Hawking (2007), Stephen , God Created the Integers, Running Press 2007 ' Bestselling author and physicist Stephen Hawking explores the "masterpieces" of mathematics, 25 landmarks spanning 2,500 years and representing the work of 15 mathematicians, including Augustin Cauchy, Bernard Riemann, and Alan Turing. This extensive anthology allows readers to peer into the mind of genius by providing them with excerpts from the original mathematical proofs and results. It also helps them understand the progression of mathematical thought, and the very foundations of our present-day technologies. Each chapter begins with a biography of the featured mathematician, clearly explaining the significance of the result, followed by the full proof of the work, reproduced from the original publication. 
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Hughes (1993), Ted, Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being, Faber & Faber 1993 ' Synopsis In this momentous adventure in criticism, one of the leading poets writing in English argues that our profound response to Shakespeare's great late plays is prompted by a mythic, symbolic structure that inheres in each of them, and indeed binds the entire Shakespearean corpus into one huge, complex, ever-evolving work. Ted Hughes sees Shakespeare's early poems Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece as embodying two great myths of the archaic world, that of the hero who rejects the love of the Goddess and is killed in revenge by a boar; and that of the king, or god, whose crime is rape and whose punishment is banishment. These two complexes merge as Shakespeare's work develops into what Hughes calls the Tragic Equation, a flexible formula through which the poet was able to tap into the innate power of these myths to enliven his own imagination - and through him the imagination of Elizabethan England, in which the conflicts between Catholicism and Protestantism in the "living myth" of the English Reformation never lay far from the bloody surface of events. With his characteristic mixture of erudition and immediacy, Ted Hughes traces this idea in a close reading of Shakespeare's entire work. This text originally grew out of correspondence with dramatists, and anyone for whom intimate attention to the plays is important - scholar, student, actor, or common reader - will profit greatly from Hughes's loving, intensive, engrossing, and radical analysis of the greatest writing in the language.' 
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Nielsen (2016), Michael A., and Isaac L Chuang, Quantum Computation and Quantum Information, Cambridge University Press 2016 Review: A rigorous, comprehensive text on quantum information is timely. The study of quantum information and computation represents a particularly direct route to understanding quantum mechanics. Unlike the traditional route to quantum mechanics via Schroedinger's equation and the hydrogen atom, the study of quantum information requires no calculus, merely a knowledge of complex numbers and matrix multiplication. In addition, quantum information processing gives direct access to the traditionally advanced topics of measurement of quantum systems and decoherence.' Seth Lloyd, Department of Quantum Mechanical Engineering, MIT, Nature 6876: vol 416 page 19, 7 March 2002. 
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Artificial Intelligence - Wikipedia, Artificial Intelligence - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Artificial intelligence (AI), sometimes called machine intelligence, is intelligence demonstrated by machines, in contrast to the natural intelligence displayed by humans and other animals. In computer science AI research is defined as the study of "intelligent agents": any device that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its chance of successfully achieving its goals.' back

Born rule - Wikipedia, Born rule - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Born rule (also called the Born law, Born's rule, or Born's law) is a law of quantum mechanics which gives the probability that a measurement on a quantum system will yield a given result. It is named after its originator, the physicist Max Born. The Born rule is one of the key principles of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. There have been many attempts to derive the Born rule from the other assumptions of quantum mechanics, with inconclusive results. . . . The Born rule states that if an observable corresponding to a Hermitian operator A with discrete spectrum is measured in a system with normalized wave function (see bra-ket notation), then the measured result will be one of the eigenvalues λ of A, and the probability of measuring a given eigenvalue λ_i will equal <ψ|P_i|ψ> where P_i is the projection onto the eigenspace of A corresponding to λ_i'.' back

David Demille et. al. (2017_09_08), Probing the frontiers of particle physics with tabletop-scale experiments, ' Abstract: The field of particle physics is in a peculiar state. The standard model of particle theory successfully describes every fundamental particle and force observed in laboratories, yet fails to explain properties of the universe such as the existence of dark matter, the amount of dark energy, and the preponderance of matter over antimatter. Huge experiments, of increasing scale and cost, continue to search for new particles and forces that might explain these phenomena. However, these frontiers also are explored in certain smaller, laboratory-scale “tabletop” experiments. This approach uses precision measurement techniques and devices from atomic, quantum, and condensed-matter physics to detect tiny signals due to new particles or forces. Discoveries in fundamental physics may well come first from small-scale experiments of this type. back

