I think I'd prefer to go freelance
At least I won't have to deal with this shit
Make me redundant
I'll take the money and just run
And find a better job without dealing with all of this pain

But that's wishful thinking while there's projects to do
If we fail again the client's going to sue
I've got projects to run, management to be done
On the people who still have a job

And I think that I still have a job
I really pray that I still have a job
I am not sure that still have a job
Sometimes I wish I did not have a job
And after this I may not have a job
HAVE A JOB
Have a job

WooHoo! "The dRuby Book" is out. Will review later

The dRuby Book: Distributed and Parallel Computing with Ruby

I just got it synced into my dropbox, so I'll get to read it soon.

I am not "The Internet with Boobs"

B invented that term for me. But it's not quite true. I, do however, have what seems like an impressive ability to dredge up seemingly obscure facts from my memory.

My colleagues at work have endless fun trying to find something about which I don't know something.
Like asking me if there was ever a game show involving a goat with an aqua lung and Henri Bergson.

The answer is "yes" by the way. 1969. Monty Python. The show was called "Spot the Brain Cell".

But the reason is far more prosaic. It's simply because I'm old. I'm 55 (well nearly 56 but who's quibbling). I grew up in a world of broken iPads (Books as they were called then) and I had an insatiable appetite to find out what the f*ck was going on. So I read. And read. And read. And still do.

I find young people today far too willing to have their whims satisfied by quick facts. When I had a whim, I had to work at it. They're called libraries, people! We grew up in a world without plastic. No gadgets. So if we had to figure something out, we had to dig. And dig. And dig. We found out eventually what it was that we were looking for, but in the process absorbed tons of other stuff that made life worthwhile.

So if the process of satisfying a whim about why so many of my grand parents hated Germans, I discovered that Russian MIG-15 fighters where based on designs made by German engineers and that there was this guy called Demajanuk who was a concentration camp guard (who's died yesterday aged 91 btw) and that he was at Sobibor about which movies and TV series were made and... and... and... You get the picture.

The point is I had to WORK FOR IT. I didn't have wikipedia or anything else for a quick fix. All the data that is available at a click and tap seems to me to be destroying the act of discovery and the osmosis of interesting stuff. I absorbed. And absorbed.

So in a sense, I am the internet with boobs. So maybe B is right.

Book Review: "The Great Disruption" by Paul Gilding

Fascinating. I've always been a bit of an anti-consumerism nutter, so this book tickles more than just my fancy. Both B and I tend to buy only what we need and often resort to 2nd hand. We tend to hang on to things long after their end of life and when we do finish with things we don't tend to throw them away, but pass them on to a good home wherever possible or pull them apart for parts. In fact I'd venture to say that the only consumerism we, or should I say I, engage in is the creation of a large Nerf gun arsenal.

Anyway, enough of us. So. Here's this guy who has a long pedigree of environmental activism and was the head of Greenpeace for many years saying this:

"It's over. There's no point in campaigning to save the environment. It's too late. Now it's time to brace for impact. The maths are clear: we can't grow the economy any more, so we need a different approach."

Well argued, snappy and amazingly upbeat, he articulates how humanity can survive the coming economic crisis and emerge into a bright steady state economy where peoples needs are met and are, more importantly, happy.

The book is peppered with amazing quotes, fantastic economic opportunities and details about companies that are using Schumachers approaches right now and making serious profits sustainably. And, most importantly, he clearly articulates how "steady-state" in no way implies "stagnant."

Sounds insane yes? I've often been described as a pessimist, but I prefer the term "An optimist with experience." And as such, I think his suggestions, actions and his hope are what is needed.

I have always been shocked at the state of the conspicuous consumption culture, the vain belief that growing the economy infinitely was viable and that we could always trade our way out of any difficulty. To me, these ways of thinking are out dated and just plain wrong. It seems to me to be sheer madness to think that with Earths finite set of resources the billions of poor people could ever reach a western level of wealth. So it is refreshing to see a well argued, statistically backed and experience led book can show a way through the coming economic problems.

