Shtetl-Optimized

So, like, I’m at QIP’2007 in Brisbane, Australia? And, like, everyone’s expecting me to blog about all the wild talks and poster presentations going down in Q-Town? But, like, I don’t actually want to blog about that stuff, since it seems suspiciously close to useful content, the very thing this blog was created to avoid?

I’m therefore declaring an Open Shtetl Day, for all of my readers who happen to be in Brisbane. Here’s how it works: using the comments section, tell the world about your QIP experience. What were the best talks/results/open problems? What happened at the business meeting? (I actually want to know — I skipped it.) What are the most salacious rumors about who’s coauthoring with whom? C’mon, you know you want to post, and you know you’ve got nothing better to do. I can see I’m not the only one in this lecture hall who’s typing away on a laptop.

And get this: after a day or two, I’ll pick the best comments and QIPiest quips, and post them right here in the blog entry proper! QIPers, don’t miss what could be your big break in the competitive quantum blogosphere.

(To preempt the inevitable question: No, there’s not going to be an after-dinner speech this year. But I have it on good authority that there’ll be something in its place.)

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Or, why I will weigh at least 3000 pounds by the time I get tenure.

• Fresh fruit (eaten in highly nontrivial quantities): grapefruit, watermelon, raspberries, blackberries, cherries, mangoes. Abnormally high tolerance for citrus (will eat plain lemons and limes with no problem).
• Vegetables: boiled broccoli, corn on the cob, avocado, raw baby carrots, cucumber, mashed potatoes, cherry tomatoes
• Peanuts, cashews, walnuts
• Beverages: fruit smoothies (mango, raspberry, banana), sparkling grape juice, coconut juice, iced tea, iced coffee, Hong Kong style bubble tea, fresh OJ, fresh lemonade, beer, champagne. Always looking for new and exotic fruit drinks. Not big on water. Trying to eliminate corn-syrup sodas.
• Chicken
• Steak, pot roast, burgers, pastrami
• Fresh fish of all kinds: salmon, mahi-mahi, halibut, tuna (not shellfish)
• Lots of soup: chicken-noodle, beef-vegetable, potato, chili…
• Breakfast: egg-and-cheese sandwich, veggie omelet, french toast, waffles with fresh fruit, Count Chocula (with whole milk, of course)
• Italian: eggplant parm, spaghetti with meatballs, linguini with salmon, cheese ravioli, garlic bread, pizza with onions and mushrooms (if that counts as Italian)
• Indian: samosas, garlic naan, numerous variations on lamb & rice, gulab jamun, chai
• (American) Chinese: egg drop soup, crunchy noodles, mu shu chicken
• Thai: cashew chicken, mango and sticky rice, Thai iced tea
• Japanese: edamame, tuna sashimi with wasabi, udon noodles, teriyaki, beef sukiyaki. Also all sorts of junk food (mochi ice cream, Hi-Chew…)
• Greek and Middle Eastern: falafel, pita with hummus, baklava
• Jewish: latkes, fried matzo, fried artichokes, gefilte with horseradish (really — it’s good!), bagels with cream cheese and whitefish (not so much lox), beef brisket
• Russian: borscht, potato pierogies
• Ethiopian: injera bread (the “edible tablecloth”), Tej honey-wine
• British:
• American Thanksgiving dinner: turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie — any time of year.
• Sweets: candy apples, Jelly Bellys (especially licorice and coconut), Mentos, Tic-Tacs, peppermint patties, Charleston Chew, Peanut Chews (as mentioned earlier), Peanut M&M’s, cherry Starburst, saltwater taffy, fudge, funnel cake, smores, Australian candied apricots, Turkish Delight, Hot Tamales, Mint Milano, soft chocolate-chip cookies, chocolate-dipped strawberries, chocolate pudding, chocolate mousse, warm chocolate cake, chocolate-covered Rice Krispies squares, sugar cubes, pure granulated sugar straight out of the bag… mmmmmmmm….
• Ice cream (obviously a separate category): Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Fudge Brownie, Breyer’s coffee or mint chocolate chip, ice cream sandwiches, hot fudge sundaes (the hot fudge is crucial — not just chocolate syrup), banana splits, fruit sorbet, gelati (ice cream + water ice), fresh-made gelato, Freeze-Dried Astronaut Ice Cream (found in science museum gift shops)

Go ahead and list your own favorites in the comments section, together with your research area (or line of work if you have a real job). Then we’ll see if there’s any correlation between the two. See, this isn’t procrastination: it’s serious research.

Update (1/23): I finally fixed the time stamps in the comments section. Unfortunately, this will cause comments to appear out-of-order during an 8-hour window.

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To those of us who can’t tell a hypotenuse from a rhombus, the phrase “math journalism” sounds like an oxymoron. It brings to mind boring pedants like Martin Gardner, Sara Robinson, and Brian Hayes, who make everything seem confusing and complicated, and who won’t even write a single word without consulting two dozen “experts.” But today, a new breed of journalist is bringing math directly to the people — and they’re doing it with flair, pizzazz, and an eye for the all-too-neglected human side.

