Some Knowledge

I just read a fairly ridiculous article on a physics website about a quantum teleportation experiment.  These researchers claim that they have observed teleportation between two atoms in vacuum chambers seperated by a meter in distance.

The experiment was like this:  They had two vacuum chambers with various electrodes in them.  In the center of each chamber they suspended a single atom.  There were two windows in the chambers.  Through the side window they shot two short laser pulses.  The pulses ionized the atoms, causing them to emit light when the electrons dropped back into the ground state.  Somehow, the photons from this excitation were emitted upwards and were collected by a lens and optical fiber arrangement.  They then passed the two photons through a beam splitter and into photomultiplier tubes.

On the rare occasion that two photons were detected of the same energy in both detector tubes, they knew that the two atoms were in a state of quantum entaglement.  In other words, the two atoms were in the same quantum state.  They then used a single laser pulse to measure the quantum state of one of the atoms.  Once they knew whether the one atom was in a spin up or spin down state, they used a microwave pulse to measure the quantum spin state of the other atom.  Amazingly, they found that the atoms were in the same quantum spin state.  Somehow, the spin state was teleported from the first atom to the second.

Let me illustrate the import of this discovery with a thought experiment.  Suppose we have two tables, seperated by a meter in distance.  We take two pennies and flip them simultaneously onto each table.  A xenon flash unit is activated, illuminating each table.  Above each table is a video camera focussed on the area where the coins land from the toss.  Each camera is connected to a computer and an image processing program so that the state of each coin can be determined automatically.  In the case where both coins are in the same state of heads or tails, the computer sends a pulse to a green LED to indicate a state of entanglement between the two coins.  Now, we take a flashlight and illuminate only one coin.  We read its state as being either heads or tails.  Then we take a kerosene lamp and illuminate the second coin.  Amazingly, it will be found to be in the same state as the first coin.  The heads or tails state of the first coin has been teleported across the one meter distance from the first coin to the second coin.

Interestingly, the researchers who set up this experiment claim that its results suggest that great, fast quantum computers can be constructed based on the principles of this observation.  Also, faster network communications will become possible because of the instantaneous communication of information from one atom to the next by the phenomenon of teleportation.  For some reason, I don’t believe any of this.  Scientists have discovered yet another way to waste time and money.  Perhaps I can use coins, tables, flash units and cameras to create a supercomputer.  I doubt it though.

Chemistry problems can be tricky.  You need to pay attention in class to what is being discussed.  The basic kind of problem I am going to talk about here is the balanced equation.  Chemical reactions are stated in the form of an equation.  An equation has a few components.  On the left hand side are the reactants.  The reactants are what reacts in the chemical reaction that the equation describes.  In a reaction, two or more chemicals combine to form one or more products.  The products are written on the right hand side of the equation.  Between the products and reactants there is an arrow that points in the direction that the reaction happens.  If the arrow points both ways, it is saying that the reaction is in an equilibrium and there will be a mixture of products and reactants after the reaction happens.

Suppose you are going to do a simple reaction.  You will take hydrogen gas and oxygen gas and react them to form water, which is H2O.  You write H2 + O2 > H2O as the starting point for your equation.  One of the most important principles of science is the conservation law.  Conservation states that matter is neither created nor destroyed.  You will note in the above equation that there are two atoms of hydrogen and two atoms of oxygen in the reactants side, but there are two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen on the products side.  One atom of oxygen is missing from the products.  This tells us that the reaction is not balanced.

To balance a chemical equation you have to add up all the atoms of each element in the reactants and make sure it is equal to the number of atoms of each element in the products.  This is where you will have to get creative and do some thinking.  You will note that in the combustion reaction of hydrogen and oxygen, it takes two atoms of hydrogen to react with each atom of oxygen to form water.  We know this because of the chemical formula of water, H2O.  For this equation to be balanced, we need twice as many atoms of hydrogen as oxygen in the reactants.  This makes the left hand side of the reaction 2H2 + O2.  How many water atoms will this make?  The answer is two.  Now we have everything we need to write a balanced chemical equation for this reaction.  2H2 + O2 > 2H2O.  Q.E.D.

You might wonder why you need to write the reactants as H2 and O2.  This is because hydrogen and oxygen are diatomic gases, which means that they react with themselves to form molecules of gas that consist of two atoms.  Chemistry incorporates knowledge of matter that has been found by experiment.  When you study chemistry you will have to learn this information and remember it.  If you forget, you can look things up in a reference somewhere like the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.

