Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
blog.stephenwolfram.com
Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
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Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#2Mitchell Feigenbaum has, for the last ~17 years, been my vote for the next Nobel Laureate in Physics. It is a rare thing to derive an irrational fundamental mathematical constant that appears in nature. The Feigenbaum constants are as fundamental as e and \pi, and they are readily observed experimentally (though, necessarily, not to full precision :) ).
Godspeed, Dr. Feigenbaum. Thank you.
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#3I know this isn’t written as a typical obituary but I can’t imagine a better way to say goodbye and thank you a true scientist. The entire blog post is beautiful- not just the presentation but also the content and sentiment.
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#4The HP-65 was pretty swank.
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#5Mitchell Feigenbaum has, for the last ~17 years, been my vote for the next Nobel Laureate in Physics. It is a rare thing to derive an irrational fundamental mathematical constant that appears in nature. The Feigenbaum constants are as fundamental as e and \pi, and they are readily observed experimentally (though, necessarily, not to full precision :) ). Godspeed, Dr. Feigenbaum. Thank you.
> Nobel Laureate in Physics
They only give Nobels to living people, and typically only young people.
Maybe there is some other award recognition?
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#6Incredible and insightful overview about the life of a man whose contributions to science were unknown to me until today. Thank you for posting.
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#7Here's a Numberphile on it if you want to understand the constant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETrYE4MdoLQ
As a nice bonus that video will also help you understand the Mandelbrot and Julia sets.
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#8One interesting place that period doubling shows up that the article doesn't mention is in population ecology. I'm most familiar with the Tribolium work of Constantino, Dennis, Cushing, and some other folks, which you can read an example of here[0]. Basically, the beetles have three life stages (four, actually - egg, larva, pupa, adult - but adding eggs in the model doesn't increase accuracy any so they leave it out for simplicity), and if you model the respective numbers of adults for a starting number of larvae, you can see truly chaotic behavior, including period doubling. It's fascinating work.
[0] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1046/j.1461-0248...
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#9Mitchell Feigenbaum has, for the last ~17 years, been my vote for the next Nobel Laureate in Physics. It is a rare thing to derive an irrational fundamental mathematical constant that appears in nature. The Feigenbaum constants are as fundamental as e and \pi, and they are readily observed experimentally (though, necessarily, not to full precision :) ). Godspeed, Dr. Feigenbaum. Thank you.
> Nobel Laureate in Physics They only give Nobels to living people, and typically only young people. Maybe there is some other award recognition?
Young people? They only give to living people but my impression is not that most laureates are young
Edit: 72 years in average across all prizes, although first half of 20th century was lower.
Re: Mitchell Feigenbaum (1944–2019), 4.66920160910299067185320382…
#10Mitchell Feigenbaum has, for the last ~17 years, been my vote for the next Nobel Laureate in Physics. It is a rare thing to derive an irrational fundamental mathematical constant that appears in nature. The Feigenbaum constants are as fundamental as e and \pi, and they are readily observed experimentally (though, necessarily, not to full precision :) ). Godspeed, Dr. Feigenbaum. Thank you.
> Nobel Laureate in Physics They only give Nobels to living people, and typically only young people. Maybe there is some other award recognition?
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