The h Bar

6:01 PM

@ACuriousMind that was a serious question

@JohnRennie rebooting computer...

@0celo7 I don't have an opinion, though. I told you I usually just let those things lie in the back of my head, but then, I'm not near as obsessive as you are when it comes to such things.

0celo7

What do you mean, obsessive

I don't think I can figure this out on my own, I'm missing some result on flows

ACuriousMind

21 hours ago, by 0celo7

@ACuriousMind Yeah I'm pretty much obsessed

0celo7

@ACuriousMind I don't see what relevance that has

I'm obsessed with this result, yes

but that doesn't mean I'm obsessive

ACuriousMind

You can't let minor issues rest, you always have to resolve everything that bugs you about something before you move on. That's not a bad thing in itself, but it's very far from how I deal with not understanding things, so I can't really advise you what to do.

0celo7

6:05 PM

@JohnRennie you owe me $30

John Rennie

Still not working?

0celo7

Yep

John Rennie

When you connect the dongle do you need separate drivers for the dongle?

0celo7

@ACuriousMind I let many minor issues rest

This is not a minor issue.

It's conceptual

peterh

$50/hr? Well, it is not so bad

John Rennie

6:07 PM

@peterh $50 per 20 minutes!

0celo7

@JohnRennie ...what

John Rennie

When you connected the dongle to the parallel port did Windows ask you to install drivers?

0celo7

No

And I didn't have to do that on the other PC, on which it works.

John Rennie

Or is there a disk supplied with the dongle that you have to install drivers from?

peterh

@JohnRennie It is a wellgoing programmer money in the US

@JohnRennie very well going

0celo7

6:08 PM

@JohnRennie No

John Rennie

@0celo7 So on the other PC you just connected the dongle, ran the program and it all just worked?

0celo7

@JohnRennie Sï

sorry, have another meeting

John Rennie

And presumably on this PC when you run the program it bitches about not finding the dongle?

0celo7

won't take long

is it "these data" or "this data"

John Rennie

@0celo7 that's one of those who gives a frack questions

0celo7

6:13 PM

@JohnRennie please

John Rennie

this dataset

these data points

0celo7

We are analyzing this data

or

We are analyzing these data

John Rennie

We are analyzing this data because you're really saying We are analyzing this dataset and dataset is singular.

0celo7

good

I was right

Ok, had to submit a funding thingie

John Rennie

@0celo7: when you get back there are a few more settings we can check using device manager again.

0celo7

6:16 PM

Back

John Rennie

Aha, good timing. Open device manager again and open the properties for the parallel port LPT1

0celo7

one sec

John Rennie

On the Resources tab does it look like this?

0celo7

Have to abort the install

John Rennie

vzn

6:18 PM

@EmilioPisanty it was also somewhat amazing Hossenfelder was describing near-temp jobs working with a Phd. a dirty secret of capitalism/ academia. (or maybe she has turned down full time jobs for her kids/ family?) fias.uni-frankfurt.de/~hossi see also the case of twin primes conqueror Zhang (working at subway sandwiches) etc

0celo7

@ACuriousMind Do I really obsess

John Rennie

Hmm, I fear you may be out of luck.

0celo7

Can you name some other instances

John Rennie

Does the PC have any PCI slots or only PCIe? I suspect it may have only PCIe.

0celo7

@JohnRennie Undergrads are forbidden from messing around inside

The Dark Side

6:21 PM

If I can read clearly, did this guy get slapped with a 10 year ban on SE ?!!

0celo7

The PC costs $10,000 to replace

ACuriousMind

What kind of PC costs 10000$?

John Rennie

An Optiplex 7010 costs < $1000. If your IT dept are telling you it cost $10K that's rubbish.

0celo7

It has proprietary software for our spectrometer

The Dark Side

@ACuriousMind An expensive one :P

0celo7

6:23 PM

And we don't get a copy of the software

We didn't buy the PC, it's a line item that came with the spectrometer

@JohnRennie Did you mathjax that

John Rennie

@TheDarkSide Ron has an issue with the SE and has been deliberately getting himself banned. He used to be on this site and was a valuable member, but he went too far one day ...

0celo7

Holy shit he got a 10 year ban

What did he do!?

John Rennie

@0celo7 Oops, I forgot the dollar signs would kick off the MathJax scripts.

Anyhow, I think you may need a PCI version of the parallel port card to get the software to work. But it sounds as if you need to get your IT guys onto the job.

The Dark Side

@JohnRennie I know bits about the old story. But the fact that one year ban got escalated by a huge amount, and in the period where he was still banned !!!