Elian Peltier & Zia ur-Rehman (2025_08_06), Another Pakistani Woman Is Killed for ‘Honor,’ but She’s Not Forgotten, ' The woman took her final steps on the open desert terrain in southern Pakistan and stopped, turning her back to her executioner as he raised his gun.
“You can shoot me,” said Bano Bibi, 35, her beige shawl fluttering in the wind. “But nothing more than that.”
The man shot Ms. Bibi three times, killing her on the spot over accusations that the mother of five was having an affair. Then he turned to the man accused of being her lover, Ehsanullah Samalani, a 50-year-old father of four, and shot him dead as well. [. . . ]
But Ms. Bibi’s death, her defiant last words and the impunity enjoyed for weeks by those who ordered her death have yet again cast doubt on Pakistani officials’ ability, or will, to tackle one of the country’s most persistent and egregious forms of violence.
In the video, male onlookers can be seen watching in silence, neither moving nor trying to intervene, some of them filming the execution with their smartphones. [. . .]
“It’s mostly victim blaming, where the killer will say, ‘She dishonored our family,’” said Sheema Kermani, a classical dancer and women’s rights activist who co-founded Aurat March, a leading feminist movement in Pakistan. “But there is no honor in these killings. They are dishonorable murders.”
At least 405 women were victims of so-called “honor killings” last year, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an independent rights group. [. . .]
Ms. Kermani, the activist, said, “That video sends a chilling message that says, ‘Don’t let any women dare decide for their own life, because that is what we will do to them' ".' back

Eric B. Norman; Bernard G. Harvey; Glenn T. Seaborg; Howard C. Hayden; Matjaz Ravnik; Bernard L. Cohen; Alex Gabbard, Pu Breeders in the Sky Not a Burning Issue after All, back

F. J. Dyson (1952), Quantum electrodynamics, ' Historical parallels are never exact. Each development in science is something new and different from any which preceded it. Still it may be illuminating to discuss the progress that has recently been made in quantum electrodynamics, using the historical development of classical electrodynamics as a standard of comparison. So may we see our present knowledge and our present difficulties in their proper perspective. If Faraday’s appeal quoted above had been more effectively answered in his day, might not electromagnetic waves have been discovered less than thirty years later? We cannot answer such a hypothetical question. But every theoretical physicist who reads Faraday’s words will be uncomfortably aware that similar appeals are still being made and are still not being answered. This article attempts to express in simple words the results of our recent thinking in quantum electrodynamics, not fully, but clearly and definitely so far as that is possible.' back

Feynman, Leighton & Sands FLP III_1, The Feynman Lectures on Physics volume III: Chapter 1: Quantum Behaviour, ' “Quantum mechanics” is the description of the behavior of matter and light in all its details and, in particular, of the happenings on an atomic scale. Things on a very small scale behave like nothing that you have any direct experience about. They do not behave like waves, they do not behave like particles, they do not behave like clouds, or billiard balls, or weights on springs, or like anything that you have ever seen.' back

Frederick Reines (1995_12_08), Nobel Prize Lecture, ' Finally, we chose to look for the reaction If the free neutri- no exists, this inverse beta decay reaction ν_e + p = n + e⁺ has to be there, as Hans Bethe and Rudolf Peierls recognized, and as I’m sure did Fermi, but they had no occasion to write it down in the early days. [. . .] Bethe and Peierls in 1934 [3], almost immediately after the Fermi paper on beta decay[4], estimated that if you are in the few MeV range the cross section with which you have to deal would be ~ l0^-44 cm ² . In fact, as we learned some years later from Lee and Yang, the cross section is a factor of two greater because of parity non- conservation and the handedness of the neutrino.) [. . . ] Pauli put his concern succinctly during a visit to Caltech when he remarked: “I have done a terrible thing. I have postulat- ed a particle that cannot be detected.” back