The above balanced equation for the combustion reaction between hydrogen and oxygen does not include the energy that is released in the reaction.  You will have to include this energy in certain circumstances, like if you are trying to figure out how much hydrogen and oxygen you will have to burn to heat your pot of tea.  There is also something called the activation energy to be considered.  Hydrogen and oxygen do not just burn when they are mixed together.  It takes a spark or heat from a flame to get them going.  All these wonders of nature have been found out with theory and experiment.

There are many other different types of chemical reactions and problems you will find in studying chemistry.  There are acid-base reactions, replacement reactions, solubility problems, and problems having to do with finding a synthesis pathway for some complicated chemical.  Chemistry obeys the laws of physics, and quantum mechanics is important in understanding why atoms form the compounds that they do.  Pay attention in class and you will learn how the physical world operates on the molecular level where chemistry takes place.

If you want to find out what this particle accelerator is all about, go to the CERN web page.  Basically, it’s a giant ring of vacuum chambers and magnets and electrodes that accelerates two beams in opposite directions.  Where the beams intersect, there is the potential for a collision.  The particles used are protons, which are the nuclei of hydrogen atoms.  The device can also be used to accelerate lead ions, according to the information on the CERN page.

Of course, there are always some people who see the worst in everything.  Some theoretical physicists have postulated that the LHC beam will be powerful enough to create a black hole or a particle called a strangelet that could in theory absorb the entire earth in a doomsday scenario.  Well, it’s only a theory, like every other end of the world theory.  Seriously, it’s more highly probable that a large asteroid will impact the earth and wipe out all life.  Bottom line, not very likely.  Still, this has done nothing to stop the idiots who phone in death threats to the particle physicists for running their simplistic experiment.  Of course, they leaked this arcane information themselves, so perhaps they are playing on people’s unreasonable fears to drum up popularity for their project.  If that’s the case, it seems to be working.

I don’t know if the scientists will find their Higgs boson or anything else besides a shower of short-lived subatomic particles.  It sure costs a lot of money to build such a large and technologically advanced machine.  The discovery of a new, arcane particle or the verification of an esoteric theory seems like slight justification for spending billions of dollars on a machine that basically makes bizarre forms of energy.  Perhaps if physicists started researching how to build a workable electric car, or some kind of power source that wouldn’t be so expensive, they could benefit the world.  Sure, particle physics is interesting, but it is unlikely to have any practical benefits for humanity.

A physics problem is generally some combination of words and numbers.  What these words and numbers describe is some kind of physical situation.  In order to understand the problem, you will have to take these words and numbers and draw a picture, a diagram.

Take a blank sheet of paper.  Using the words and numbers of the problem draw a picture of the situation described.  Label each component with the given data.  Now, look at your picture.  What is missing that was not included in the information of the problem.  There will generally be something missing.  This includes the force of gravity, the curvature or radius of the earth, the temperature of the room.  Fill in any missing information with appropriate symbols.

Now, to resolve the problem you will have to have all the data in compatible format.  This usually means some kind of vector notation.  In general, use the metric system for measurements because it works better in calculations.  If you are given weight of objects in pounds, you will have to solve for mass, because weight is a measure of force.  If you are given mixed systems of measurements, like inches and meters, you should convert everything to metric, as you are being tested on your knowledge of converting units.

Now, you have a diagram with all relevant vectors and data drawn on a page of blank paper.  Go back to the problem and look near the end of the problem text for the information that is desired.  What is the solution?  If the problem gives initial velocity and mass and wants distance traveled, the solution will be distance.  If the problem gives energy input and specific heat and asks for final temperature the answer will be a temperature.  Write the desired solution on the page with a question mark by it.

Now you will either have to remember or look up the law.  Physics is all about laws.  There are laws of motion, laws of heat, laws of everything.  This is what physicists do, they cook up laws that describe nature.  If the problem is about motion, you will need to apply the laws of motion.  If the problem is about heat, you will apply the laws of thermodynamics.  If you were taught well in your class you will not only remember the law, you will know how the law was derived, so you will not have to go looking equations up in a book.  If you took the low level course, you will have at least learned how to apply the law.

Write down the applicable law below the diagram you drew.  Write down any data you know from your diagram.  Use vector notation properly.  write down the solution you want to arrive at.  Include the units of each measurement.  Now, set up the equations.  Solve the equations algebraically so that you can fill in your numbers to calculate the solution.  This is the hard part of solving a physics problem.  You will need to eliminate terms and move variables around until you find a formula that allows you to fill in your numbers and find a solution.  You may have to use concepts like energy to simplify your problem.  These are all tricks they should teach you in class for the various types of problems.  Do not sleep in class.

