Congrats to the Rutgers College of Engineering:
Friday, January 27, 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
John Baez
Baez is also known to science fans as the author of This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics,[5] an irregular column on the internet featuring mathematical exposition and criticism. He started This Week's Finds in 1993 for the Usenet community, and it now has a worldwide following in its new form, the blog "Azimuth". This Week's Finds anticipated the concept of a personal weblog.[citation needed] Additionally, Baez is known on the World Wide Web as the author of the crackpot index.
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[edit]Early life and education
Baez was born in San Francisco, California.
He graduated from Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey, with a Bachelor of Arts in mathematics in 1982. In 1986, he graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with a Doctor of Philosophy under the direction of Irving Segal.
[edit]Career
After a post-doctoral period at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, he has been teaching — since 1989 — at UCR.
[edit]Blog
Baez runs the blog "Azimuth," where he writes about a variety of topics ranging from This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics to the current focus, combating climate change and various other environmental issues.
[edit]Family
Singer and progressive activist Joan Baez is his cousin and her father, physicist Albert Baez, was his uncle.[6]
John Baez is married to Lisa Raphals who is a professor of Chinese and comparative literature at UCR.[7][8]
[edit]References
- Baez, John C. (ed.) (1994). Knots and quantum gravity. Oxford: Clarendon Press, an imprint of the Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-853490-6.
- Baez, John C.; Segal, & Muniain, Javier (1994). Gauge fields, knots and gravity. Singapore: World Scientific. ISBN 981-02-2034-0.
- Baez, John C.; Segal, Irving E.; and Zhou, Zhenfang (1992). Introduction to algebraic and constructive quantum field theory. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-08546-3.
- Baez, John C. (1996) Spin networks in gauge theory, Advances in Mathematics 117, 253-272
- Baez, John C. (1998) Quantum geometry & black hole entropy, w. A. Ashtekar, A. Corichi & K. Krosnov, Phys Rev. Lett. 80, 904-907.
[edit]Notes
- ^ UC Riverside, Department of Mathematics
- ^ Baez, John C. (1998) Spin foam models, Class. & Quantum Gravity 15, 1827-1858
- ^ Top Cited Articles of All Time (2004 edition) in gr-qc
- ^ John Baez Diary - January 2010, 2010-01-01
- ^ This Week's Finds
- ^ "Interview by David Morrison". Retrieved May 24, 2009.
- ^ February 17, 2007 - Lisa Raphals and I got married today! (Diary - February 2007)
- ^ Lisa Raphals (UCR faculty page)
[edit]External links
- Baez's home page at UCR's official website (ucr.edu)
- Azimuth blog by Baez
- The n-Category Café, a physics/mathematics/philosophy blog by Baez, philosopher David Corfield, and physicist Urs Schreiber, hosted at The University of Texas at Austin's official website
- nLab, a wiki-lab for collaborative original research in mathematics, physics, and philosophy; see also nLab
- "Should I be thinking about quantum gravity?", essay by Baez at The World Question Center
- Baez, John (2002), "The Octonions", Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 39: 145–205. Online HTML versions at Baez's site or see lanl.arXiv.org copy
- John C. Baez at the Mathematics Genealogy Project.
An Open Letter To My Fellow Americans
If I could recommend ONLY three things to my fellow Americans who HORRIBLY misunderstand our country (thanks to our BAD "public" "education" system) and what we are all about, I would recommend these three things, which are two books and a film:
In chronological order, to understand WHO we ARE, that is to understand OUR ancestors and WHY we are are here, I would recommend these:
In chronological order:
1) The book: Mayflower, the 2nd half of which and the important half is really about King Phillip's War, America's First War (with the greatest percentage of American deaths of all our wars), against the New England American Indians (and vice versa) in the 1670's. The first 50 years after 1620 the Pilgrims of Plymouth and the Puritans of Boston got along fine with the Indians. This is why we celebrate Thanksgiving. Beginning in the 1670's? Not so much, and this book will explain the How Not and Why Not. Read, study, and learn.
2) The book: "1776", about the first year of the US Army under General George Washington, from the Siege of Boston vs the British Navy's blockade of Boston Harbor in 1775, through the retreat to winter in Morristown, NJ, following the successful routing of the British at The Battle of Princeton in 1776.