John Rennie

@TheDarkSide We don't know what went on, but Ron could be startlingly irrational at times.

DanielSank

6:27 PM

@DavidZ Showed to coworker:

"Ah yes, the smiley face of doom".

0celo7

@TheDarkSide What bits?

10 years is honestly impressive.

How do you get banned for that long and not just have your account deleted

The Dark Side

@0celo7 Through some diligent searching on Meta and chat, and even otherwise on Google. Regarding how PO came into being.

@JohnRennie :)

0celo7

@ACuriousMind FYI, we put the $ in front of the number.

John Rennie

@0celo7 what type of case does your PC have? Desktop (i.e. flat) or mini tower?

0celo7

I don't know what that means

I can take a picture

John Rennie

6:31 PM

Yes please

The Dark Side

@JohnRennie But I was wrong. It is not entirely 'no activity' in the ban period. One year ban was only on Physics.SE I guess, otherwise there has been some activity:

John Rennie

A picture of the back panel would be best ...

The Dark Side

stackexchange.com/users/528458/ron-maimon?tab=activity

0celo7

John Rennie

That's a mini tower case and it does have one PCI slot.

If you're not allowed inside the case you need to get your IT chaps to confirm that there is a PCI slot and it's not being used. NB PCI not PCIe.

0celo7

6:34 PM

I can open it up

But not mess around inside.

John Rennie

@0celo7 Go on then

Does it have a white connector in between the black connectors where you've put the parallel card?

0celo7

John Rennie

Ah, that white connector is the PCI slot, but already has a card in it.

0celo7

That card cannot be removed

It's hooked up to the spectrometer

John Rennie

OK.

I've been googling this and I've found comments that the parallel port cards that go in PCIe slots (like yours) can give problems with dongles.

And also comments that you can buy older type parallel port cards to go in PCI slots that have a better chance of working.

But if the PCI slot isn't available I fear you are out of options.

0celo7

6:38 PM

@JohnRennie I will be flogged for this failure

John Rennie

For $30?

0celo7

No, for failure

My excuse is that a British man on the internet told me so

The Dark Side

@0celo7 lol

John Rennie

It isn't you who has failed. Basically the company sold you the wrong computer i.e. one without a parallel port.

And charged you $10K for the privilege - I'm in the wrong business.

0celo7

we're trying to use the computer for something it wasn't intended

John Rennie

6:41 PM

Ah, OK :-)

0celo7

ok, I have another task

Instead of running the diffraction analysis dongle on this computer, I need to hook up the X ray diffractometer on the PC that the analysis dongle works on

Ok

I think I need a 9 probe parallel port on this other PC

John Rennie

My guess is that the card currently in the PCI slot is the IEEE-488 card that connects to the diffractometer.

0celo7

@JohnRennie No, it's the IEEE card that connects to the spectrometer

We have a spectrometer and a lab X ray hooked up to this PC

John Rennie

So how does the diffractometer connect to the PC. What port does it use?

0celo7

I think a 9 pin parallel port.

Emilio Pisanty

6:44 PM

@JohnRennie Oh boy, that is a 2026 on the expiry date.

Never seen that before.

0celo7

ikr

Why not just delete his account at that point

John Rennie

Aha, the 9 pin port is a serial port not a parallel port. Technically it's an RS-232 port.

0celo7

wtf

John Rennie

All computers (apart from laptops) should have at least one serial port.

dmckee

@0celo7 The 10 year sentence was imposes at the CM level and even mere elected site moderators were not party to the discussions.

0celo7

6:45 PM

@JohnRennie All PCs

Macs haven't used that technology in 20 years.

John Rennie

Upload a photo of the backplate on the PC you want to use - the PC the software works on.

0celo7

that's the spectrometer PC

I'm figuring out what goes where

John Rennie

Yes, that blue connector is a serial connector

dmckee

He is an opinionated person at times; doesn't like to be told to moderate his language; and doesn't seem to respect/believe-in the boundary between attacking an idea and insulting a person that most of us see.

0celo7

yes, it's upside down.

Emilio Pisanty

6:46 PM

-17

Q: Can the right to delete one's account be denied?

I am writing for a friend who cannot ask a question here on Meta. He has been suspended last week , asked to delete his account[s] and a message said that accounts cannot be removed before the end of the suspension. Since he has been suspended for ten years, that seems tantamount to right being...

dmckee

The result was an on-going conflict.

Emilio Pisanty

so ten-year suspensions are apparently a thing

0celo7

huh

@JohnRennie I won't go plugging/unplugging things today

will wait for our postdoc on that front

no, it's not the blue plug that goes to the X ray

John Rennie

I'd be cautious about messing with the diffractometer. I don't think you're likely to break anything, but it would be good to have someone who's done this before.

