Beyond Euclid - #129
Welcome to Beyond Euclid #129, the newsletter for the best mathematics and science stuff of the week. I am Ali, and I curate cool math and science stuff every week to help you have a better week.
📰 Greetings. I am back again this week with good internet. Last week, while surfing the internet, I generally listened to movie soundtracks in the background and thought about the effect of music on people for a long time. Imagine, you put on your headphones and start listening to the music I recommend below. Suddenly you find yourself saving the world, scoring the winning goal in the last minutes of the Champions League, or going head-to-head with Usain Bolt in the Olympic men's 100 meters final. But the moment you take off the headset, everything disappears as if cut with a knife. You can't live the dreams you just had, even if you want to. Yes, music may be the greatest talent God has given to man after thinking.
For this week, I recommend one of my favorite songs, "Gravity by Steven Price.”
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• From Countable to Uncountable: The Revolutionary Ideas of the Father of Modern Mathematics, Georg Cantor. Georg Cantor is my favorite mathematician. He was the mathematician who for thousands of years had been unable to solve the concept of infinity, and because of this, famous mathematicians of the time made his life miserable because they were jealous of him. Last week, I completed my Medium post that I have been working on for days to express my respect to that great master. I hope you like it.
• This guy's coconut oil melted and then reset into perfect hexagons. This reminded me of my geometry teacher's motto: " Hexagons are the bestagons."
• Paul Dirac, one of the twentieth century's most distinguished physicists, profoundly appreciated the universality and precision of mathematics. His assertion that "Mathematics is the tool specially suited for dealing with abstract concepts of any kind and there is no limit to its power in this field" stems from his observation of mathematics's foundational role in formulating and understanding the laws of physics and beyond.
• When Richard Feynman couldn't take any calculus courses in high school, he decided to teach himself calculus and made his own calculus book from his notes.
• The Hardest Geometry Question in Rushmore. Have you ever watched the movie Rushmore? It’s a quirky, charming film that tells the story of Max Fischer, a high school student with big dreams, a big heart, and an outsized ego. One of the most memorable scenes in the movie involves a seemingly impossible geometry problem that Max takes on. The problem is so difficult that his teacher claims it’s the hardest geometry question ever. But actually, the question asks for the area of an ellipse with the following measurements: the major axis is 40, and the minor axis is 20.
• Firefighter Bicycle from 1905. It was serving as an indispensable tool for firefighters in the petrochemical sector. This early 1900s creation was ingeniously outfitted with essential firefighting apparatus: a fire hose meticulously coiled within its frame, complemented by a crowbar, a compact axe for breaking through barriers, and a siren whose wail was powered by the friction against the front tire. Adorned for safety and functionality, it featured a helmet and a carbide headlamp to pierce through the smoke and darkness. The bicycle’s grips and pedals were carved from wood, offering a steadfast grip and a sustainable touch, while its design prioritized quick stops with a front-only braking system.
• The painting "The Blank Signature" (1965) by the Belgian artist René Magritte displays his unparalleled knack for combining visual wit with enigmatic depth. René Magritte (1898-1967) was a key figure in the Surrealism movement.
His work invites viewers into a dialogue with the absurd, encouraging a reflection on the 'rationality' of the irrational, much like the intellectual challenge presented by the concept of the square root of -1 or the principles of non-Euclidean geometry. Magritte's approach to blurring the distinctions between subject and background mirrors how scientists and mathematicians question and manipulate foundational assumptions to arrive at profound truths that defy intuition.
• Here is a beautiful idea. SproutWorld Plantable Pencils are an eco-friendly alternative to wasteful plastic pens and mechanical pencils. After use, the pencils can be planted upside-down in a pot filled with soil. Sprouts will start to grow after a few weeks of regular watering. This is a great way to teach kids about using products in a more cyclical, minimum-waste fashion.
• Pencils have been used by famous artists, in democratic elections, and for everyday tasks like marking saw cuts. Despite technological advancements, pencils are still widely used and manufactured. Carol Beggy's "Object Lessons: Pencil" is a concise 160-page book about the history and use of the pencil. The book offers a deep look at this seemingly mundane object.
• It is a known fact that Pothos, the easiest plant to care for, makes the air in the room healthier. The Neo PX system, developed by biotech startup Neoplants, claims to make pothos plants 30 times better at purifying indoor air using special soil-dwelling bacteria. The bacteria live on and around the plant's roots and help capture VOCs, which are then converted into carbon sources to feed the plant.
• Filmmaker Robert E. Fuller captured sweeping 4K footage of a winter starling murmuration over the Ripon City Wetlands in Yorkshire, England. Thousands of starlings in the UK gather to form dark, shape-shifting clouds before dusk in a breathtaking natural spectacle known as murmurations. The birds congregate in this area to escape the colder weather of Scandinavia and use their formations to confuse and deter predators.
Scientists are still unsure how communication works among the birds, with each individual monitoring six to nine others for synchronized movements.
• Astronomers have discovered the brightest known object in the universe, located 12 billion light-years away. The object, a quasar with a supermassive black hole at its center, devours more than a sun's worth of mass every day. It shines 500 trillion times brighter than our sun and stretches about seven light-years across.
The record-breaking quasar was previously misidentified as a star until researchers took a closer look last year.
• A new study has found that teens who frequently vape are exposing themselves to toxic metals like lead and uranium. Compared to occasional vapers, those who vape frequently have 40% higher levels of lead and twice as high levels of uranium in their urine. Exposure to these metals can harm the developing brains of teenagers and increase the risk of breathing problems, cancer, and heart disease. Vapers who preferred sweet flavors had 90% higher levels of uranium in their urine compared to those who chose menthol or mint flavors.
• AI is spreading misinformation faster than fact-checkers can keep up with it. Only about half of Canadians are confident in recognizing AI-generated content on their newsfeeds. You can take an AI news quiz to test your instincts and knowledge in identifying real news versus AI-generated content.
• If one day you feel helpless on the internet and don't know what to write, you can copy the shrug emoji from this site and use it. It looks something like this ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
If you look carefully, the melted coconut oil contains not only hexagon but also pentagon.