Frank and Ernest by Thaves for January 06, 2012

… a toilet reference … appropriate for hip-hop …

I saw a poster online that said:Do not move the coffee machine. It will change settings-The Engineersand below it someone postedDo not observe the coffee machine. It will change quantum states- The Physicists.

Just because I like the word “jiggle”…

A niece of mine was giving advice to someone who was having trouble with a stuck drawer. She was amazed to find herself saying, “Jiggle it a little; it’ll open.” Say it quickly several times to get the full effect.

@ Rockngolfer: Was it this? http://mthruf.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/job-fails-talk-nerdy-to-me.jpg

So we can’t quite get a handel…. on quantum physics….? ! ?

Wow. And I thought it was just a comic strip. I don’t know how I feel about actually learning amazing things while reading the comics every day.

And, Bach to you Frank.

Lindsey Strirling – Classical Hip Hop

A Wise One keeps his mouth closed to avoid looking foolish.A Fool opens his mouth and removes all doubt.

Boom! Boom!

It sounds like your position could be summarized as, “Nothing is true. Everything is permissible.” It makes me wonder whether you’ve spent too much time playing the “Assassin’s Creed” games…. :) (Outstanding games, by the way. But I wouldn’t give you a nickel for the philosophy.).You’re completely correct that our understanding — each one of us — of both concrete reality and abstract truth is imperfect. But that doesn’t mean that absolute reality or absolute truth don’t exist — only that we’re not much good at admitting that we’re not perfect at understanding them, and unfairly picking on each other as a result..Plato’s parable of the cave is appropriate here. We only see the shadows of real things, and we interpret them differently. But the absolute reality is still there. It follows that absolute right and wrong do exist, and our responsibility as decent people is to live according to our best understanding of that, as best we can…and be forgiving of each other as we honestly disagree (or screw up!).,(I hope it’s also clear that not all of our personal interpretations will be equally correct or incorrect. Some will contain a more accurate approximation of the truth than others. But as someone once said, you won’t go wrong if you never stop searching for the truth.)

The difficulty of understanding quantum physics, and other such models, is why the true scientists insist on following the math, and not other versions. The “image” may be useful to interpret the math, to help our human minds understand what is going on, but it’s the math that counts.

This also reminds me of the long-ago “Switched-on Bach”.

Feynman was brilliant and one of my favorite people. GENIUS is a good book about him. Feynman and John Wheeler once discussed why every electron in the Universe was like every other electron. Wheeler’s semi-serious idea was that there is only ONE electron and it just manages to be everywhere it needs to be. That would explain a lot of things and that’s how weird this subject is.

Please lord spare us!!

I always liked the violin rock beat in ‘Come On, Eileen’ back in the 80’s.

Ah yes, about the music: a truly despicable pun as is the wont of the cartoonist. But it’s baroque, not classical. It is, however Hi, Baroque, or gopher baroque, i’m baroque. The thread got off to a different planet.