Sim Matrix

Ever played the sims?  Mathematical knowledge is unlike any other knowledge, its truths are objective not subjective and independent of human bias. Maths appears to be an underlying level to the universe that determines it's rules and laws. But how and why are we able to access this immaterial level to reality?

 

One possibility is that we live in a computer simulation based on the laws of mathematics not actually in what we perceive to be the real world.  According to this theory, some highly advanced computer programmer has devised this simulation, and we are unknowingly part of it. Thus when we discover a mathematical truth, we simply discover aspects of the code being used.

 

As strange as it may sound, we may in fact be more likely to be in such a simulation than not. If such complex simulations are possible, then eventually people will create them and presumably many of them. If this is so, in time there will be many more simulated worlds than non-simulated ones, so statistically we are more likely to be living in a simulated world than the real one.

 

Are we ready to take the red pill and see how deep the rabbit hole goes?

 

 

In a recent paper, Constraints on the Universe as a Numerical Simulation, the physicists Silas R. Beane, Zohreh Davoudi and Martin J. Savage outline a possible method for detecting if our world is actually a computer simulation. Physicists have been creating their own computer simulations for years, on a tiny scale. They use a three-dimensional grid to model a minute chunk of the universe, then they run the program to see what happens. This way, they have been able to simulate the motion and collisions of elementary atomic particles.

 

But these computer simulations generate slight but distinctive anomalies. Could we be able to detect these same distinctive anomalies in the actual universe? In their paper, they suggest that a closer look at cosmic rays, those high-energy particles coming to Earth's atmosphere from outside the solar system, may reveal similar asymmetries.  If so, this would indicate that we may ourselves be in someone else's computer simulation.  But whose?

Do you think that's oxygen you're breathing?

Beer Maths

 

Rock, Paper, Scissors

 

Rock, Paper, Scissors, it's played around the world and in more recent years the game has developed it's own official, professional circuit.

The game dates back to the Chinese Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD) and was called Shoushiling (translates as hand command).  The original game consisted of Snake, Centipede & Frog, where the snake feared the poisonous centipede, the centipede feared the frog, and the frog feared the snake.


When the game reached Japan the hand sign for centipede was misinterpreted as slug or snail.  By the 17th century the hand gestures had changed to Stone, Scissors, Cloth in China (& its neighbour Korea) and to Stone, Scissors, Paper in Japan.  By the early 1920's the game had spread from Japan to Europe where it became widely popular but didn't seem to reach America until the 1930's. Some time through the 20th century the term rock replaced stone.

 

Last year researchers at the University of Tokyo developed a robot that has the capacity to beat any human challenger 100% of the time.  The robot is essentially, a camera-connected mechanical hand, driven by a supercomputer that knows how to cheat so well it is physically incapable of losing at the game.  The robot reads the shape of its human challengers hand faster than the human eye can, then translates that reading into its own pre-emptive response.

 

 

Aside from potentially losing to cheating fembots, the problem with Rock Paper Scissors is that three hand gestures give only 9 possible outcomes and a 33.33% chance of a tie.  A growingly popular variation Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock, adds a couple of extra hand gestures to help remedy this.  The rules of engagement are: Scissors cuts paper; Paper covers rock; Rock crushes lizard; Lizard poisons Spock; Spock smashes scissors; Scissors decapitates lizard; Lizard eats paper; Paper disproves Spock; Spock vaporises rock; Rock crushes scissors.

The addition of the extra two options gives 25 possible outcome combinations and lowers the chance of a tie to 20%.
 

But when you are trying to make a serious decisions 20% chance of a tie is still far to great.  Again the solution is to add more gestures.  Fortunately someone by the name of David Lovelace has already developed the expanded solution.  Lovelace has devised a 25 gesture game, he seems to have renamed Spock to Alien (presumably to avoid and copyright trouble) and has reverted the Lizard to Snake.

Each gesture beats out twelve gestures, and is beaten by the remaining twelve, resulting in 300 possible outcomes and only a 4% chance of a tie.

But in the age of extreme sports this is just still not enough.  What's needed is extreme rock paper scissors and fortunately Lovelace delivers again. Extreme Rock Paper Scissors consists of 101 gesture many of which are so extreme they require two hands to form.