Gell-Mann matrices - Wikipedia, Gell-Mann matrices - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Gell-Mann matrices, developed by Murray Gell-Mann, are a set of eight linearly independent 3×3 traceless Hermitian matrices used in the study of the strong interaction in particle physics. They span the Lie algebra of the SU(3) group in the defining representation. . . . These matrices are traceless, Hermitian (so they can generate unitary matrix group elements through exponentiation), and obey the extra trace orthonormality relation. These properties were chosen by Gell-Mann because they then naturally generalize the Pauli matrices for SU(2) to SU(3), which formed the basis for Gell-Mann's quark model. Gell-Mann's generalization further extends to general SU(n). For their connection to the standard basis of Lie algebras, see the Weyl–Cartan basis. ' back

Gheorghe Sorin Paraoanu, On the (im)possibility of quantum computing, Essay Abstract 'We are witnesses nowadays in physics to an intense effort to built a quantum computer. In this essay, I point out that the failure of this enterprize could be in fact more intellectually exciting than its success. I conjecture that, despite the fact that we do not know any law of nature that would prevent us from building such a machine, it might not be possible, after all, to scale up the few qubits that have been realized so far. If this turns out to be the case, the consequences could be truly amazing: it would mean that quantum mechanics is indeed an incomplete description of reality, as Einstein thought, and it would also imply that certain types of computation - and the knowledge derived from it - are fundamentally inaccessible.' back

Hans G Dehmelt (1989_12_08), Experiments with an Isolated Subatomic Particle at Rest, ' The metastable pseudo-atom geonium (Van Dyck et al. 1978 and 1986) has been expressly synthesized for studies of the electron g factor under optimal conditions. It consists of an individual electron permanently confined in an ultrahigh vacuum Penning trap at 4K. The trap employs a homogeneous magnetic field B₀ = 5T and a weak electric quadrupole field. The latter is produced by hyperbolic electrodes, a positive ring and two negative caps spaced 2Z 0 = 8 mm apart.' back

Ian Duck and E.C.G. Sudarshan (1998), Toward an understanding of the spin-statistics theorem, 'We respond to a request from Neuenschwander for an elementary proof of the Spin-Statistics Theorem. First . . . Then we discuss an argument suggested by Sudarshan, which proves the theorem with a minimal set of requirements. . . . Motivated by our particular use of Lorentz invariance, if we are permitted to elevate the conclusion of flavour symmetry (which we explain in the text) to the status of a postulate, one could recast the proof without any relativistic assumptions, and this make it applicable even in the nonrelativistic context. . . . Finally, an argument starting with ordinary number-valued (nonmmuting), and with Grassman valued (anticommuting) operators, shows in a natural way that these relativitcally embed into Klein-Gordon spin-0 and Dirac spin-½ fields, respectively. In this way the Spin Statistics theorem is understood at the expense of admitting the existence of the simplest Grassman-valued field.' back

Jiangyong Jia (2024_11_04), Imaging Nuclear Shapes by Smashing them to Smithereens, ' “In this new measurement, we not only quantify the overall shape of the nucleus — whether it’s elongated like a football or squashed down like a tangerine — but also the subtle triaxiality, the relative differences among its three principle axes that characterize a shape in between the ‘football’ and ‘tangerine,’” said Jiangyong Jia, a professor at Stony Brook University (SBU) who has a joint appointment at Brookhaven Lab and is one of the principal authors on the STAR Collaboration publication.' back

John Preskill (2021), Quantum computing 40 years later, Forty years ago, Richard Feynman proposed harnessing quantum physics to build a more powerful kind of computer. Realizing Feynman’s vision is one of the grand challenges facing 21st century science and technology. In this article, we’ll recall Feynman’s contribution that launched the quest for a quantum computer, and assess where the field stands 40 years later.' back

John Preskill (2025_07_01), , ' Information carried by a quantum system has notoriously weird properties. Physicists and engineers are now learning how to put that weirdness to work. Quantum computers, which manipulate quantum states rather than classical bits, may someday be able to perform tasks that would be inconceivable with conventional digital technology. back

Large Hadron Collider - Wikipedia, Large Hadron Collider - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle collider. It was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008 in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists and hundreds of universities and laboratories, as well as more than 100 countries. It lies in a tunnel 27 kilometres (17 mi) in circumference and as deep as 175 metres (574 ft) beneath the France–Switzerland border near Geneva. The first collisions were achieved in 2010 at an energy of 3.5 teraelectronvolts (TeV) per beam, about four times the previous world record. After upgrades it reached 6.5 TeV per beam (13 TeV total collision energy, the present world record). At the end of 2018, it was shut down for three years for further upgrades.' back