3) The film, "1776", a VERY entertaining musical comedy about the month-long legal wrangling in Philadelphia of June of that year that would lead to the passage of the Declaration of Independence on July 2nd, and its signing 2 days later. The passage is important. It came down to one man, one vote, that man being the wimpy James Wilson. The protagonists are Franklin, Adams and Jefferson, but the antagonists Rutledge and especially Dickinson are much more interesting, yet all are good. It's a musical comedy with lots of sex references, heh, well, we're Americans. :-)
In chronological order, to understand WHO we ARE, that is to understand OUR ancestors and WHY we are are here, I would recommend these:
In chronological order:
1) The book: Mayflower, the 2nd half of which and the important half is really about King Phillip's War, America's First War (with the greatest percentage of American deaths of all our wars), against the New England American Indians (and vice versa) in the 1670's. The first 50 years after 1620 the Pilgrims of Plymouth and the Puritans of Boston got along fine with the Indians. This is why we celebrate Thanksgiving. Beginning in the 1670's? Not so much, and this book will explain the How Not and Why Not. Read, study, and learn.
Monday, January 23, 2012
The Travelling Math Midway Tour Marches On !
The travelling The Math Midway of MoMath, being America's ONLY dedicated Museum of Mathematics, in New York City and opening this year, is moving on from the New York City area, next to Dayton, Ohio. Be sure to bring the kids! Engender a love of Mathematics and science in them young and it will stay with them for life!
Here is the schedule through May of 2013:
Boonshoft Museum of Discovery, Dayton, OH
February 4 through April 29, 2012
We're excited that we'll be bringing the Math Midway to an innovative science center in western Ohio. The Math Midway will add math to the Boonshoft’s already diverse mix of physics, chemistry, ecology, and wildlife exhibits.
Maryland Science Center, Baltimore, MD
May 26 through September 3, 2012
The Math Midway will mark its return to the East Coast at the Maryland Science Center, an institution hosting many cutting-edge exhibits near Baltimore’s historic Inner Harbor.
Lawrence Hall of Science, Berkeley, CA
September 21, 2012 through January 6, 2013
The Math Midway will be returning to California in Fall, 2012 thanks to the Lawrence Hall of Science, an institution dedicated to sharing the wonder of science since 1968.
Museum of Discovery and Science, Fort Lauderdale, FL
January 26 through May 5, 2013
The Math Midway begins 2013 with a first-time appearance in Florida at the Museum of Discovery and Science, a museum with over 200 interactive science exhibits.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Yosemite National Park and the Tarantula Nebula
Two quick videos of two beautifully and seemingly non-interconnected things, except that they're both part of our Universe: a time lapse video of Yosemite National Park, and an open star cluster in the nearby Tarantula Nebula.
Time Lapse of Yosemite
Click on the link above to see a beautiful presentation of the U-Shaped valley 3 hours east by car of San Francisco that is Yosemite national Park, one of the most gorgeous places in America, and the world. Certainly the most beautiful place I have witnessed, but I haven't been to The grand canyon nor Hawaii. Most valleys in cross section would resemble the letter "V", but Yosemite's is cross would resemble a block "U". Very flat bottom, and large cliffs rising straight up from the valley floor with some of America's tallest waterfalls.
For more explanation, see Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy weblog here.
Yosemite HD from Project Yosemite on Vimeo.
TARANTULA CLUSTER
I totally LOVE this short video which zeros in on the nearby Tarantula Nebula. It begins with a large view of our galazy, then homes in. For the reason this was in the news, you can read about the details in at Live Science here.
Time Lapse of Yosemite
Click on the link above to see a beautiful presentation of the U-Shaped valley 3 hours east by car of San Francisco that is Yosemite national Park, one of the most gorgeous places in America, and the world. Certainly the most beautiful place I have witnessed, but I haven't been to The grand canyon nor Hawaii. Most valleys in cross section would resemble the letter "V", but Yosemite's is cross would resemble a block "U". Very flat bottom, and large cliffs rising straight up from the valley floor with some of America's tallest waterfalls.
For more explanation, see Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy weblog here.
Yosemite HD from Project Yosemite on Vimeo.
TARANTULA CLUSTER
I totally LOVE this short video which zeros in on the nearby Tarantula Nebula. It begins with a large view of our galazy, then homes in. For the reason this was in the news, you can read about the details in at Live Science here.
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