Hacker News Reader

agartthaon Slow breathing modulates brain function and risk behavior

You can practice regulating exhale rate in a pool or bath by blowing bubbles. I find it helps with freediving exercises where you fix the number of breaths in between reps.

agartthaon The Emperor of Ice-Cream

Reload a couple of times.

agartthaon Learning Feynman's Trick for Integrals

In quantum mechanics, what you can measure experimentally (observables) are given by integrals. You can do the integrals computationally, but then you only have an empirical understanding of how the observables behave when you change some parameter of your experiment.

In our experiments, we need to know how the frequency of an electromagnetic resonator will change when we couple it to a quantum system. We calculate these frequency shifts with integrals. Being able to calculate these integrals analytically for some limiting cases helps us understand the dependence on the parameters. And usually you can patch the limiting cases together and not even have to compute the integrals numerically.

agartthaon Myna: Monospace typeface designed for symbol-heavy programming languages

What about a J example? https://code.jsoftware.com/wiki/NuVoc

agartthaon Show HN: Quibbler – A critic for your coding agent that learns what you want

Replace the middle manager

agartthaon Doomsday scoreboard

Here's python code to simulate one of the still-active doomsday predictions (The Limits to Growth)

https://github.com/TimSchell98/PyWorld3-03

agartthaon LaTeXpOsEd: A Systematic Analysis of Information Leakage in Preprint Archives

I offer free beer in a comment in my arxiv tex source.

agartthaon Eprel: European Product Registry for Energy Labelling

Compare specs on appliances

agartthaon Suzhou Imperial Kiln Ruins Park and Museum of Imperial Kiln Brick (2018)

Read "kiln ruins" as a noun: the ruins of kilns. It's an amazing overlooked museum near Shanghai.

agartthaon Scientific Papers: Innovation or Imitation?

Random thoughts from physics researcher: - Too much imitation delays innovation. - For all the emphasis on high risk research, the system doesn't reward it. - Creativity isn't valued as much as it should be. - negative results and failed experiments hold back careers but are signs of attempts at innovation - the VC world may understand that only 1/100 projects will be novel and perhaps successful, but funding agencies don't

agartthaon George Green (Mathematician)

George Green, the baker, received one year of schooling and discovered Green's functions

agartthaon Why and How I use "Org Mode" for my writing and more

syncthing for all my org files

agartthaon Microsoft unveils Majorana 1 quantum processor

Another condmat physicist wondering how this work got so hyped up. Single shot parity measurements are not new.

agartthaon Mystery brain disease patients in New Brunswick say they welcome investigation

House and Wilson Holmes and Watson

agartthaon What other communities do you use apart from HN?

Gemini https://geminiprotocol.net/

agartthaon Easy Vegan Pie Crust

Can substitute solid coconut oil for the vegetable shortening.

agartthaon Monodraw

Is there a UTF-16 version?

agartthaon Can Electronics made of COTS components work at cryogenic temperatures? (2020)

In our physics research lab we use some COTS components down to 10 mK. Many passive components no longer work and we have to use C0G capacitors and NiCr resistors. Only some discrete SiGe and HEMT transistors will continue to work. But then our thermal budget is 50 uW so design is difficult even if the components remain operational.

agartthaon Can Electronics made of COTS components work at cryogenic temperatures? (2020)

Spacecraft can use https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_... to heat up electronics.

agartthaon Pressure-induced high-temperature superconductivity retained at ambient

My apologies for the title change due to a misreading. Won’t happen again.

agartthaon An argument that nuclear power makes the climate crisis worse

Looks like Mycle Schneider, the lead author, is a founding member of WISE-Paris, which is the French branch of the anti-nuclear group WISE, which he directed from 1983 to 2003. [wikipedia]

agartthaon Homer Simpson and Topology

Quoting:

"A coffee cup and a doughnut are homeomorphic because a coffee cup can be stretched into a doughnut. A doughnut cannot be a sphere because a sphere does not have any holes. Cutting is not allowed in topology but Homer finds a workaround by biting the doughnut, because if you bite the top off of an A and eat it, then the top no longer exists. Homer makes the doughnut and the sphere homeomorphic. And maybe that’s why he’s also called Homer."

agartthaon All Hail Geometric Algebra

This is the paper that hooked me:

"Imaginary numbers are not real—The geometric algebra of spacetime"

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01883676

(http://geometry.mrao.cam.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Im...)

agartthaon Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

Here is an analysis of how many people die due to confinement vs COVID.

https://theconversation.com/is-the-covid-19-pandemic-cure-re...

agartthaon Fasting leads to stress resistance, self-renewal, and regeneration (2014)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2673798/

Although intermittent calorie restriction (CR) has been shown to lower IGF-1, this article shows that prolonged CR does not affect IGF-1 levels. However prolonged protein restriction, especially animal protein, _is_ shown to reduce IGF-1 levels.

agartthaon Graphene’s sleeping superconductivity awakens

A superconductor is not a resistor. It is an ideal inductor. Ohm's law doesn't apply. You have Phi = LI instead of V = IR, where Phi is the magnetic flux generated by a superconducting wire of inductance L.

agartthaon Impending kOS

joke: search jqk on google images

agartthaon Don't Become a Scientist (1999)

As an American physics PhD who is continuing his career in academia in France, the situation is comparable to that in the US: the number of tenure openings (French CR1/CR2) is declining while the number of PhDs is growing.