Louise Devenish (2025_08_05), What would a climate model made from music sound like? This team of artists and scientists has created one, ' David Attenborough said “saving our planet is now a communications challenge”. This points to the gap between the knowledge about the actions needed to address climate change, and motivation towards taking this action.
In this gap, musical creativity and imagination can offer new pathways towards awareness and understanding. This can contribute to how we collectively develop climate communication.
I have been collaborating with a team of artists and scientists on Dark Oceanography to explore new ways of sharing climate information.
The intangible nature of music provides exceptional opportunities to convey things that words, numbers or images cannot. The continuous circular motion of eddies offers a metaphor for restarting, for renewal. Each iteration brings a level of change and evolution. The piece descends through the dataset in three stages from the ocean’s surface to nearly one kilometre underwater. The percussionists begin by sounding delicate glass and metal instruments, before the soundworld deepens with low drums and the sinking, sliding sounds of timpani.
The dataset that propels the music was extrapolated from existing ocean simulations, following the pathways of eddies from the Eastern Australian Current. As performance locations for this work change, so will the data, integrating new eddies drawn from local ocean currents. The musical experience also changes with different eddies.
The impact of changing ocean eddy systems on the global climate is currently unknown. This confluence of sound and science leans into the unknown, and offers a way of navigating uncertainty through music. Dark Oceanography shows us that there are many ways to imagine the future.' back

Mikhail Zygar (2025_08_05), Russia’s Rulers Are In For a Nasty Shock, ' After weathering more than three years of sanctions, the Kremlin believes it can handle anything thrown at it — that’s if Mr. Trump even follows through, which many in Moscow doubt.
But there’s a deeper reason for the dismissive response. Mr. Putin has, according to Kremlin insiders I talked to, concluded that negotiating with the United States makes no sense and that compromise is pointless. Hostility, not friendship, is the policy. [. . .]
Everyone now realizes that Mr. Putin has no desire to end the war, which remains his main tool for controlling society. Worse, he has lost faith in the very idea of reaching agreements with the United States. According to the people I talked to, his view is that any American administration, by definition, is temporary — and so any deal with it is meaningless. Mr. Trump is in charge today, but in three years he might not be. Personal rapport means nothing. To Mr. Putin, it is no longer possible to build a working relationship with America. [. . .]
The Kremlin hasn’t forgotten that Mr. Trump reportedly asked Volodymyr Zelensky whether Ukraine could strike Moscow or St. Petersburg. But Moscow is convinced that Westerners remain far more afraid of Russian nuclear threats than Russians are of hypothetical West-supported strikes. The reason is simple: In the West, public opinion would never accept the civilian casualties from an attack. In Russia, public opinion no longer matters; in fact, it hasn’t existed in any real sense for years. That’s why the Kremlin found it amusing when the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, rushed to deny any possibility of U.S.-backed strikes on Moscow. [. . .] And yet Russia’s rulers cling to the belief that nothing can harm them. After all, they reason, the country has spent the past three years learning how to live in isolation. It’s possible they’re right about Mr. Trump and that his bark is worse than his bite. But drunk on propaganda, oblivious to the risks ahead, they may soon find they are in for a nasty shock.' back

Nic Danforth (2016_05_14), Could Different Borders Have Saved the Middle East?, ' THERE probably aren’t many things that the Islamic State, Jon Stewart and the president of Iraqi Kurdistan agree on, but there is one: the pernicious influence of the Sykes-Picot Agreement, a secret plan for dividing up the Middle East signed by France and Britain, 100 years ago this week. It has become conventional wisdom to argue, as Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. recently did, that the Middle East’s problems stem from “artificial lines, creating artificial states made up of totally distinct ethnic, religious, cultural groups.” That Western imperialism had a malignant influence on the course of Middle Eastern history is without a doubt. But is Sykes-Picot the right target for this ire? [. . . ] In 1919, President Woodrow Wilson sent a delegation to devise a better way to divide the region. Henry King, a theologian, and Charles Crane, an industrialist, conducted hundreds of interviews in order to prepare a map in accordance with the ideal of national self-determination. Was this a missed opportunity to draw the region’s “real” borders? Doubtful. After careful study, King and Crane realized how difficult the task was: They split the difference between making Lebanon independent or making it part of Syria with a proposal for “limited autonomy.” They thought the Kurds might be best off incorporated into Iraq or even Turkey. And they were certain that Sunnis and Shiites belonged together in a unified Iraq. In the end, the French and British ignored the recommendations. If only they had listened, things might have turned out more or less the same.' back