@0celo7 is the blue plug the screen?

0celo7

@JohnRennie I'm the primary user of it

@JohnRennie yes.

dmckee

6:49 PM

Breaking a few pieces of equipment while you're learning is par for the course. But it's worth trying to arrange things so that you break inexpensive and easily replaced stuff.

John Rennie

I did loads of work on a diffractometer as part of my PhD - measuring the areas under diffraction peaks recorded from silver films.

0celo7

@dmckee yeah, I would lose my job if I broke the X ray

John Rennie

We got it running from a BBC micro.

dmckee

My worst offense was destroying a few-hundred dollar PMT, but I knew some grad students who racked up several thousand dollars worth of damage.

0celo7

BBC is not what I think it is, I hope.

John Rennie

6:50 PM

That was in the computing stone age before PCs existed.

0celo7

hmm, maybe it is a 9 pin serial

John Rennie

@0celo7 British Broadcasting Corporation

Ah yes, having Serial written on it is a clue :-)

@0celo7 Not Big Black Cook

0celo7

What?

now you want the back plate of the other PC?

John Rennie

It should be straightforward. Install the XRD software on the other PC and connect the diffractometer to the serial port and it should just work.

0celo7

I can also open her up

there is no open serial port, IIRC.

hmm, maybe there is

John Rennie

6:53 PM

@0celo7 no serial port?

Don't believe it

0celo7

John Rennie

It's the port to the left of the blue port

0celo7

Ok.

John Rennie

Serial ports on PCs are male i.e. they have the pins sticking out.

@0celo7 OK, can I sit back with my beer now? :-)

0celo7

Once you wire the $30, yeah

John Rennie

6:58 PM

Give me your bank details and I'll send it right over. Oh yes, include your credit card number as well.

0celo7

ok

It's a Visa

2345 7824 1246 3345

name: "John Leonard Rennie"

John Rennie

I forgot to ask for the CVV code

0celo7

137

John Rennie

Cool, I need a new car.

Anyhow, are you going to use that other PC to both run the XRD and do the analysis? That seems like a good option.

0celo7

Hopefully!

I should install a remove viewing thing on it while I have time

John Rennie

7:04 PM

What are you studying with XRD?

Phase transitions?

0celo7

Ricci flow

John Rennie

That's, erm, a novel use of XRD :-)

0celo7

Radiation damage in weaponized plutonium surrogates

John Rennie

I used it to measure the reaction rate of silver films reacting with germanium selenide ina photoreaction.

It worked really well.

@0celo7 does that show up in XRD? I would have guessed the changes would be very small.

How do you measure it? Changes in the peak shapes?

0celo7

We need to make sure our surrogates have the same structure as plutonium.

John Rennie

7:07 PM

Ah, so the XRD is just to check the surrogate has the right crystal structure?

0celo7

oh shit

@dmckee the K cup thingie exploded inside of the keurig

dmckee

@0celo7 That's going to be fun to clean up. Better you than me.

0celo7

time to find paper towels...

coffee started shooting out of the side

John Rennie

A good moment to leave ...

0celo7

there's going to be a bunch of grounds in my coffee

Ok, let's do some Ricci flow

@JohnRennie I need a rubber duck

What do you know about flows (of vector fields)

Emilio Pisanty

7:12 PM

@JohnRennie still around?

Britishest thing ever

0celo7

Wait what

Sanya

7:44 PM

@EmilioPisanty the Vegetarian V is the thing I have missed most ever since leaving the UK

well, most ... but one of the top things

Emilio Pisanty

8:11 PM

@Sanya Honestly? The vegetarian V is something I only noticed was a thing when I saw that image. I'm more of a meatatarian, really.

But the crisps bag apologizing for not being recyclable... man, that's priceless.

0celo7

Crisps?

They're called chips, @EmilioPisanty

vzn

@EmilioPisanty ...esp for vegetarians concerned about the environment :P

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 No, not really. I'm not particularly beholden to either of British or American English, but on this one the brits have it right.

