the truth is out there

the chronicling of my life as a second year physics student and unashamed geek/nerd/dork. yes the title is an x-files reference.

[physicsforbunnies]

I came to realize that it’s better to be a dumbass with a lot of patience than a genius without self discipline.

[iffii]

mathematicians have a very weird standard for use of the term “well-known”

[shadowpeoplearejerks]

This is the most correct post about mathematicians I have ever seen. 

[bisexual-bifurcations]

//date a girl who comments her code

[rachelignotofsky]

Wang Zhenyi was one of the greatest scholars in China. She was an astronomer, poet, and mathematician who accurately recorded lunar and solar eclipses and equinoxes. She also wrote political poetry about injustice.and papers explaining trigonometry and the principles of multiplication and division. https://www.etsy.com/listing/459039646/women-in-science-wang-zhenyi Enjoy these illustrations? Check out my new book Women in Science at 

www.readwomeninscience.com 

[futuristech-info]

Star Trek inspires physics students to come up with “novel method for the working principle of the photon torpedoes”

[oocphysicsquotes]

Ignore any physical intuition you have about how this is wrong.

out-of-context physics quotes (via oocphysicsquotes)

[clefsandlasers-deactivated20190]

if usain bolt played a concert Bb on a trumpet while running past you at his 100m wr pace, you would hear the note almost exactly a quarter step sharp when approaching you and almost exactly a quarter step flat as he runs away

this is what I do with my master’s degree

[sciencealert]

What a gentlemoon! This photo has been circulating the internet since at least 2012, and this well timed bird or other ‘UFO’ totally makes it. 🌙

Image: mtnoxx/Imgur http://ift.tt/2b2pifB

[toocooltobehipster]

windows users, save money using these free apps!!

[femboss]

other fab programs that are absolutely 100% free:

recuva - accidentally deleted something in the recycling bin? recover it back with this program!

speccy - tells you the specs of your computer, among other things

defraggler - defrag the SHIT out of your hard drive and clean it right up

[wilwheaton]

(The Moon’s surface in true color and high resolution, via China’s Yutu rover  (JPEG Image, 4095 × 2768 pixels))

Okay, this picture is HUUUUUUUUUUUUGE, and it’s amazing.

[bobak]

It’s surreal to see a world without* an atmosphere and therefore a deep black sky. And before you claim it’s fake because there aren’t any stars, that’s because camera exposure to see the surface is too short.

*technically the moon has an atmosphere, but it’s around 10-100 trillionth of ours^

^assuming you’re reading this from Earth, and this isn’t being read in the year 2050 on a Mars colony

[goddamnshinyrock]

I was zoomed in on it, trying to figure out why it was making me vaguely uncomfortable and why my mind kept insisting this was fake, and I realized the problem I was having was that I was expecting atmospheric perspective to fade the contrast on the farther objects and make the horizon hazy, but….. no atmosphere. 

[pipistrellus]

i… am …disturbed

[prokopetz]

The preceding comment is interesting because it highlights one of the ways that our perception of reality can be culturally influenced.

You know how sometimes, when you’re watching a movie with computer-generated special effects, you can just tell whether certain scenes are CGI, even though you can’t put your finger on exactly why?

Well, one of the things your brain is picking up on to make that determination is missing or incorrectly simulated atmospheric haze; this is highly characteristic of cheap CGI because atmospheric haze is a huge pain in the ass to correctly calculate - most low-budget productions either omit it entirely, or else fake it with simple linear distance fog.

That’s why photos of the Lunar surface and objects in outer space tend to look fake to modern audiences: we’ve been unconsciously conditioned to associate wonky atmospheric haze with bad CGI.

[lesbiandeancas]

what I wanna know is what’s up with that black dot. is it a moon cave. who lives in there

[a-physics-student]

Spontaneous day trip to London with @lovely-little-landscapes We went to the science museum and had lunch in Hyde Park

[lovely-little-landscapes]

[a-physics-student]

Fangs Brow, Cumbria, ft. my parents and my dog (January 2016)

[a-physics-student]

Kitsbühel, Austria (January 2016)

[a-physics-student]

Kitsbühel, Austria (January 2016)

[mathprofessorquotes]

There is power in simplicity.

Physics Professor (via mathprofessorquotes)

[ucresearch]

A solution for CO2: Turn it into concrete

Concrete is an essential material when it comes to infrastructures— it can be found in our roads, driveways, and even the foundations of homes and buildings.

However, concrete production also poses an environmental concern. About five percent of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions come from making the cement that’s a binding agent in concrete.

A team of interdisciplinary researchers at UCLA has been working on a unique solution that may help eliminate these sources of greenhouse gases.

Their plan is to create a closed-loop process: capture carbon from power plant smokestacks and use it to create a new building material — CO2NCRETE — that would be fabricated using 3-D printers. That’s “upcycling.”

This isn’t the first attempt to trap carbon emissions from power plants. It’s been done before, but the so far unmet challenge is what to do with the carbon dioxide once it’s been acquired.

“We hope to not only capture more gas,” DeShazo said, “but we’re going to take that gas and, instead of storing it, which is the current approach, we’re going to try to use it to create a new kind of building material that will replace cement.”

Read more about how scientists are upcycling carbon