That’s why I’m proud to announce Shtetl-Optimized‘s semiregular Math Journalism Award, intended to recognize those journalists who make fractions, long division, and other topics of current research seem “as easy as pi” even to those of us who can’t balance our checkbooks and never did get algebra. The inaugural award goes to Ben Moore of the BBC, for his fascinating report about a maverick professor who’s solved a problem that befuddled Newton and Pythagoras over 1,200 years ago — not to mention millions of students since! The problem: what happens when you divide by zero?

Feel free to nominate other journalists for this prestigious award. (Hat tip for this one goes to my brother David.)

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Among all the mysteries of the universe, it’s good to know that at least one of them is answerable. My accent, apparently, is “as Philadelphian as a cheesesteak.” Hat tip to Greg Kuperberg.

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From sayat-travel.kz:

ALMATY, Kazakhstan – Sayat Tour, a leading Kazakh tour operator, announced today several new tours for Americans and others who are willing to travel to Kazakhstan and see for themselves what the real country, not the Borat’s version, is really like.

The tours, called “Kazakhstan vs. Boratistan” and “Jagzhemash!!! See the Real Kazakhstan”, include visits to the cosmopolitan Almaty and its beautiful surroundings, tours of ancient sites such as the Hodja Akhmed Yassaui Mausoleum in Turkestan, as well as plentiful opportunities to meet and interact with the real Kazakhs. In addition to sightseeing, tours also include visits to local colorful bazaars, artifact shops and high fashion boutiques, as well as trying kumyss, the deliciously tasting Kazakh traditional drink made from fermented horse milk.

Marianna Tolekenova, Sayat’s Executive Director, said: “With the release of Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, we are hoping many Americans will want to engage in ‘cultural learnings’ of that unknown ‘glorious nation’ for their own ‘make benefit.’ That is why we are launching these new tours and hoping the Americans will come visit us.”

Earlier in October 2006, a high ranking Kazakh official said the creator of Borat, British comedian Sasha Baron Cohen, would be welcome in Kazakhstan. First Deputy Foreign Minister Rakhat Aliyev said, “His trip could yield a lot of discoveries — that women not only travel inside buses but also drive their own cars, that we make wine from grapes, that Jews can freely attend synagogues and so on.”

Update (11/13): In response to a comment by Greg Kuperberg, I’ve now reached a halakhic ruling on the morality of Sacha Baron Cohen’s antics. Go to the comments section if you want to read it.

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Here’s a heartwarming story of religious reconciliation in Israel, one that puts the lie to those cynics who thought such ecumenism impossible. It seems that large portions of Jerusalem’s Orthodox Jewish, Muslim, and Christian communities have finally set aside their differences, and joined together to support a common goal: threatening the marchers in a Gay Pride parade with death.

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According to my usage statistics, of the people who come to scottaaronson.com via a search engine, about 5% do so by typing in one of the following queries:

biggest number in the world
the biggest number in the world
what is the largest number
largest number in the world
what is the biggest number

These people are then led to my big numbers essay, which presumably befuddles them even more.

So, let me satisfy the public’s curiosity once and for all: the biggest number in the world is a million billion gazillion. But stay tuned: even as I write, Space Shuttle astronauts are combing the galaxy for an even bigger number!

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So said my brother David (MIT math major), on forwarding me this animation of the inner life of a cell.

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O Achilles of Arkansas, O bane of Foxes and Roves, O solitary warrior among Democrats: dasher of hopes, prince of platitudes, felatee of Jewesses, belated friend of Tutsis, toothless tiger of climate change, greatest of all living Americans: how shall we summon thee back?

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So, it seems the arXiv is now so popular that even Leonhard Euler has contributed 25 papers, despite being dead since 1783. (Thanks to Ars Mathematica for this important news item, as well as for the hours of procrastination on my part that led to its rediscovery.) Since I’d long been curious about the mathematical research interests of the nonliving, I decided to check out Leonhard’s most recent preprint, math.HO/0608467 (“Theorems on residues obtained by the division of powers”). The paper starts out slow: explaining in detail why, if a mod p is nonzero, then a² mod p, a³ mod p, and so on are also nonzero. By the end, though, it’s worked out most of the basics of modular arithmetic, enough (for example) to analyze RSA. Furthermore, the exposition, while “retro” in style, is sufficiently elegant that I might even recommend acceptance at a minor theory conference, even though the basic results have of course been known for like 200 years.

Oh — you say that Mr. E’s papers were as difficult and abstract for their time as Wiles and Perelman’s papers are for our own time? BULLSHIT. Reading the old master brings home the truth: that, for better and worse, math has gotten harder. Much, much harder. And we haven’t gotten any smarter.

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