Ouroboros - Wikipedia, Ouroboros - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The ouroboros or uroboros is an ancient symbol depicting a snake or dragon[4] eating its own tail. The ouroboros entered Western tradition via ancient Egyptian iconography and the Greek magical tradition. It was adopted as a symbol in Gnosticism and Hermeticism and, most notably, in alchemy. SoThe term derives from Ancient Greek οὐροβόρος, from οὐρά oura 'tail' plus -βορός -boros '-eating'.
The ouroboros is often interpreted as a symbol for eternal cyclic renewal or a cycle of life, death and rebirth; the snake's skin sloughing symbolises the transmigration of souls. The snake biting its own tail is a fertility symbol in some religions: the tail is a phallic symbol and the mouth is a yonic or womb-like symbol.' back

Physics Today, About us, ' Physics Today, the flagship publication of the American Institute of Physics, is the most influential and closely followed physics magazine in the world.
Physics Today's mission is to be a unifying influence on the physical sciences by cultivating a shared understanding, appreciation, and sense of belonging among physical scientists. It does that by providing authoritative, engaging coverage of physical science research and its applications without regard to disciplinary boundaries; by reporting on the often complex interactions of the physical sciences with each other and with other spheres of human endeavor; and by offering a forum for the exchange of ideas within the scientific community. With authoritative features, full news coverage and analysis, and fresh perspectives on technological advances and ground-breaking research, Physics Today informs readers about science and its role in society.' back

Physics Today, Quantum archive, ' To celebrate the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology, we present this selected collection of our coverage of quantum mechanics through the years. ' back

Qiu-Hong Hu (2005_12_29), The nature of the electron, ' Through investigating history, evolution of the concept, and development in the theories of electrons, I am convinced that what was missing in our understanding of the electron is a structure, into which all attributes of the electron could be incorporated in a self-consistent way. It is hereby postulated that the topological structure of the electron is a closed two-turn Helix (a so-called Hubius Helix) that is generated by circulatory motion of a mass-less particle at the speed of light. A formulation is presented to describe an isolated electron at rest and at high speed. It is shown that the formulation is capable of incorporating most (if not all) attributes of the electron, including spin, magnetic moment, fine structure constant, anomalous magnetic moment, and charge quantization into one concrete description of the Hubius Helix. The equations for the description emerge accordingly. Implications elicited by the postulate are elaborated. Inadequacy of the formulation is discussed.' back

Richard Behiel, Electromagnetism as a Gauge Theory, ' "Why is electromagnetism a thing?" That's the question. In this video, we explore the answer given by gauge theory. In a nutshell, electromagnetism arises from local phase symmetry. But what does that mean, and how exactly does that work? That's what this video is all about!
This video is quite long and technical. Think of it as a video textbook, so you can skip around to different parts if you’d like. But I wanted to err on the side of rigor and thoroughness, to show comprehensively how local U(1) symmetry blossoms into electromagnetism. So the ideas are all there for you, but you don’t have to watch this in one sitting! ' back

Richard Behiel (2025_08_07), The Strong Nuclear Force as a Gauge Theory, Part 1: Quarks, ' Hey everyone, in this video series, we'll be exploring how the strong nuclear force arises naturally from local SU(3) symmetry. Today, in Part 1, we'll be easing into the subject matter, talking about quarks, looking at some baryons and mesons, and developing the concept of a quark color triplet field (which we'll later apply a local SU(3) transformation to). back

Richard Behiel (2025_08_07a), Superconductivity and the Higgs field, ' In this video, we explore the Higgs field, which has a nonzero expectation value throughout our universe, even in "empty" space. The Higgs field is very much like a superconducting condensate, and so we will use superconductivity as a way of exploring the Higgs field. back