0celo7

are you going to defend "chip" over "freedom fry"

vzn

@0celo7 oooh that has a terrible political bkg o_O

Emilio Pisanty

8:16 PM

these are crisps

these are chips

these are fries

Imma stick with the language version with the bigger dynamic range

0celo7

@EmilioPisanty what the hell is that

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 that's fish 'n' chips for you

vzn

@0celo7 fat fries

0celo7

those fries look like they've been through gitmo

jesus

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 yeah, don't say that near any brits

0celo7

8:19 PM

why

Emilio Pisanty

they won't appreciate it much

chips ("chunky fries" in American) are the main sliced-fried-potato form in the UK

kind of a big part of the national cuisine, in the form of fish and chips (cf supra)

0celo7

Chunky fries is not a thing over here

the word, that is

vzn

← thinks we should gtfo gitmo, but thats 0-1 obama vs uswarma$hine

0celo7

@vzn sounding awful lot like a terrist right now

vzn

@0celo7 you guys have that all figured out where you work doncha

0celo7

8:21 PM

Huh?

vzn

Huh?

0celo7

What do you mean by that

vzn

1 hour ago, by 0celo7

Radiation damage in weaponized plutonium surrogates

0celo7

Yeah?

Emilio Pisanty

Also, you may find that the concept of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, along the phrase gitmo, won't always elicit positive reactions in non-American people.

vzn

8:23 PM

@0celo7 just keep taking the blue pill, dont want to upset you :P

Junaid Aftab

Hi,

I'm looking for a book recommenation for an undergraduate level textbook covering Lagrangian and Hamiltonian Mechanics. I'll be taking the second course on classical mechanics in the upcoming term. Ideally, I'd like a textbook that -- in addition to focusing on the application of the principles to solve physical systems, as mostly done in "$\text{PHY}: 101$" -- focuses on the theoretical aspects as well -- Poisson Brackets etc. Most of the textbooks I have seen seem to focus only on the former.

0celo7

Physics 101 covers Poisson Brackets?

@vzn I'm taking any pill, you're being cryptic as fuck and it's annoying

Emilio Pisanty

@JunaidAftab yeah, you're looking for Arnold's Mathematical Methods of Classical Mechanics by the sound of it

0celo7

@EmilioPisanty That's not really undergraduate level.

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 red pill / blue pill, no? youtube.com/watch?v=zE7PKRjrid4

0celo7

8:25 PM

@EmilioPisanty I know what the blue pill is.

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 I did just fine with it in 6th semester.

0celo7

@EmilioPisanty And I did fine with it in high school, doesn't mean it's undergraduate.

vzn

@0celo7 lol ok so lets talk about ricci flow instead... dont want to upset you

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 don't really know what you mean, but whatevs. seriously.

0celo7

@EmilioPisanty Just because an undergraduate can read it does not make it an undergraduate book.

Emilio Pisanty

8:27 PM

@0celo7 whatevs.

Trivial discussions on a non-issue is not something I'm looking for.

0celo7

@JunaidAftab Shankar's QM book has a lot of information on that stuff, with the intent of using it for QM.

@EmilioPisanty Do you still have Arnold?

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 On my bookcase. Why?

0celo7

Do you understand Poincare recurrence for dynamical systems?

i.e. what's on page 71

Sanya

@EmilioPisanty for a vegetarian, it is a very useful thing if there's not much time to shop and go through ingredient lists where necessary

Emilio Pisanty

@0celo7 Sorry, mate, I should really stop mucking about and get back to writing.

0celo7

8:32 PM

@vzn That should be "I'm not taking any pill"

Emilio Pisanty

@Sanya For a meatatarian, it's about as useful as the toll-free number. But I'm glad you folks find it useful.

vzn

@0celo7 thx for clarifying

Junaid Aftab

8:44 PM

@EmilioPisanty Same question. Is that book an undergraduate? I don't mind reading a graduate level book in my spare time but would it be useable as part of a standard second course in CM?

0celo7

@JunaidAftab Do you know what a smooth manifold is

GPhys

constraints on 3.5 keV dark matter from various experiments:

Hitomi...almost did something T.T

(see: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitomi_(satellite)#Loss_of_spacecraft )

vzn

@GPhys thx for sharing. got great new (~popsci) book on dark matter & wanna read it soon. personally suspect dark matter is "hiding" somewhere in here, any reaction? arxiv.org/abs/1603.07655 ← my new fave ref for "everything" but no one else cares... yet :(

0celo7

9:01 PM

Hiding

What does that even mean

GPhys

I'm (somewhat) surprised they got anything out of the Hitomi satellite

vzn

@0celo7 it means youll have not even the slightest )( clue unless you open it at least

0celo7

what is )(

cleavage?

vzn

@GPhys do you understand the diagram axes etc?

