waves

The Earth’s Shape and Size? You Can Measure it Yourself — Part 2

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In my last post, I showed, using only simple arithmetic, that the observed atmospheric effects from the January 15th volcanic explosion in the Kingdom on Tonga are consistent with a round Earth. From the timing of the observed spikes in pressure, seen around the world, one can work out how long the pressure wave took … Read more

The Earth’s Shape and Size? You Can Measure it Yourself — Part 1

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This week, I’ll describe how one can easily use the Jan 15th explosive volcanic eruption in Tonga to obtain strong evidence that the Earth’s a sphere and determine its circumference, using nothing more than simple arithmetic.   This illustration of scientific measurement is perfect for any science classroom, because it uses publicly accessible data, is … Read more

Geometry From Within: Evidence for a Round Earth

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It’s a lot easier to map the Earth than it used to be.  Before satellites, you had to do many careful measurements of distances and directions, at many different locations around the world, and combine them all to build a picture of a world you couldn’t see.  That’s part of why maps and globes made … Read more

Creating a New Particle from the Annihilation of Two Others

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[Long silence should be over for now; personal issues had to take precedence for a little while.] Back to building up articles on how the Higgs field works! As part of the necessary background, I’ve added another general article on how particles and fields interact with each other to my series on Particles and Fields … Read more

Two Major Steps Forward

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Apologies to those who’ve been asking questions: I’ve been away from the website for a few days (family matters) and have not been able to keep up with comments.  I will try to catch up over the coming day or two. But I do have two pieces of good news. First, I gave a public … Read more

What Fields Are (& a Public Talk Saturday)

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To the five articles in my very-slightly-mathy series on Fields and Particles [sorry, the non-mathy series will be probably appear a couple of months from now] I have now added a 6th: Ball on a Spring (Classical) Ball on a Spring (Quantum) Waves (Classical Form) Waves (Classical Equation of Motion) Waves (Quantum) Fields (new!) Particles … Read more

The Quantum Wave

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If you’ve just gotten back from vacation, perhaps after days or weeks seeking the perfect wave, well, what a treat awaits! So much reading to do, about such interesting things. I’m writing a set of articles, intended for the reader who has once-upon-a-time seen beginning physics (what we in the U.S. would call “freshman physics”, … Read more

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