A Weblog

Today my dad, Abbe, and a character new to you readers called David, and I are going to a Civil War reenactment later today in Groton to celebrate the town’s three-hundred fiftieth anniversary. I’m not entirely sure just what the Civil War has to do with the year 1655 — shouldn’t we be killing King Philip or something? Then again, I suppose there’d be one of those political demonstrations, and nothing kills a town celebration faster. — but I’m pretty excited. Bring on the fife and drum corps!

It is only fitting that I introduce David properly before I get much further. [Those who are especially anxious can jump down to the bottle where I discuss math.] David comes to us from Russia via Maryland. His father and mine used to work together a number of years ago. David and I first spoke on the phone when he was sixteen, which must’ve made me about thirteen. He wanted to be a video game programmer. So he went to school to learn computer science. He moved up here, and my dad helped him with his programming assignments from time to time. For a little while, David even lived with us, during school holidays and that sort of thing. I can’t remember the last time I spoke with him. But I do remember it consisted of a very perfunctory “No, I’m not graduating this year. I’ll be done in the fall…Yes, still math…Probaby go to grad school, not sure. You?” But before grad school, I need to get my thesis done. And I’m no closer than I was two weeks ago. This is a problem, considering my encroaching Thursday presentation. I told Aaron I’d talk vaguely about “spinor structures and Lorentz manifolds.” There is a theorem of Geroch that says a spinor structure exists on any Lorentz manifold. This seems like it might be appropriate. I say it seems because it’s not really. The original proof relies on some pretty strong topological machinery. Even to define a spinor structure takes us into the world of principal bundles. And the other kids in the tutorial are freshmen and sophomores. There is a more, er, elementary proof that is heavily steeped in Clifford algebra. So the elementarity of it is really a matter of opinion.

I do have to write an appendix on principal bundles, so I could conceivably do that instead and mention spinors at the end. Write now I’m rewriting Lecture 2 since that horrible hour of bundles I subjected Amit to. Something good might come of this, I believe. Right now the next three lectures in my head go something like this:

Lecture 2 Spinors without the Bundles
Lecture 3 Bundles without the Spinors
Lecture 4 Putting It Together: Spinor Structures

As soon as I write these things [hopefully today], I’ll post them and send out an email. Let me know if you want to be added. I love adding people.

[A new draft of Lecture 2 is up. But it's woefully incomplete.]

I have been a little deceptive, faithful readers. I have carefully omitted a very substantial something from all of my previous posts for fear of getting found out: my car was towed. This comes as a shock, as many of you might idealize me, romanticize me, know me to be the sort of person who would not let his car get towed. To this I really must confess. My car’s getting towed is symptomatic of a much deeper problem: cause and effect is one of those vital life lessons I just simply haven’t yet mastered.

This is most easily understood by example. Thursday afternoon, for example, I got fed-up with my own filth and decided that laundry was well overdue. So, I did what I always do; first, prioritize the individual articles of clothing until the basket is over flowing. Then go downstairs, hope that washer A1 is availible [because I use that washer exclusively. My alzheimer's preparation wouldn't have it any other way. Habbits, I read, are hard to break], begin to fill the washer, laying the shirts in flat because someone once told you that the water can’t get in to soak the clothing properly if it’s all bunched up, then realize that the basket is over full and so the washing drum will be, too, stuff what doesn’t in until it does, swipe my ID, add a jigger or two’s worth of detergent in, wait two days, return. Of course, there’s that debate I have with myself each time laundry forces itself upon me: should I take my basket back upstairs, how about the detergent?

This time I thought it best to leave the detergent in the basket and leave the basket on top of the dryers. The light tipped over the bottle of detergent, and I thought, “If I leave it like this, the detergent will weak all over the basket.” Impressed that my thesis on gravity had, in fact, taught me something, I allowed myself a self-indulgent smile and went upstairs.

