pontiff | September 30, 2008Two quantum postdoc advertisements crossed my desk this week, from two fine institutions. Good postdocs if you can land one! The first advertisement is a double wammy from Caltech
CENTER FOR THE PHYSICS OF INFORMATION
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Postdoctoral Research Positions
The Center for the Physics of Information at the California Institute of
Technology will have postdoctoral scholar positions available beginning
in September 2009. Researchers interested in all aspects of the
interface between information science and physical science are invited
to apply. The appointment is…
pontiff | September 30, 2008The New York Times has an article about Chongo Chuck. Chongo is a legendary homeless rock climber who lived in Yosemite for years. He is also the author of The Homeless Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics. Anyone ever seen a copy?
pontiff | September 30, 2008DARPA math challenges. My favorite is "Mathematical Challenge Nineteen: Settle the Riemann Hypothesis." I'm guess that's one where you can't follow the age old strategy of writing a grant proposal for work you've already figured out ;)
pontiff | September 29, 2008Yes, it's all finance all the time, here at the Pontiff. Where else can you go to get your daily dose of extralusionary intelligence?
Once again it's a New York Times article Maybe Short-Selling Isn't So Bad, After All. Now I don't know much about how the changes in shorting stock (the removal of the uptick rule, where one could only short the stock on an up move in the stock, and the banning of shorting of a large group of stocks) effect trading, but I think I've plaid enough games in my life to know that the following argument is a good way to spot a sucker:
Has the rule's removal been an…
pontiff | September 28, 2008From this Sunday's New York Times in an article entitled Wall Street, R.I.P.:
In search of ever-higher returns -- and larger yachts, faster cars and pricier art collections for their top executives -- Wall Street firms bulked up their trading desks and hired pointy-headed quantum physicists to develop foolproof programs.
Quantum physicists? Come on media get it right. I'm pretty sure those were string theorists who ruined America ;)
Personally I think we should use the association of Ph.D. physicists as the cause of the Wall Street mess to lobby for higher science funding. "Sure you could…
pontiff | September 26, 2008The prime number theorem is a statement of a quantuplicity: there are about N/log N prime numbers in the first N numbers.
quantuplicity noun. The quantitative relationship between two amounts. Usually referring specifically to the case when this is expressed as a ratio giving the number of times that one contains another (or vice versa.)
Calculating quantuplicities for different sociological quantities can lead one to a very complicated poset.
pontiff | September 26, 2008There are many things I do not understand in the wide world of finance, but the one which perplexes me the most is why people believe that their money is safe under their mattress.
I mean come on people: mattresses? The odds of a fire in your household serious enough to call the fire department during the year are about one in three hundred. Sure the odds of the whole house burning down are lower, but do you really want to put it under a mattress?
And what about residential robbery? Your odds of a break in are somewhere around one in 250 per year. And if I'm a robber in these dire…
pontiff | September 25, 2008Reminder that Sandra, Maria, Grrl, and I will be Ozzies this Saturday. Translation: beer! That's Saturday, Sept. 27th at 4 pm in the upstairs mezzanine at Ozzie's. The address is 105 W. Mercer St., Seattle, WA 98119. That's in lower Queen Anne just east west of that gigantic need with a spaceship stuck on top of it.
pontiff | September 25, 2008"Dreams of poverty excited universal enjoyment in Berkeley, coupled with the hope that the political and economic situation would worsen, throwing the country into ruin: this was the theory of the activists. Misfortune so vast it would wreck everyone, responsible and not responsible sinking into defeat..." - from The Transmigration of Timothy Archer by Philip K. Dick
pontiff | September 25, 2008An entry into the "best abstract ever" subcompetition of the "best title ever" competition, arXiv:0809.3979:
Counterfactual Quantum Cryptography
Authors: Tae-Gon Noh
Abstract: The 'quantum counterfactuality' is one of the most striking counterintuitive effects predicted by quantum mechanics. This manuscript shows that the counterfactual effect is not merely an interesting academic theme, but that it can also provide practical benefits in everyday life. Based on the quantum counterfactual effect, the task of a secret key distribution between two remote parties can be accomplished even when no…
pontiff | September 24, 2008Well that explains why the United States is not mentioned in the Bible! I always wondered about that one.
pontiff | September 24, 2008Major news from the quantum information front. Today I see posted on the arXiv a paper by M.B. Hastings: arXiv:0809.3972 "A Counterexample to Additivity of Minimum Output Entropy." If correct this resolves one of the most famous open problems in quantum information theory, and, even more interestingly says that in a quantum world, transmitting classical information down quantum channel defies your classical intuition. Blessed be our quantum world, which just continues and continues to amaze.
Previously I explained the idea channel capacity. You're sending (classical) information from one…
pontiff | September 24, 2008Over at Information Processing, the bit processor, Steve, has an interesting post up about your chances of getting a faculty job in high energy theoretical physics. (In between the best posts on the financial turmoil around 1, 2, 3.) If you're a high energy theoretical physics graduate student, and don't want to get depressed today, I would recommend avoiding the post so as to keep up your illusion of safety, but if you want a good dose of reality, check it out.
From the post you can see that the odds of getting a high energy theory job in physics are more close to none than even to slim…
pontiff | September 23, 2008A word which might be useful in describing depictions of Jesus in South America:
Iconotropy noun. The misinterpretation of icons of an earlier cult by a later cult. Especially so as to bring the beliefs of the old school in line with the new school.
The monotheist bested the polytheist by repeated counterarguments of iconotropy.
pontiff | September 23, 2008The word which is closest in the dictionary to my name:
Daven. verb. 1. To recite a prayer. 2. To rock too and fro (as if praying.)
Have you ever noticed how some very smart mathematicians daven when they are excitedly talking about research?
pontiff | September 22, 2008I just saw the news that Alexei Kitaev, a pioneer in quantum computing and an incredible physicst/computer scientist, has won a MacArthur "genius" award. Awesome!
Kitaev was my next door neighbor while I was a postdoc at Caltech, and among the many highlights of my short life I count listening to Kitaev's amazing, confounding, brilliant and way over my head ideas. One event in particular I will always remember involved Alexei talking to theoretical computer scientists and, halfway through the talk, pointing out how Majorana fermions were essential to understanding what was going on in that…
pontiff | September 19, 2008Two new Mersenne primes: 243,112,609-1 and 237,156,667-1. The former is now the largest prime number known. Interestingly the larger was discovered before the former, thus winning $100,000 from the EFF for Edson Smith who installed the software which identified this Mersenne prime on a UCLA computer. The $100K prize was for the first 10 million digit prime. The next prize is $150K for a 100 million digit prime number. Pretty amazing that two 10 million digit Mersenne's were discovered within weeks of each other.
Mersenne primes are prime numbers which are a power of two minus one, i.e. of…
pontiff | September 18, 2008The University of Marland's Joint Quantum Institute has won an NSF Physics Frontier Center. $12.5 million over five years. This is the first frontier center devoted exclusively to quantum information science. Congrats to UM! Press release below the fold.
UM Awarded $12.5 Million for Research Center at Frontier of Quantum Physics
COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- The National Science Foundation has awarded the Joint Quantum Institute $12.5 million over five years to create and operate a Physics Frontier Center at the University of Maryland. The Joint Quantum Institute is a partnership between the…