Born on March 14, 1879, Albert Einstein entered a world similar to, but also irreconcilable with, the one from which he would eventually leave. His birthplace, Ulm, had recently entered the German Empire following decades of petty territorial conflict and an optimistic peace had settled over the region. From an early age, Einstein pondered the […]
Relativity: How one man eclipsed physics Read More »
Physics — from the Latin physica (“natural philosophy”), itself from the Greek φύσις (“nature”) — is the study of matter, energy, and the interactions between them. All such interactions fall into one of four categories, known as the four fundamental forces of physics, the combinations of which explain with great accuracy the majority of known
The four fundamental forces: A brief history of natural philosophy Read More »
Lightning is not uncommon, nor is it particularly subtle. In fact, with approximately 9 million strikes per day, it is one of the loudest, brightest, and most common natural phenomena known to the terrestrial sciences. Most people know lightning as loud arcs of light that sometimes occur during severe storms. Indeed, this is the most
Aerial electricity: Lightning and other poorly-understood phenomena Read More »
From tying shoes to untangling a power cord to just playing with a piece of string, most people have a passing familiarity with knots. Those with climbing or seafaring experience may even be an expert at tying ropes into every manner of shape for every manner of purpose. But few would go so far as
Knot theory: Binding mathematics to molecules Read More »
Most people, at one point in their life or another, attempt to learn a second language. Whether they do so in high school or college to fulfill a foreign language requirement or well into adulthood as a fun challenge, it would be fair to say that a healthy portion of the population has forayed into
Language attrition: How learning new languages displaces those known Read More »
They say first impressions are important. Clothing, hairstyle, posture — all these things affect one’s opinion of others. Admittedly, outward appearances are relatively easy to tailor to one’s environment — it’s about as appropriate to wear a bathing suit to a job interview as a business suit to the beach, after all. Unfortunately, it is
What what you say says about you: How how you speak speaks for you Read More »
High school science class has a tendency to boil the universe down into a series of immutable laws. Newton’s laws of motion, Kirchhoff’s circuit laws, the laws of thermodynamics, etc. — these principles govern the known universe without exception. Of the aforementioned, one of the most often quoted is the second law of thermodynamics, which
The Ramifications of Quantum Entropy Read More »
Growing up, we all have those big life questions that catch our interest. Those with a penchant for nature, for instance, may ask such questions as: where do the Moon’s phases come from, what are rainbows, why is the sky blue? The answers to these questions, as may be given to a scientifically-inclined young mind,
Rayleigh scattering: Why the sky is blue and other miscellanea Read More »