Friday morning, I remember that my clothes are still in washer, or, more likely, some angry neighbor had taken my clothes out and placed them in a bag or on a table or even in my basket. But they hadn’t. I grabbed my basket to transfer my warm, wet mass of mostly clean clothes to the dryer. But, ah! As I had predicted, the basket was holding just about as much detergent it could without spilling. Awkward as I am, and still mystified by gravity, reached for the basket with one hand, spilling thick, blue soap all over the ground. I evened out the basket and brought it to the nearest accessible slop sink two buildings away and across the courtyard.

Of course, I couldn’t help but allow myself another self-indulgent smile at having correctly calculated cause and effect. The problem is, I knew full well what was going to happen. This is where the world of theory and the practicalities of application kick in and where I duck out.

Much the same is true about my car. I read the signs. They were clearly and plentifully posted: No Parking. Tow Zone. I even checked to make sure it really said that one night after a run at the track. There were no other cars, except mine and a police car. But I just ran back, took a shower, and went to bed. All the while worrying that my car would be towed. And it was. I have to admit the secret satisfaction it gives me. Knowing the future is something like causing it. But if I’m not careful, we’ll very quickly get into Boethian ethics and a discussion of free-will.

To end the story, the car is back and I did another load of laundry today.

Continuing the birthday celebration, I skipped tutorial in favor of pubcrawling with Kaitlin and friends starting at Grendel’s and ending at Ian’s. I got to listen to French, which, for me, is a kind of a treat. Teymour and friend Sara, both from Paris, both English-speakers, played the French game last night. They left at around People’s Republik, however.

I left, too. But only temporarily. Ian asked me to stay, and as I have often said, “Danny has no soul and I have no will.” And I don’t. So I stayed. And I’m glad, too.

We shuffled down Mass Ave in the non-transcendalist direction until we hit the Field. Doug was bartending, but it’s very likely he doesn’t remember that boy and girl who were sitting with that other guy and they offered to fetch him something from Taco Bell in the blizard just before, or was it just after, no, it was before Christmas. But this is all moot as we were served by a very kind waitress. It wasn’t until three bars in that Kaitlin’s home friends and her college friends started talking. By college friends, I mean that I started talking to two of her friends, but, as is almost necessarily the case, Ian and I started talking physics politics.

We put the physics aside long enough to make it to the Tavern, a bar that we universally decided against but went to anyway. They let me continue my streak of Dogfish Head which I had broken at the Field. This time I had my hand at another of the home friends, Lindsey. Her mother was from Holbrook, so she knew where I’m from. And I once got into a car accident on 53 in Norwell, so I knew where she was from. The planets must have been in perfect alignment.

The bar closed, so we called the shuttle. The shuttle carted us back to Ian’s. I had a margarita. I think Lindsey brought up the shuttle program. Gosh, maybe I brought it up. It’s a nasty habbit that I’ve taken to these past few days. Before I knew it, Ian and Lindsey and I were screaming, in a friendly, civilized manner. Naturally this degenerated into a discussion on the nature of carrier particles and gravity and electromagnetism by analogy. Or something. Someone calmed us down and I left with my new three friends back to my place.

I think they’re still here. There’s no evidence either way. I haven’t gone into their rooms and they haven’t come into mine. I woke up to six missed calls a few were from Ian but most of them are from an private number. I don’t mind their staying longer, but Kaitlin might want them back.

And the point is this: I woke up at 5p yesterday and I was up before 1p today. All it took was a few drinks to right my schedule. Beer and physics, modern marvels both.

Today is one of those days which feels distinctly New England. The temperature is such that shorts are still appropriate and you can, if you’re not thinking, believe that you can comfortably wear a long-sleeve rugby. According to a reliable weather source, the synoptic forecast is 66 degrees. I think it’s slightly warmer; I broke a sweat walking down Mass Ave after dinner just now, but then again, I am wearing that long-sleeve rugby.

While walking up Mass Ave to dinner, I grudgingly noticed that today was one of those days which might be responsible for the transcendentalist movement. Cambridge is a small town, which believes itself so important as to elevate it to city-status. But the low-lying buildings and tree-lined four lane streets belie its grander pursuits. This is small town New England. You can tell because in almost every direction, a white steeple, probably Congregational or Unitarian, puntuates the horizon.