Richard Behiel (2025_08_08), The Strong Nuclear Force as a Gauge Theory, Part 2: Group Theory , ' Hey everyone, today we'll be talking about the group theory involved with quantum chromodynamics, not just SU(3) and su(3), but also U(N) and u(N) in general. This will give us the ideas and vocabulary we'll need, to explore how local SU(3) symmetry blossoms into the strong force. back

Richard Behiel (2025_08_08a), The Strong Nuclear Force as a Gauge Theory, Part 3: The Gluon Fields , ' Hey everyone, today we'll be deriving a gauge field, which will equip our lagrangian with local SU(3) symmetry. We'll go through each of the logical steps to prove that the four spacetime components of the gauge field must live in su(3), the Lie algebra of SU(3). Then, because G_mu lives in su(3), we'll see how we can write it in terms of eight real-valued four-vector fields, the gluon fields! back

Richard Behiel (2025_08_09), The Strong Nuclear Force as a Gauge Theory, Part 4: The Field Strength Tensor, ' In this part, we derive the field strength tensor from scratch, letting it emerge naturally from local SU(3) symmetry. It contains the color-electric and color-magnetic fields, basically eight versions of the electric and magnetic fields. This is the most mathematically intense video in the series, as we dive deep into the algebra. But it's worth it, because you'll see exactly why the field strength tensor takes the form it does, and how it all traces back to symmetry. When you see that for yourself, it gives you a sense of ownership over the subject. You don't have to take anyone's word for it, because you can just see that that's how it is.' back

Robert V. Harlander & Jean-Philippe Martinez (2024_03_01), The development of computational methods for Feynman diagrams, ' Over the last 70 years, Feynman diagrams have played an essential role in the development of many theoretical predictions derived from the standard model Lagrangian. In fact, today they have become an essential and seemingly irreplaceable tool in quantum field theory calculations. In this article, we propose to explore the development of computational methods for Feynman diagrams with a special focus on their automation, drawing insights from both theoretical physics and the history of science. From the latter perspective, the article particularly investigates the emergence of computer algebraic programs, such as the pioneering SCHOONSCHIP, REDUCE, and ASHMEDAI, designed to handle the intricate calculations associated with Feynman diagrams. This sheds light on the many challenges faced by physicists when working at higher orders in perturbation theory and reveal, as exemplified by the test of the validity of quantum electrodynamics at the turn of the 1960s and 1970s, the indispensable necessity of computer-assisted procedures. In the second part of the article, a comprehensive overview of the current state of the algorithmic evaluation of Feynman diagrams is presented from a theoretical point of view. It emphasizes the key algorithmic concepts employed in modern perturbative quantum field theory computations and discusses the achievements, ongoing challenges, and potential limitations encountered in the application of the Feynman diagrammatic method. Accordingly, we attribute the enduring significance of Feynman diagrams in contemporary physics to two main factors: the highly algorithmic framework developed by physicists to tackle these diagrams and the successful advancement of algebraic programs used to process the involved calculations associated with them. back

Saïda Guellati-Khelifa (2023_02_13), Searching for New Physics with the Electron’s Magnetic Moment, ' New physics starts at the next digit of precision, according to a physicists’ adage—for which the history of the electron magnetic moment offers a great illustration. After experiments revealed that the electron had spin, Paul Dirac offered a formal description of the electron spin with his famous relativistic equation. He predicted that the electron g factor—a dimensionless quantity relating the particle’s magnetic moment to its angular momentum—should be 2. But in 1947, the high-precision experiments of physicists Polykarp Kusch and Henry Foley revealed that g is slightly larger than 2. This “anomalous” magnetic moment was explained by physicist Julian Schwinger, who showed that a value slightly larger than 2 could be obtained by including a quantum-mechanical correction in the g calculation. Schwinger’s calculation laid the foundation for the theory of quantum electrodynamics (QED). Ever since, the electron’s magnetic moment has played a key role in tests of QED and of the standard model. back

