The Shape of the Universe
How does one describe the shape of an ever-expanding universe? It is not easy to imagine what it might look like. Neither was it easy for some to imagine a spherical earth. For many centuries, the best model for the shape of the earth was a flat disk. This model held sway for at least…
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Slide Rules and Gopher Protocols
(Click on the thumb-nail image for a larger picture.) In my junior high education we used logarithm tables to do specific types of math and in grade 10 science I purchased a slide rule to do my calculations. In 1975, calculators were not very sophisticated, they were expensive, and my physics teacher believed we all…
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Group Dynamics
Tucked in a 64 year old book is a mathematical formula that gives clues about grouping procedures. Bossard1 points out that the number of people in a group may increase by simple mathematical progression, but the increase of relationships comes through geometric progression. Two variables are defined. Let Y equal the number of persons in…
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“Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who set the planets in motion. God governs all things and knows all that is or can be done.” – Isaac Newton* Isaac Newton is often referred to as an English mathematician & physicist who lived from 1642 – 1727. Yet few remember that…
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The miracle of the appropriateness of the language of mathematics for the formulation of the laws of physics is a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve. We should be grateful for it and hope that it will remain valid in future research and that it will extend, for better or for worse, to…
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