Author Archives: PlatoHagel

Black Holes, String Theory and the Fundamental Laws of Nature with Andrew Strominger

Posted on October 19, 2014 by PlatoHagel

What are black holes? What are they made of? What is string theory? Is everything we see just vibrations of strings? How are string theory and black holes related? What are the fundamental laws of Nature? For decades, since the … Continue reading →

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Information Technology

Posted on October 18, 2014 by PlatoHagel

Who are we? And what is our role in the universe? Information technology is radically changing not only how we deal with the world and make sense of it, or interact with each other, but also how we look at … Continue reading →

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The Hard Problem of Consciousness

Posted on October 17, 2014 by PlatoHagel

The hard problem of consciousness is the problem of explaining how and why we have qualia or phenomenal experiences — how sensations acquire characteristics, such as colours and tastes.[1] David Chalmers, who introduced the term “hard problem” of consciousness,[2] contrasts … Continue reading →

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Holometer

Posted on October 11, 2014 by PlatoHagel

The sensitivity of various experiments to fluctuations in space and time. Horizontal axis is the log of apparatus size (or duration times the speed of light), in meters; vertical axis is the log of the RMS fluctuation amplitude in the … Continue reading →

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Majorana Fermions Discovered

Posted on October 9, 2014 by PlatoHagel

A Majorana fermion (/maɪəˈrɒnə ˈfɛərmiːɒn/[1]), also referred to as a Majorana particle, is a fermion that is its own antiparticle. They were hypothesized by Ettore Majorana in 1937. The term is sometimes used in opposition to a Dirac fermion, which … Continue reading →

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Then, A Theory in the Abstract

Posted on October 4, 2014 by PlatoHagel

ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment)Image Credit by CERN Collisions in the LHC generate temperatures more than 100,000 times hotter than the centre of the Sun. For part of each year the LHC provides collisions between lead ions, recreating in … Continue reading →

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Studying the Perfect Fluid

Posted on October 4, 2014 by PlatoHagel

A simulated collision of lead ions, courtesy the ALICE experiment at CERN A simulated collision of lead ions, courtesy the ALICE experiment at CERN – See more at: http://newscenter.lbl.gov/2010/11/04/lhc-lead/#sthash.yxm9loVb.dpuf Within five different approaches to parton propagation and energy loss in … Continue reading →

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LHChamber Music

Posted on October 4, 2014 by PlatoHagel

LHChamber Music, CERN scientists perform musical compositions created using data sonification of LHC experimental results (Video: CERN) See Also: CERN scientists perform their data Dialogos of Eide

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Lecture 1: The Theoretical Minimum

Posted on October 1, 2014 by PlatoHagel

Published on Feb 16, 2012 (January 9, 2012) Leonard Susskind provides an introduction to quantum mechanics. See: Lecture 1: The Theoretical Minimum Dialogos of Eide

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Stellar flares seen from a nearby red dwarf star.

Posted on October 1, 2014 by PlatoHagel

On April 23, NASA’s Swift satellite detected the strongest, hottest, and longest-lasting sequence of stellar flares ever seen from a nearby red dwarf star. The initial blast from this record-setting series of explosions was as much as 10,000 times more … Continue reading →

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