On the corner of the street, I noticed a tiny lady walking her even tinier dog. Both must’ve been in their fifties, in the respective human and dog year scales, that is. The woman was sporting thick angular glasses and a flamboyant, large hat. Her dog was resting patiently while her owner — I’ve met this dog before — chatted to a new friend she happened upon during tonights walk. I wanted to stop to catch up but decided against it.

This sort of day makes me think that maybe I could spend a few years at Dartmouth. They have days like this with as many steeples and even more trees. Maybe too many trees. It’s hard to know. But I should check it out, the Seven Barrel Brewery is there, you should know.

Tonight was Kaitlin’s birthday, and I, unlike, Teymour, skipped math to celebrate her birth. It was nice, despite the sixth grade boys-on-one-side-girls-on-the-other mentality — eventually, the genders came to terms thanks to, of course, Harry Potter. I’m not a “reader”, but I have met the sorting hat a number of times, though. No matter my answers to his questions, I am always placed in Hufflepuff — the house full of “good guys.” We’re not brave, we’re not smart, we’re not strong. We’re good. Luckily I was in good company. That is, Evan was in town. We chatted, and eventually took the bin full of beer and the left-over riesling from the party back to my room. Which makes me wonder, when did I become someone who even knows what riesling is?

Which brings me to my second point, and this really isn’t a segue, I admit. I know. This week’s episode of This American Life was especially poignant. Jackie introduced me to the program on NPR a few years back, but it took a Hubble fellow Risa Wechsler to make me listen. Episode 293, entitled “A Little Bit of Knowledge” featured stories about people who make big statements about things they know little about. One of the main stories comes from Dan Savage’s, renowned nationally syndicated columnist of Savage Love, new book to come out this fall called Commitment. His excerpt details his six-year old son’s objection to Dan and his boyfriend Terry’s marriage. They don’t even know if they want to get married. But DJ, their son, preemptively objects. Eventually, DJ gives his blessing, but you should listen to the story for yourself. I defy you not to find it adorable.

If anything, this makes me think about the real power and danger of definition. G�del said that ninety percent of mathematics is done in the definitions. I think he was right. Right now I’m reading a classic text by Steenrod on the topology of fibers. This was back before there was a standard definition of fiber bundle existed. Anyway, this story helped quel a secret hypothetical fear of mine: what if my son wanted to be gay? Savage and Steenrod seem equally elegant, in my mind, in their treatment. Too bad I just took out a book of verse by Ogden Nash today instead.

The oyster’s a
Confusing suitor;
It’s masc., and fem.,
And even neuter.
But whether husband,
Pal, or wife,
It leads a soothing
Sort of life.
I’d like to be
An oyster, say,
In August, June,
July, or May.

The Oyster, Ogden Nash.

Last fall I took a class at MAS 714J: Systems and Self; it was a look into meta-cognition and application of technology to learning. Harvard Ed School Technology in Education kids. (I have things to say about the program, but I guess I’m not supposed to slander my own school, right?) I’ve heard the Media Lab called the “dot com of academics.” I can appreciate what they were saying, but it’s important not to discount the whole program because of a few, failed flashy projects. If anything, the Media Lab is a lesson in avoiding bad ideas. But nothing I have said has been substantiated.

The point is, snuck in among the TIE kids was a very sharp, very well-spoken woman named Bella. She was a spy from WGBH doing research for a new spin-off called Nova scienceNOW!. The social engineers on Western Ave were trying to stage and science revolution. Introduce science into bars. Don’t replace trivia night. Add live demonstration night to the rotation. Get scientists sloppy drunk and explain decentralized systems to the masses.

I can only imagine what would happen if Ian and I got drunk in the presence of a real cosmologist. Things are bad enough as they are. Ask Danny, or Tey. We’ve hit a real, horrible block in our mathematical cognitive philosophy debates. (To speak nothing of the Nature of Space and Time debates by Penrose and Hawking.)