Once you have your beautiful formula, fill in your numeric data and calculate the answer.  If you are doing a careful analysis of error, you will have to take the partial derivative of your formula and solve for the chi squared error propagation to calculate the uncertainty in your solution.  If you don’t know how to do this, just write down the same amount of significant figures as you had in your least accurately specified data.

A good physics problem will demonstrate the application of some physical law or laws.  Solving problems will help you understand not only how to apply the laws, but also how the laws were derived.  When you encounter physics problems in the real world, you may have more or less data than you need to find a solution.  Practice problems in books help you understand what you will need in the real world to find solutions to real problems you may encounter.

This is a tricky subject.  Many people have problems with adolescents.  Perhaps this is because they are all a bit crazy.  The key to understanding adolescent psychology is to understand the individual adolescents themselves.  There are many textbooks on this topic that you can pay hundreds of dollars to purchase.  There is a lot of information on the web that relates to this subject.  Perhaps it would be best to look into this a bit more simply.

Adolescents are in the stage of development when they are no longer children, yet they are not yet adults.  They have many of the pressures of both the adult and the child to deal with.  They have rules set for them by parents and schools, as well as the responsibility of studying and work.  They are not only going through emotional changes, they are also going through biological changes.  All this pressure adds up to a lot of stress.  It’s no wonder so many teenagers act insane.

If you want to understand your own child’s psychology, you will have to learn to talk to them.  Yelling at them for breaking your rules is the surest way to alienate them.  You should ask questions in a calm and non-judgmental manner.  If you see them doing something stupid, ask them why they would do such a thing.  Trying to punish a teenager for breaking your rules will make them antagonistic towards you.  Study them like you might study any kind of wild animal you encountered in the field.  Note their behaviors, then use their own curiosity to effect changes in this behavior.

These days kids don’t have a lot of responsibility.  You should have things for your teenager to do on a regular basis.  This should start when they are young so they get used to the idea of work.  Work skills will help them tremendously when they become members of the work force and have to earn a living.  This does not mean you have to keep them busy all the time.  Small things like keeping their room clean, doing laundry, cooking, yard work, and general chores should be arranged on a schedule so they can get used to the idea of other people telling them to do things.  If you leave them alone all the time and never talk to them except to yell at them for being lazy, it is your own problem, not theirs.

Anyone interested in adolescent psychology is probably really interested in abnormal adolescent psychology.  I can see parents wanting to manipulate their kids using the power of psychological techniques, but only in the event that they think their child is somehow crazy.  Teenagers are exposed to a lot of things which they simply have not developed the character to cope with.  Life is a learning experience, and just like babies who fall a lot when they learn how to walk, they will at times make wrong choices.  You will want to help them cope with the consequences of their mistakes, not put yourself in the position of jailer who punishes them when they do something wrong.  If you act like a jailer, they will treat you like an enemy and rebel against you.

I can only offer a slight amount of common sense to help you deal with a psycho adolescent.  If your child has real problems, like depression or paranoia, you will have to seek professional help.  The worst thing you can do when trying to deal with a person who has real mental health problems is to get angry and antagonistic.  People with problems need help, not arguments.  Develop some basic communication skills and learn how to talk to people and you will be able to tell when outside help is necessary.  Continue to yell and scream and make restrictive rules and your problems will get worse and worse.

Further investigation of the supposed carcass of a bigfoot found in Georgia show it to be nothing but a rubber monkey suit filled with ice.  Once again the media has been overtaken by hucksters intent on promoting their own agenda.

It is surprising that anyone would bother to concoct such a ridiculous scheme.  Perhaps they were just trying to promote their third-rate website.  This seems like a probable explanation.  I’m sure there must be thousands of websites dedicated to these mythical creatures.  Millions of hits on a website monetized with even lame advertising translates into a bit of cash.  Perhaps this is just a complicated click fraud scam these people were running to make a fast buck.

A person would have to be a low-grade moron to think they could make the whole world believe that a monkey suit was the body of a non-existent creature.  The fact that they called a press conference and got on national TV only makes them appear that much less intelligent.  Perhaps the media should become less credulous of claims that bizarre creatures have been found and quit wasting people’s time with nonsense about things that don’t exist.

CNN has posted a video of a creature shot by Texas Sheriff’s Deputy Brandon Riedel.  The video shows a hairless, doglike creature running in front of a squad car.  The creature has an unusual muzzle and may be some kind of coyote.  A similar creature was found last year dead and was determined to be a coyote.

