Stephen Wolfram - Computation and the Fundamental Theory of Physics
Good and relatively modest explanation of what Wolfram has been up to.
physics
Good and relatively modest explanation of what Wolfram has been up to.
That stupid light in Las Vegas is the brightest spotlight in the world?!
From some tooltips:
It's common knowledge that Mt. Everest is the tallest mountain on Earth, measured from sea level. A somewhat more obscure piece of trivia is that the point on the Earth's surface farthest from its center is the summit of Mt. Chimborazo in Ecuador, due to the fact that the planet bulges out at the equator. Even more obscure is the question of which point on the Earth's surface moves the fastest as the Earth spins, which is the same as asking which point is farthest from the Earth's axis. The answer isn't Chimborazo or Everest. The fastest point turns out to be the peak of Mt. Cayambe, a volcano north of Chimborazo. And now you know.
and
DO NOT USE THIS GRAPH FOR PLANNING PURPOSES. It's not that it isn't accurate, it's just that any kind of plan that involves this type of data is probably a bad one.
and
For aerodynamic reasons, this [protective] gear should probably make it look like you're wearing a very fast airplane.
Feynman discusses three equivalent representations of the theory of gravity.
Equivalent representations of physical theories drive the plot in Ted Chiang's Story of Your Life (made into the movie Arrival) (Fermat's principle of least time in that instance).
Another version, lots of lyrics for this one.
First of a few of these.
Some really "long now" thinking. I love the possible answer to the Fermi Paradox too - that the ETs are hoarding mass & energy to do their computing when the universe cools down and it's more efficient to run their data centers.
An Omni magazine interview with Richard Feynman.