Which leads me, perhaps a bit forcedly, to this article whose reference I stole from Peter Woit’s blog over at Columbia, which I recently learned Gopal reads, too. It’s an article in the archives about the need for a background independence in a successful theory of quantum gravity. Something I’ve said blindly for at least a year because of a quantum loop gravity book I got a hold of. I, however, quickly put the book down when I realized the amount of algebra I’d need to read it. But everyone should read this artcile. Much of it is a history of science lesson mixed with a survey of contemporary theories. If anything, it’d impress most of the guests at the next cocktail party you attend.

Today Paul woke me up to work in the office around 3p. I swore it must’ve been 10a, but I trust internet time. We talked about meta-cognition a bit, and I tried to explain the idea behind principal bundles — something I’d do again later, but with Amit. Liz is too cool for school it would appear — not long before I received a phone call from Mary. Michelle is at the hospital. No, she did not have spinal meningitis; gastroenteritis caused by E. coli or some other third world agent, sometimes also found at water parks and slaughter houses. I skipped out a few minutes early [read: five]. Luckily, new tutor Lauren was out feeding the meter when she ran into me. I told her that I was off to the hospital, she offered me a lift. I accepted.

Once I got to the ER, I merely pulled the closest person resembling medical staff aside and told her that my friend was here and that I had come to see her. She quickly looked Michelle up on the computer without further inquiry and told me to walk right in, she was in room fifteen. I politely thanked her and wandered into the deeper recesses of the hospital, all the while calculating my chances of swiping some cotton swabs or a stethoscope.

Michelle was in room fifteen, prone and neatly tucked in her bed, IV and all. But not for long, they carted her out of the room and into the hall — they were kind enough to relocate a chair for me as well — there were more patients than rooms and Michelle was not among the most pressing of cases. They populated her room with a man who only spoke Spanish. Somehow it took them more than three attendents to realize this. I was agog each time I heard a medical professional utter, “No habla espanol.” The man replied each time with a short laugh. Meanwhile, I dove into a few math books and periodically asked Michelle if her water had broken yet. I played jazz and the Stones, too. And Sesame Street’s “Put Down the Duckie” once for a small boy visited the Spanish-speaking man.

Eventually they released Michelle. But I wonder. I’m not sure even I can see my own medical files. Don’t I have to pretend to be a brother or husband or someone to visit an in-patient in the ER; can they even release the names of the in-patients? I’ll ask my doctor friends, one of whom works at this hospital, I think. But she’s in the psych ward, and her stories scare me suffiently to stay away.

On the plus, I was able to visit. And all I got in return was a cruddy mango. And dinner. From Nine Tastes. Gosh, Tom Kha is about the best thing in the world.

Tonight is Sunday night, which means, among other things, that it’s dollar dinner night at Grendel’s. That very nice and attractive waitress whom I first met a few Sundays back with Teymour and DJ served me. This time she recognized me and asked how my thesis was coming. Maybe she was tipped off by the stack of reading I had at my table. No matter what, her politeness was appreciated.

I couldn’t help but listen to this man in the table to my diagonal right who was very loudly explaining to his friend that at Harvard they make up their own degrees. Like, well, he couldn’t remember any at the time. I suppose he means that we call our B.A. an A.B. He almost found an example after a minute or two of digging. At the School of Education, he explained, they don’t call it a Ph.D. Instead it’s something, not a Ph.D., but something else. We call it an Ed.D. But I think that’s not too uncommon, as Google will corroborate.

Then two women joined them, having returned, I guessed from their bags, Finale. The man switched topics but continued speaking loudly. “Chest hair,” he announced “has come back.” He followed up with some statistic about 60-70% something, but I couldn’t make it out, as the ambient noise level and my excitement to see a proof of the existence of a spinor structure on a space-time evolved from Cauchy data drowned him out. At this point I stopped listening, but I’m fairly sure the man is pleased with his own chest hair. And I say, why not!

After things settled down a little, the two men mentioned above left; the women stayed and a man joined them. I didn’t catch his speaking ever, and the women switched to what I thought was German.