STAR Collaboration (2024_11_06), Imaging shapes of atomic nuclei in high-energy nuclear collisions, Abstract: Atomic nuclei are self-organized, many-body quantum systems bound by strong nuclear forces within femtometre-scale space. These complex systems manifest a variety of shapes1,2,3, traditionally explored using non-invasive spectroscopic techniques at low energies4,5. However, at these energies, their instantaneous shapes are obscured by long-timescale quantum fluctuations, making direct observation challenging. Here we introduce the collective-flow-assisted nuclear shape-imaging method, which images the nuclear global shape by colliding them at ultrarelativistic speeds and analysing the collective response of outgoing debris. This technique captures a collision-specific snapshot of the spatial matter distribution within the nuclei, which, through the hydrodynamic expansion, imprints patterns on the particle momentum distribution observed in detectors6,7. We benchmark this method in collisions of ground-state uranium-238 nuclei, known for their elongated, axial-symmetric shape. Our findings show a large deformation with a slight deviation from axial symmetry in the nuclear ground state, aligning broadly with previous low-energy experiments. This approach offers a new method for imaging nuclear shapes, enhances our understanding of the initial conditions in high-energy collisions and addresses the important issue of nuclear structure evolution across energy scales. back

The Man Who Fell to Earth - Wikipedia, The Man Who Fell to Earth - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Man Who Fell to Earth is a 1976 British science fantasy drama film[4] directed by Nicolas Roeg and adapted by Paul Mayersberg. Based on Walter Tevis's 1963 novel of the same name, the film follows an extraterrestrial named Thomas Jerome Newton (David Bowie) who crash-lands on Earth seeking a way to ship water to his planet, which is suffering from a severe drought, but finds himself at the mercy of human vices and corruption. It stars David Bowie, Candy Clark, Buck Henry, and Rip Torn. It was produced by Michael Deeley and Barry Spikings. [. . .] back

Toni Feder (2023_12_01_ , Precision measurements bring the search for new physics to the table , ' Practitioners of atomic, molecular, and optical (AMO) physics are increasingly applying their tools to the search for physics beyond the standard model, thanks largely to advances in precision-measurement techniques. Particle colliders have dominated the search for new physics in recent decades. But the growth in small-scale studies coincides with two realities: the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has not found hoped-for new physics and a higher-energy particle collider is likely to be far in the future.' back

Toni Feder (2025_01_01), 2025 is the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology Available , Building awareness and inspiring a future workforce are two aims of the UN-designated quantum year. [. . . ] To celebrate the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology, we present this selected collection of our coverage of quantum mechanics through the years. [. . . ] Hands-on demonstrations of quantum entanglement, role-playing diplomacy games, continental-scale shindigs, and more activities for the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology (IYQ) are coming into focus. Last June, the United Nations declared 2025 the IYQ; since then, scientists, educators, and science lovers have been buzzing with ideas for how to celebrate the past century of quantum physics and its applications and look ahead to the next one. back

William Wood (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Philosophy and Christian Theology, ' Because its twin foci are so broad, an encyclopedia entry on “Philosophy and Christian Theology” could legitimately go in many different directions. This entry has two related aims. First, the entry discusses methodological questions about how philosophy and theology should be related. Accordingly, it surveys some of the most important ways they have been related in the history of the Christian tradition (Section 1), before turning to contemporary debates about the way Anglo-American analytic philosophy of religion interacts with theology (Section 3). Second, in between these two methodological sections, the entry also discusses recent work in analytic philosophical theology (Section 2).' back

Wojciech Hubert Zurek (2008), Quantum origin of quantum jumps: breaking of unitary symmetry induced by information transfer and the transition from quantum to classical, 'Submitted on 17 Mar 2007 (v1), last revised 18 Mar 2008 (this version, v3)) Measurements transfer information about a system to the apparatus, and then further on – to observers and (often inadvertently) to the environment. I show that even imperfect copying essential in such situations restricts possible unperturbed outcomes to an orthogonal subset of all possible states of the system, thus breaking the unitary symmetry of its Hilbert space implied by the quantum superposition principle. Preferred outcome states emerge as a result. They provide framework for the “wavepacket collapse”, designating terminal points of quantum jumps, and defining the measured observable by specifying its eigenstates.' back