So. Go buy a copy.

Some Ruby IDEs I didn't know about...

Interesting...
From the ruby-lang mailing list:

<snip>

I just stumbled across some IDE's I never even knew about:

http://arcadia.rubyforge.org/

http://www.cloud-ide.com/

http://shiftedit.net/home

I know that there are others out there, but these are what I found 

first.  What's remarkable here is the install process for these IDE's is 

quite different from what I'm (somewhat) familiar with:  Netbeans and 

Eclipse.  

These IDE's are distributed either by gem or through the browser.  Quite 

interesting.

</snip>

Haven't put the author's name for privacy reasons.

Book Review: "The Science Delusion" by Rupert Sheldrake

Hmm. It's 3:30am and I have just put this book down.

Fascinating. I read the dust jacket and my immediate thought was that this was a load of old bollocks.
But it isn't and the dust jacket is just plain wrong.

The tone is one of sober, deliberate questioning of the dogma and paradigm of 'traditional' science. In one sense the concept of 'traditional' science is the thing he's suggesting needs addressing.

Sheldrake isn't saying that his ideas are right or that the universe is alive or that parapsychology is real.
He's just saying that the questions about them should be treated the same way as other 'scientific' questions.
So at the end of each chapter he provides clear questions about what was discussed and possible experiments that could be performed to approach the 'heresy'.


I have to say that many of those experiments are doomed to failure because they are not constructed very well. The crystallization experiments are just plain silly. But that's not the point. In any case I particularly like his idea for X-Prizes for proving various things such as over unity devices. Cute.


Each chapter attempts to address a key assumption, dogma if you will, about the current state of science. He then asks questions about it and provides 'evidence' to the contrary. His 'evidence' in most cases is utter rubbish, but again that's not the point. The fact that asking the question at all in the current materialistic science view is viewed as heresy IS the point.

Finally I would like to say that if I hear the phrase 'morphic resonance' one more time I'll throttle the person saying it and shove an easter island statue into their nether regions. The idea is completely unfalsifiable and there are time-slice-universe field theories that, I feel, better address the issues than a morphogenic field.

Movie Review: "Legion"

Hmmph.
Downgraded to Meh.
First off I just don't get this obsession with end of times stuff.
I don't mean the save the world stuff like Independence Day (not that I don't have serious beefs with that one), but rather this Armageddon apocalypse nonsense where some invisible mystical being sends 'down' warriors to destroy everything and kill everybody but the ones who are faithful.
Messianamericism I guess.

Anyway, apart from one scene where I thought the angels use of wings as a potent physical weapon was an original idea, I felt the movie just fell flat.
There were a lot of zombies involved, but they were a characterless inert bunch and if they had not been present I don't think anyone would have noticed.

All in all if you want to get a feel for the movie, watch Terminator followed by The Prophecy movies.
Same result but more enjoyable.

Say this in a Christopher Walken voice: "If you want the baby to live, come with me"

Meh.

I was feeling miserable so I built a castle out of cushions.

I work in IT. Anyone who does will recognise these:

P1: Worlds going to end.
P2: Worlds going to end later today.
P3: Worlds going to end by COB.

All of which have the following consequence: Managers will make you commit hari kari if it isn't fixed right frickin now. There is a P0 but no-one talks about that except in hushed tones as it usually involves an alien mothership, sharp knives and investors. OMG, I've revealed too much.

I have quite a few of these pending.

I've been sick. Flu sick. I was feeling shattered, aching, sick and miserable so I went downstairs and started watching a few episodes of King of the Hill season 6. Nice. Only problem was that every time I laughed I coughed up a lung. Not nice as I am running out of them.

We have this really nice sofa. L shaped. And I found myself in the corner and was cold. So I started pulling cushions in on myself. Then a pillow. Then my Blankie. Then a hyper-frickin-fluffy bath robe B's mother bought me.

Pretty soon I had a castle. Warm. Cuddly. Feeling better now. Mistress of all I survey. Which admittedly is mainly a coffee table, a TV and a glass of bourbon.