By the time I got to dessert — and the dessert at Grendel’s is good. I got the turtle cheesecake — a man from the table behind me left and returned three times. On his final departure, a girl at his table “hope[d] your date works out.” I wondered what she meant. I suppose she had marriage in mind, because she couldn’t've meant free dinner. He had just eaten.

But as that group Pink Martini sings:
Je ne veux pas travailler. Je ne veux pas déjeuner. Je veux seulement oublier. Et puis, je fume. [Not really.]

So it turns out that people do read this. DJ pointed out that Patrick Swayze is alive and well, despite that terrible fire that took his life last October. This came as a tremendous shock to me, as I did not previously know that the internet extends to the far-reaches of Vacationland, Rhode Island.

While I missed 9am again this morning, it wasn’t by much. Teymour and I stayed up discussing math, music, and tequila until the early hour of five this morning. I came back and some how managed to amuse myself until 8am.

Then the fun started. I had two long dreams while I slept. The first placed me on the starship Enterprise, Next Generation-style. The Enterpirse, along with several other ships in the fleet, was transporting small, grotesque garden statue to Earth. However, I intercepted a message cluing me in to the sinister nature of the lawn ornaments. For they were not statues at all but the first offensive of a wave of attacks by alien creatures, who, in our tongue, called themselves Trojans. Once safely landed and sold to humans, the heat of the sun would awaken the Trojans from their suspended-state sleep. Then they would shoot a horrible spear-like string � la Scorpion from Mortal Combat from a disc on their forehead into the brain of a human. Then the victim would become a sort of Trojan zombie. I imagine that the human host would either become a Trojan or host a Trojan baby. The details are not clear in my memory. Anyway, anyway! I alerted Commander Ryker or whatever his name is. And Diana Troy did a flip off a balcony and we were on Earth and things moved very quickly. The Trojans attacked Boston at night, perhaps at Quincy Market or the North End. I investigated the seen, but they had completely overwhelmed the population. So I tried to get back to the ship, but this man kept on following me. I told him to go back and leave the city, but it was too late. A Trojan got him. I woke up before I got back to the ship. Professor Georgi took the place of Captain Picard. So I knew it probably was a dream.

The second was even more complicated. Suffice it to say, democrat lobbyists were trying to shut down a corporation, which appeared evil but was not, and I got to work with the CEO who was a Monty Burns-like character. Also, there were a lot of spy acrobatics and maybe floor plans of Leverett towers and some 3D geospatial rendering. One of the lawyers threatened my life and stole an iPod which didn’t belong to me.

I would like to extend a warm thank you to my father, who recently pointed out that Gene Wilder, is not, in fact, dead as is clearly evidenced by this web source. Of course, it speaks nothing of the terrible fire that took Patrick Swayze last November. The International Fan Club community is still in mourning.

But back to Wilder. Last night Michelle and Mary and I packed up our blankets and joined a mass of children and their families at last night’s WBZ’s Free Friday Flicks shown at the Hatch Shell to see the original in an attempt to wash away the pain caused by Johnny Depp and Tim Burton. Ed Carroll promised the rain was far away in the Berkshires. But even dynamic meteorology can be wrong sometimes. They shut down the production just before Mike got shrunk on WonkaVision. Things could be worse.

And they were. Earlier, but not too much earlier, I had gone swimming which whetted my appetite. Not wanting to miss the movie, I didn’t have time to fetch dinner proper. Instead, I downed a bag of praline granola from Trader Joe’s. That’s right, all ten servings at 210 calories each. To wash it down, and to keep hydrated — as it is so important during these summer months — I finished the better part of a gallon of water. The resultant slush weighed down my stomach. But I am an athlete. So I rallied through and finished a BLT and a serving of putine at the South Sreet Dinner. By this time, Michelle’s stomach had given out and we had to go home. Maybe now she’ll have to see a neurologist.

Smiling Mighty Jesus can get even the best of us sometimes. That’s why they vaccinate so heavily, you know.