The energy crisis around the corner...

Some time ago, (on October 10th, 2006) I attended the physics and astronomy colloquium at Stony Brook. It was by prof. Albert Bartlett from Univ. of Colorado, Boulder. It pretty interesting, and sad.

The main idea of the talk was that we have been very ignorant about the fossil fuel usage and it lifetime. He began his talk by stating that most of the problems we faced come from not understanding a simple mathematical function: the natural exponential growth. I forgot most of the details about it, but he mentioned that the world already crossed the peak of fossil fuel production, and now it is going down. I guess his purpose is to make people realize the seriousness of the issue and consider taking on the problem of developing a new, efficient energy source. I felt pretty bad with my dreams of fame and fortune as a worthless string theorist...

No matter how much oil people could discover, it wont last long. We are increasing the consumption rate each year. So eventually, it will all disappear. My Classical Mechanics professor mentioned that certainly we all will (hopefully) live to experience the crisis. I was still ignorant about it until I realized a small detail that made me feel REALLY worried.

So what if the cars stop, the airplanes, the production lines for food. Transportation of materials will be nearly impossible, in the sense that it could still be done, with more time and money, by the old fashion ways of horses or coal. Communications will fall back 200 years. And then I realized that the Internet will shut down.

!!!

What am I going to do with out the Internet! ;-)

But seriously, the Internet has change things. Think about all the daily transactions that are done over the Internet. All the infrastructure will be useless. We will end up in a huge junkyard. I can see how countries could start wars to get each other resources. I can see how people could start fighting each other just to survive, first with the actual luxuries of water, food and warm; and then just to survive. Of course this commodities are not present in all parts of the world.

We came a long way from the caves. Now we do not know how to live in the forest without being eaten by wild animals, or just even die of dehydration. Well, at least I am not ready for that.

It all sounds very sad. I do not know what to do. I do not think I could help with any physics. At least I will never propose any idea to build another power-sucking accelerator. Hope someone helps. Else, we and our children will live the consequences.

The posts I would like to (post?)

At some point I would like to comment on:

1. Energy crisis,
2. NYC,
3. Ed Witten

Soon!

I'm still alive!

After all that has happen, I am still alive and kicking (and also solving physics problems for my homeworks...)

I guess my last post was ages ago. I am happy to tell that after a couple of hours, my computer worked fine again. I have not used that stupid blanket again. It is evil!

Anyways, I have been really busy with lots of stuff. My midterm cycle is restarting again this coming Monday with Electrodynamics and next Monday with Classical Mechanics. At least I am done with my seminar talk on Orbital Angular Momentum of Light.

Just like the electron has an intrinsic angular momentum (Spin) and the extrinsic (Orbital), the photon also has polarization and phase gradients. These angular momenta give rise to all sort of nifty effects. It was pretty fun.

I got a book on Lie Algebras by H. Georgi. So far I have read the first part, but it is very interesting. I think it should be very useful for the first part of Warren's Field Theory class. That is basically all I have been doing on my path to String Theory, since I had to stop typing the lecture notes. So much work!

I found this graffiti on one of the blackboards in the D floor of the physics building. It is amusing since it reads "clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right".



The Physics building is to the left of the hall. To the right is the Math tower.

How to fry the sound capabilities of your laptop

Follow this simple steps to make your laptop mute forever:

1. Sit down in your desk and get comfortable.
2. Put your earphones on. If you do not listen yo music, it is OK. You will look cool.
3. Place a blanket over you, to protect from the cold, or to look cool (or miserable).
4. Now, take the blanket off.

You will feel a slight electric zap on your ears, and hear some weird sounds. Try singing just so you verify you are not deaf. Now you can check that your computer has just lost its sound capabilities due to the static. Damn you electromagnetism! You took away my precious music! Oh well...

There was no particular reason for me to have my earphones on. There was no reason for me to use the blanket since: 1) it was not that cold; and 2) I had a jacket I could have wear. But still, I followed this simple steps....

This week has been so depressing. On Monday I had the Classical Mechanics midterm. I was able to fully solve one problem out of three. I worked my way around the third, but I had to hand in a poorly worked second problem. I do not even want to talk about last week's midterm on Classical Electrodynamics.

I feel so tired. Yet I totally did not rested during the weekend. At least I am done with grading now. Problem set #5...

Midterm...

Egads! Tomorrow is my first midterm at Stony Brook.

Classical Electrodynamics is first, followed next week by Classical Mechanics and the week after with Quantum Mechanics. This past weeks have been really hard. I got a 20 out of 120 in the second homework in CE. Basically I did not worked on the problems enough to say anything about them. I gain some lost ground with the third one, 70/80. I also feel a better understanding of the third chapter's material (I never liked the method of images...) Anyways, the fourth problem set was again handed in poorly worked. This time I worked the problems, but could not solve any by the deadline. Oh well! I went through Jackson's and reworked some of the homework problems with the professor's solutions. I really do not want to fail this class, or ANY for that matter. Let's see what happens tomorrow.

At the same time I feel a bit desperate. A course in Classical Electrodynamics deals with the electromagnetic field (in vacuum and matter), radiation, waves and relativity. Besides for relativity, I find most of this topics a bit boring, I guess they describe tangible, everyday-objects. But I just do not care. My interest lies along quantum theory and strings. I should learn these topics, and get them right for at least once.

I have been feeling really stupid while working with the homework problems of all my classes. It is not about dealing with the math, but the physics is coming out a bit constricted from my mind. I think this are bad signs. Am I becoming a "physically" mindless mathematician? Maybe I need that type of thinking when working with abstract concepts. Still, I believe that physical intuition is important. I hope I do not fail as a physicist!

I do not want to fail.