@0celo7 joking? thought it was a known emoticon. picture the distance between two fingers squinched together, or (old greek metaphor) the size of an iota

0celo7

What

vzn

9:07 PM

What

0celo7

In the butt

vzn

@0celo7 butt cleavage

0celo7

You know it

vzn

@0celo7 thx for clarifying :P

@#%& that probably the only thing ever said by me youve starred, youre so cute

Junaid Aftab

@0celo7 nope, still have to take GR and/or the corresponding math courses on manifolds etc (may have to do this on my own some time).

0celo7

9:18 PM

@JunaidAftab Arnold talks about manifolds for 80% of the book

Emilio Pisanty

9:29 PM

@JunaidAftab It depends on where you go and what you're interested and what course you take. I would find it unusual for an undergraduate course of analytical mechanics to use it as the main text, but if I recall correctly it was given as a supplementary text when I took analytical mechanics.

It's a book worth having and reading (if only eventually), so go and have a look at it. It is pretty up-front in terms of what it is and what it isn't, and you should be able to tell from a first skimming whether it's what you're after or not.

Beyond that - you just don't give enough info on what "theoretical aspects" you're interested to tell whether it's quite right or maybe too mathematical.

Junaid Aftab

9:53 PM

@em

@EmilioPisanty @0celo7 I haven't done manifolds as of now. Unfortunately, I don't know the theroatical aspects in detail since I have to study mechanics in detail -- with more rigor. As of now, I am looking for an undergrad text that does present all the theory and motivates one to tackle advanced texts later on -- such as the one you suggested.

Sanya

10:10 PM

everytime I try to do something easy with these new windows versions I am a step closer to converting to linux once and for all

such a messy load of nonsense

Emilio Pisanty

@JunaidAftab Yeah, if you haven't done manifolds then Arnold will probably be too mathematical for you. That said, if you haven't done manifolds, then I'm not sure you really appreciate quite how deep the theoretical analytical mechanics rabbit hole actually goes.

@JunaidAftab The thing is, it's still not particularly clear what you mean by "present all the theory". "All the theory" includes things like the relationship between mechanics and geometry on symplectic manifolds, which presumably you don't want.

What's your take, for example, on Goldstein's book? or Lanczos? What books have you tried, exactly, and how are they not sufficient, exactly?

vzn

Organisms might be quantum machines / BBCNews ← "quantum biology"!

Sanya

10:31 PM

LOL~

Mikael Kuisma

Of course they are, why wouldn't they be

Sanya

because biology is not physics and thus quantum does not apply there, I guess

I think if I am ever really desperate I go into natural science journalism

the bar can't be that high after all I've read so far

ACuriousMind

@Sanya The world is quantum and cares not for our distinctions of "physics" and "biology". For instance, the exact mechanism of photosynthesis - absorption of light by individual molecules - certainly involves quantum mechanics.

Sanya

@ACuriousMind the next time, I am going to use [irony] [/irony], ok?

ACuriousMind

@Sanya Oh, sorry :(

Sanya

10:43 PM

I'm a bit astonished that you hold me in such low esteem :|

ACuriousMind

But yeah, you'll have to add those tags till you've trained this room to recognize your irony ;)

Sanya

well, with time I guess ...

vzn

11:08 PM

@Sanya did you look at the article at all? half of pop science is science... :(

Sanya

yes, I did @vzn . I am not mocking the scientific content, I am just thinking it is a bit hilarious that it is presented as a great surprise that quantum mechanics also applies to the mechanisms in biological systems

vzn

@Sanya and what do you know about QM or biology? admittedly the article doesnt cite much research directly but its great overview/ very well informed & theres a massive paradigm shift in play/ going on, & essentially the birth of a new field... so go ahead & feel free to ridicule it all you want...

Sanya

@vzn well, I obviously hurt your feelings ... and again I seem to have expressed myself poorly because I never said that it is not a scientifically interesting topic ... I think I should just say nothing anymore ^^"

vzn

@Sanya you think the journalism is poor quality? whatever

Mikael Kuisma

I mean the discoveries are amazing. It is not easy to observe quantum behaviour in anything in vivo 300K. But it is no surprise I meant.

vzn

11:18 PM

@MikaelKuisma ofc its a surprise because little is known about the processes being investigated, its terra incognita and the surprises will surely continue/ mount. (in other ways, ofc its no surprise, so we can all go back to our boring lives)

Mikael Kuisma

I believe that quantum effects are involved much beyond that article.

vzn

@MikaelKuisma ok, interesting conjecture/ hypothesis, so then does science agree or not?

Mikael Kuisma

It does not matter at this point yet, since that was just a belief/intuition/hunch/profecy.

0celo7

@ACuriousMind I'm stupid

My prof figured it out instantly.

Using a theorem in my favorite Riemannian geometry book

...