Goodbye Aberration: Physicist Solves 2,000-Year-Old Optical Problem

Post by Izkata » Sun, Jul 07, 2019, 2:53 PM UTC

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #90

jjeaff wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hazelnut spread is one of those things that is much more commonly referred to as the brand name. No one says "Reynolds wrap" they say "aluminum foil". No one says "hazelnut spread", they say Nutella. No one says "resealable sandwich bags", they say ziploc bags.

Most people would just say "sandwich" unless the spread is somehow critical to the tale. I know it's a quote, but it sounds most odd to me as most people I know don't really brand drop in conversation. Coke is probably the big exception there... TIL what ziploc bags are. Just called "sandwich bags" here. Cling film isn't "sarran wrap" here either. :)

Post by Izkata » Sun, Jul 07, 2019, 2:57 PM UTC

Netcob wrote: post #170

joeberon wrote: post #21

Slightly related: One thing I've learnt in Physics is that there are still a huge number of practical and fundamental problems to be solved. You might expect everything easy will already be done by now but that's just not true. Hence we still manage to write so many papers! In fact many Physicists have too many papers they want to write and not enough time to write them. This was a huge surprise for me coming in to m…

Just yesterday I was watching a video about machining flat surfaces, and it was mentioned that the reason why two very flat surfaces stick together isn't thoroughly understood yet. We can build things that deal with unimaginable precision, create new elements, compute with quantum effects, but we don't know why flat things stick together?

Post by sempron64 » Sun, Jul 07, 2019, 3:18 PM UTC

kragen wrote: post #94

There are various people speculating on the economic significance of this solution, which, to me, is rather missing the point. It's like measuring the significance of the excavation of Tutankhamen's† tomb by the tourist revenues of museums. The point of economics is that it keeps us alive so we can do math and also think in other ways; the point of consciousness is not to make money. I don't think there is any econom…

Post by heeen2 » Sun, Jul 07, 2019, 4:10 PM UTC

richardhod wrote: post #106

nuxi wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nutella though is a sugar-and-palm/vegetable-oil spread, which - probably accidentally - contains traces of hazelnuts, powdered milk and cocoa.

I don't understand the downvoting of the parent here, which is factually correct and worth noting. It's incredibly unhealthy and this is just down to marketing that anybody eats it. You can make really nice chocolate spreads with your own hazelnuts

Post by kragen » Sun, Jul 07, 2019, 4:40 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #169

kragen wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought the point of photography was primarily so that you (people, in general, not necessarily just you individually) could look at the photos, i.e., experience them consciously, and secondarily to consciously experience the process of photography itself. But perhaps you have a different reason for considering photography worthwhile, other than the conscious experience of the photographs and of the photography pro…

Sure, various systems can use photographs to automatically do useful stuff like pea sorting even if a person is never aware of individual photos.