Only thing missing is a 50 cal and an AK-47. With sniper scope. And night vision. OMG I've made myself laugh. There goes the last lung.

Movie Review: "The Man with X-Ray Eyes"

From 1963. Does it hold up?
Frickin' A.
I first saw this in the early 70's and thought it was great.
And it still is.
Ray Milland as the obsessed scientist, Don Rickles as the fairground exploiter and so on.

I have only one beef with it...

"And if thine eye offends thee, pluck it out!"

Er... No... No I won't. I want more. Dammit. MORE.
Every now and then I get a glimpse into the underlying reality that is reality.
A "matrix moment" if you will. Brian Greene, Carl Sagan, Richard Feyman et al.
It's really there! A swarming mass of radiation. A fog of particles sleeting through us and around us and *is* us.
We are a seething mass of radiation swirling and interacting with other seething masses of radiation.

There is no 'red'. There is just a mass of swirling radiation with a little paint-by-numbers messages on it that our brains use to interpret as 'red'.
I love that. It makes sense.
I can almost see it out of the corner of my eye, Dirk Gently like.

Like the Inflaton field.
I can almost glimpse it sometimes, and I can almost feel the sheer frickin' expanse of it sweeping outwards.
The sound of one inflaton clapping so to speak.

Ray Milland didn't go far enough.
Just a bit further and the character might have seen the face of ... Er... No... Maybe Einstein or Godel or Feynman even.

So if you get a chance to see this movie, do so.

Movie Review: "Hybrid"

Ok. Once you get past the central conceit, this isn't a bad film.
The acting is good, the filming fairly tight and not flaky, the suspense and flow maintained quite well.
Nice sting in the tail and good characterizations for the most part.

The idea is that a bunch of police mechanics and doing a late night Friday shift and are working 3 levels down in a heavily secured workshop.
Unfortunately for them a car has been delivered that is, shall we say, not what it seems.
Ten little indians happen and one by one they get eaten by the car.
Until they trap it in.... No. No spoilers.

My only problem is the central conceit.
So... You know that certain octopuses, octopi or whatever can disguise themselves as coconuts, coral and what not, yes?
So... Thousands, if not millions of years ago, some octopi came on land.
And started hunting humans.
So they disguised themselves as caves, trees and what not.
Wait. What?
Ok. Ok. Never mind. Let's just drive headlong into weirdness.
So over the millennia they have disguised themselves using the current dominant useful thing.
Caves. Trees. Huts. Sheds. Cars.
What. What?
Ok. Ok. Never mind. Let's just drive headlong into weirdness.
Yes cars. So they camouflage themselves so well as a Buick town car or a Ford GTO that even trained mechanics can't tell at 2 feet that they are a frickin' great bad ass octopus.
When it's sitting there and they're all standing around it, why the phuque doesn't it reveal itself and eat them right there?
Oh well.
I enjoyed it. It just wasn't that bad as far a B- Grade sci-fi.
Or maybe I was too sick. Whatever.
So grab some beers and a pizza and watch it.

Contagion! Or why there were no links posted yesterday

B got sick. Then I got sick. Then several others got sick. Sweeping through the office like a brush fire.
Patient zero is just beginning to get over it after several days.
He spent the day intermittently:

1) carving chess sets out of chopsticks and
2) watching episodes of QI and Burn Notice and
3) coughing, choking, chucking up and
4) generally being miserable

I was absolutely hopeless yesterday spending most of the day in a daze of snot, coughing and chucking up.
It's 3:30am and I couldn't lie down for the coughing, so I came into our home office to check email.

It's the first time I've been able to use a keyboard or look at a screen for 24 hours.
Anyone that knows me would find that almost like discovering that the Queen is actually a lizard alien.

The worst thing about it is the headaches, joint aches and the dissociative state you're left in.
I need glasses to read, and the headaches precluded wearing them which made it all but impossible to code.

I'll try to get the links done this morning as I can almost function normally now.

Sorry everyone.