The game is Rock, Death, Wall, Sun, Camera, Fire, Chainsaw, School, Scissors, Poison, Cage, Axe, Peace, Computer, Castle, Snake, Blood, Porcupine, Vulture, Monkey, King, Queen, Prince, Princess, Police, Woman, Baby, man, Home, Train, Car, Noise, Bicycle, Tree, Turnip, Duck, Wolf, Cat, Bird, Fish, Spider, Cockroach, Brain, Community, Cross, Money, Vampire, Sponge, Church, Butter, Book, Paper, Cloud, Airplane, Moon, Grass, Film, Toilet, Air, Planet, Guitar, Bowl, Cup, Beer, Rain, Water, TV, Rainbow, UFO, Alien, Prayer, Mountain, Satan, Dragon, Diamond, Platinum, Gold, Devil, Fence, Game, Maths, Robot, Heart, Electricity, Lightning, Medusa, Power, Laser, Nuke, Sky, Tank, Helicopter, Dynamite, Tornado, Quicksand, Pit, Chain, Gun, Law, Whip, Sword.

Each gesture beats fifty gestures and is beaten by the remaining fifty gestures. The 101 gestures results in 5,050 outcomes with only a 0.99% chance of a tie! Follow this link here to open an interactive chart showing what beats what or follow this link here for a printable friendly list describing the gestures and their descriptive spoken outcomes such as "Scissors Stabs Brain", "Robot Hurls Rock" and "Rainbow Irritates Satan".  Follow this link here and you can purchase David Lovelaces RPS-101 guidebook describing all gestures and their verbal descriptions.

 

Zenzizenzizenzic

No nothing to do with extreme Zen meditaton, back in the 16th century mathmatical number powers were written out in words rather than as superscripted numbers.  Zenzizenzizenzic is the eighth power of a number.  The  term was suggested by Robert Recorde, a writer of popular mathematics textbooks, in his 1557 work The Whetstone of Witte.  Although, being Welsh, his spelling of zenzizenzizenzic was zenzizenzizenzike and wrote in his book that it  "doeth represent the square of squares squaredly".

 

 

Dodging Bullets

In theory any moving object can be avoided given the right time frame.  Now assuming we don't have super speed, what's the minimum distance needed to successfully dodge a bullet?  We're also going to assume we move the right way not the wrong way on reflex.

 

Here's the maths:

Average human reaction time is 0.19 of a second, for visual stimulus.  So yeah, with this theory you have to actually see the gun fire.

Activation of muscle fibre averages at 0.008333 of a second for humans, so the total reflex time is of 0.198333 of a second.  Let's round that up to a tidy 0.2 of a second.
The bullet speed of a 9mm pistol is 340m/s.  .2 of 340m gives a 68m minimum distance to dodge a 9mm pistol bullet.

 

Alternatively, given that distance and pistol accuracy, you may be better of just standing sideways, sucking in your gut and hoping for the best.

 

 

Now, here's the distances of some other firearms to try not to get shot with:

.22 pistol/rifle fires at 290m/s giving a 58m minimum dodge distance.
Magnum fires at 460m/s giving a 92m minimum dodge distance.
The average assault rifle fires at 920m/s giving a 184m minimum dodge distance.

 

Well there's the mathematics for the theory, good luck trying that out in the field.

 

 

Archimedes Lever

Archimedes was a hack.

He's fameous for saying: "Give me a place to stand on, and I can move the earth." Turns out no one would notice.

For a male adult to move the earth the fulcrum would need to be placed one kilometer from where it makes contact with the earth (at the south pole). The lever it's self would be six and a half billion light years long. Based on average male height, Archimedes would move his end approximately one point six meters (1.6m) which would translate to the earth being moved a distance less than the diameter of a proton.  What he didn't specify is that he also needs an equally immovable fulcrum and a lever of unbreakable material that has absoloutely no flex aross it's six hundred billion lightyear length.

I would wager that I could get a better result bastardising Newtons third law by moving every person on earth to the same landmass and having them to all jump at once.  While it would be a logistical nightmare, it's actually much more plausable than the fantastical notions of manufacturing an intergalactic sized phallic device of Archimedes.

Someone has actualy already figured out all the maths regarding this possibility. Lets see if I win my bet: Aproximatly 7 billion people with average weight of 50 kg (counting kids, midgets, hobbits etc); Jumping about one foot high.  You get the result from the push off part of the jump rather than the landing (which makes sense if you stop to think about what's happening) and the Earth would move about a hundredth of the radius of a hydrogen atom.

The hydrogen atom is aproximately 100,000 times larger than the proton. That means that the jumping method moves the earth around 1000 times more than the intergalactic lever.  So I win the bet!

Quatopygia

This year instead of quoting the Urban Dictionary, I'm going to go old school Oxford and post uncommon words I've come across. To start with:
Quatopygia

The enticing, shaking movement of a persons buttocks that occurs while walking. Also an algebraic equation or function of the fourth degree.

Turns out both definitions consolidate better than expected:

See.