Chupacabra is a Spanish word that means “goat sucker” and describes the behavior of a mysterious creature that attacks livestock at night.  There are many conflicting descriptions of the cryptic chupacabra ranging from a lizard-like creature that hops like a kangaroo, to a small anthropoid animal with long teeth and claws.  Like any other mythical creature, the description varies with the witness.

Like the monster of montauk, which was a dead dog, it seems that yet again a canine has been mistaken for an unidentified animal.  If this is in fact a chupacabra, perhaps they can name it that as a sub-species of the coyote.  In any case, it is a strange looking animal and is probably the result of some kind of toxic waste causing a coyote to mutate and become hairless and long in the snout.

A comment on my blog entry about the monster of montauk got me to look up cryptozoology. Apparently there is a branch of science now that studies animals that don’t exist. If there’s a poster boy for cryptozoology, it would have to be bigfoot. Along with the Loch Ness Monster, bigfoot has got to be the most popular non-existent animal on earth.

I’m not trying to say that there are not plenty of animals on this planet that nobody has discovered. There are probably millions of species yet to be described by science. Cryptozoology is not about discovering new species. Cryptozoology is about studying monsters that some people report seeing that have never been found. Nobody has ever found a dead bigfoot. Either somebody has to shoot one of these creatures and drag it back to a lab for identification, or they need to capture one of them alive and put it in a zoo.

Bigfoot has got to be the longest-lived hoax in the world, next to the Loch Ness Monster that is. People have dressed up like bigfoot and gone off into the woods leaving fake footprints and shooting bogus footage of these non-existent creatures. How can you have a field of study that studies things that can’t be seen? Cryptozoology is nothing but a fictional science of fictional monsters that don’t exist.

I blame television for a lot of the nonsense in the modern world. The History Channel, Discovery, National Geographic, all run programs on these fake, non-creatures almost every single day. They also have programs about aliens, which also don’t exist, and the end of the world, which isn’t going to happen for another five billion years. Why does television force-feed people such nonsense? My theory is that they want to make people stupider so they waste more of their money on buying things they don’t need.

Cryptozoology is nothing but nonsense. Any animals that get discovered are studied by zoologists. Cryptozoology is only a term for people trading stories about fictional creatures that do not exist.

A dead animal was found on a beach near Montauk New York on July 12th. A picture was posted on the Internet. There was speculation that the creature might be some kind of a shell-deprived sea turtle or an experiment from a nearby government facility gone horribly wrong.

I saw a picture of the creature on a website. It is nothing but a big dead dog. Honestly, if people are so stupid that they can not tell a dead dog when they see one, I don’t know. It’s a popular search today on Google, which is how I found the information in the first place. Maybe some people need help in identifying common pets when they die and wash up on shore.

The Monster of Montauk is a dead dog. Mystery solved.

A meme is a thought or idea unit.  The term was coined by Richard Dawkins in 1976 to refer to ideas that spread through human society like genes spread through a population.  Dawkins also uses the terms “mind virus”  or “thought virus” to describe what he refers to as memes.

Memes have become very popular these days.  There are many Internet meme trackers.  Social bookmarking sites are basically sites to track websites in relation to the ideas expressed on them.  It is becoming popular to think of ideas as viruses that spread from mind to mind as if they were contagious diseases.  In many cases the meme in question may indeed be like a toxic disease.

There are many aspects of society that can be thought of as memes.  The idea that we need leaders is certainly an old meme.  Language itself is a vast collection of memes in the form of words that convey an agreed upon meaning.  Without the meme system of language we would not be able to share ideas or information.  Of course, the main way memes spread is through language.

Popular trends and beliefs spread by memes throughout society.  The idea of a meme, the word for it, was only coined in 1976.  The meme meme has become more widespread through society because it was published in a popular book and taken up by others and used in discussions and the mass media.  Meme is really a pretty useless term.  It is in fact nothing more than the older term “idea.”  Ideas have been spreading through human culture since long before recorded history.  The idea of using fire, making tools and weapons, living in shelters, hunting animals, and many other things were spreading through the human populations for millions of years.

One meme that is very popular is the idea of money.  Memes are being used to make money in the modern world.  People in marketing are constantly trying to start trends for consumption of new products.  Marketing is basically thought engineering.  If you can start a popular trend, it will spread by word of mouth everywhere.  This is the goal of marketing, to get as many potential customers for some thing as possible.

With the instant communication potential of the Internet, the future for new memes is bright.  A person can think up some new idea and post it on the web, and millions of people will latch onto the thought and think it themselves.  This can be good or bad, depending on the idea.  In the modern age people will have to learn to discern good ideas from bad ideas using their own judgment.  In the end, it is not ideas themselves that are good or bad, but the actions that people do based on these ideas.