X. Fan et. al., Measurement of the Electron Magnetic Moment , ' The electron magnetic moment, −𝜇/𝜇𝐵=𝑔⁡/2=1.001  159 652  180 59 (13) [0.13 ppt], is determined 2.2 times more accurately than the value that stood for fourteen years. The most precisely determined property of an elementary particle tests the most precise prediction of the standard model (SM) to 1 part in 10¹². The test would improve an order of magnitude if the uncertainty from discrepant measurements of the fine structure constant 𝛼 is eliminated since the SM prediction is a function of 𝛼 . The new measurement and SM theory together predict 𝛼−1=137.035 999 166 (15) 0.11 ppb] with an uncertainty 10 times smaller than the current disagreement between measured 𝛼 values. back

Xavier Waintal (2023), The quantum house of cards, 'Abstract: Quantum computers have been proposed to solve a number of important problems such as discovering new drugs, new catalysts for fertilizer production, breaking encryption protocols, optimizing financial portfolios, or implementing new artificial intelligence applications. Yet, to date, a simple task such as multiplying 3 by 5 is beyond existing quantum hardware. This article examines the difficulties that would need to be solved for quantum computers to live up to their promises. I discuss the whole stack of technologies that has been envisioned to build a quantum computer from the top layers (the actual algorithms and associated applications) down to the very bottom ones (the quantum hardware, its control electronics, cryogeny, etc.) while not forgetting the crucial intermediate layer of quantum error correction.' back

Yaron Peleg (2025_08_08), How Israel’s self-image changed from self-reliance to aggressive militarism, ' Share article Print article When the Zionist movement began to gather pace a century ago, many Jewish supporters wanted not just to create a political state for themselves, but to initiate a cultural revolution that would forge a new kind of Jewishness. Proud, self-reliant and resilient, the “new Jew” was a reaction to centuries of bullying, culminating in the virulent antisemitism of the modern era. But, as I argue in my book, New Hebrews: Making National Culture in Zion, as Zionists set out to invent themselves anew, they also sowed the seeds of self sabotage. Early pride and defiance, paired with disregard for the native Arabs of Palestine, bred both a survival instinct and a dangerous militarism. A look back at some of the principles of the Zionist revolution in the 20th century uncovers the cultural backstory to Israel’s current situation. It shows how the same vision that built a strong nation also hardwired the divisions and antagonisms now threatening its democracy, security and place in the world. In this way, I argue the logic behind Israel’s alarming actions in Gaza, the rage with which it continues to come down on the Gazans following the October 7 attack almost two years ago, may be found in the country’s history. [. . . ] Commonly referred to in quasi-military terms as the “conquest of labour,” it romanticised agriculture and construction work as a moral and spiritual renewal. It was a rebuttal to the negative stereotype of Jews. But I believe it had a more problematic side. As Arab resistance to Zionist settlement grew, the new Jewish farmers evolved a military side as well. The inspiration for it came from two sources, from the fighting culture of local Bedouins, and from the Ukrainian Cossacks. This was an ironic twist given the violence Cossacks often directed at Jews. By 1948, both farmers and soldiers became two of Zionism’s most distinct symbols, national ideals of productivity and physical force. [. . .] Consider this: in the aftermath of the October 7 2023, attack many people in Israel referred to it as a pogrom, a word that describes the sporadic massacres of Jews in eastern Europe. Think about it. Israel, a rich and powerful country, well-connected and – until recently at least, generally well-liked – compared itself to a small, vulnerable and isolated Jewish shtetl (small settlement in eastern Europe) in a bygone world where Jews were utterly powerless. That one word, pogrom, explains it all. It wipes away 100 years of Zionist history and resurrects old Jewish grievances.' back

Zvi Bern, Lance J. Dixon & David A. Kosower (2013_05_21), Loops, Trees and the Search for New Physics, ' In recent years the three of us and our colleagues have developed a new way of analyzing particle processes that bypasses the complexity of Feynman's technique. Called the unitarity method, it amounts to a highly economical way of predicting what a subway passenger will do by realizing that the passenger's options at each decision point are actually rather limited and can be broken down into probabilities for sequences of actions. [. . . ] The unitarity approach is more than a helpful calculational trick. It suggests a radical new vision of theories of parti-cle interactions that are governed by unexpected symmetries, reflecting an underappreciated elegance of the Standard Model. Notably, it has revealed a strange twist in the decades-old effort to unite quantum theory and Einstein's general theory of relativity into a quantum theory of gravity.' back