Mid-morning. John is here working on
reinstalling the floor under which the tub is to be placed. Then he will
install the tub plumbing once it is in position. – Amorella
Late
morning. You were missing Spooky who is hard to miss. After searching about a
half hour or so Carol found her in the laundry room, a room you had checked
five minutes before. Both cats had been hiding out because of the pounding
noises, etc. coming from the master bath. – Amorella
1023
hours. We worry more about Jadah leaving than Spook. Jadah will not wear a
collar while Spooky loves hers – she likes to jingle it. Jadah likes it too
because then she knows where the Spook is and if Spook is trying to sneak up on
her. Sneak attack is one of the games they like to play on one another; the
other is wrestling. Jadah almost always wins wrestling and can quickly pin
Spook; however if she doesn’t do it quickly Spooky uses her 16 pounds of weight
against 7-pound Jadah to drive her away. They are a constant entertainment for
us. – Thinking about this I am like an English commoner in the twenty-first
century writing a ‘Mock Diary’ after Samuel Pepys. I don’t have any historical
adventures to write about, nor servants either. This is sort of a mock diary
from an unknown Ohioan about his retired life. I read the Diary and enjoyed
Pepys’ style. I miss teaching English literature; it was one of the greatest
joys of my life as I would hope my students would remember. You can’t do better
than to live the life you love.
** **
From Wikipedia
Samuel
Pepys
23
February 1633 – 26 May 1703) was an English naval administrator and Member of
Parliament who is most famous for the diary that he kept for a decade while
still a relatively young man. Pepys had no maritime experience, but he rose to
be the Chief Secretary to the Admiralty under both King Charles II and King
James II through patronage, hard work, and his talent for administration. His
influence and reforms at the Admiralty were important in the early
professionalisation of the Royal Navy.
The detailed private diary that Pepys kept from 1660
until 1669 was first published in the 19th century and is one of the most
important primary sources for the English Restoration period. It provides a
combination of personal revelation and eyewitness accounts of great events,
such as the Great Plague of London, the Second Dutch War, and the Great Fire of
London.
Two excerpts from the Plague and
Fire:
Great
Plague
Outbreaks
of plague were not particularly unusual events in London; major epidemics had
occurred in 1592, 1603, 1625, and 1636. Furthermore, Pepys was not among the group of people who were
most at risk. He did not live in cramped housing, he did not routinely mix with
the poor, and he was not required to keep his family in London in the event of
a crisis. It was not until June 1665 that the unusual seriousness of the plague
became apparent, so Pepys's activities in the first five months of 1665 were
not significantly affected by it. Indeed, Claire Tomalin writes that "the
most notable fact about Pepys's plague year is that to him it was one of the
happiest of his life." In 1665, he worked very hard, and the outcome was
that he quadrupled his fortune. In his annual summary on 31 December, he wrote,
"I have never lived so merrily (besides that I never got so much) as I
have done this plague time". Nonetheless, Pepys was certainly concerned
about the plague. On 16 August he wrote:
But,
Lord! how sad a sight it is to see the streets empty of people, and very few
upon the 'Change. Jealous of every door that one sees shut up, lest it should
be the plague; and about us two shops in three, if not more, generally shut up.
-- Diary of
Samuel Pepys, Wednesday, 16 August 1665
He
also chewed tobacco as a protection against infection, and worried that
wig-makers might be using hair from the corpses as a raw material. Furthermore,
it was Pepys who suggested that the Navy Office should evacuate to Greenwich, although
he did offer to remain in town himself. He later took great pride in his
stoicism. Meanwhile, Elisabeth Pepys was sent to Woolwich. She did not return
to Seething Lane until January 1666, and was shocked by the sight of St Olave’s
churchyard, where 300 people had been buried.
Great
Fire of London
In
the early hours of 2 September 1666, Pepys was awakened by his servant who had
spotted a fire in the Billingsgate area. He decided that the fire was not
particularly serious and returned to bed. Shortly after waking, his servant
returned and reported that 300 houses had been destroyed and that London Bridge
was threatened. Pepys went to the Tower to get a better view. Without returning
home, he took a boat and observed the fire for over an hour. In his diary,
Pepys recorded his observations as follows:
I
down to the water-side, and there got a boat and through bridge, and there saw
a lamentable fire. Poor Michell's house, as far as the Old Swan, already burned
that way, and the fire running further, that in a very little time it got as
far as the Steeleyard, while I was there. Everybody endeavouring to remove their
goods, and flinging into the river or bringing them into lighters that layoff;
poor people staying in their houses as long as till the very fire touched them,
and then running into boats, or clambering from one pair of stairs by the
water-side to another. And among other things, the poor pigeons, I perceive,
were loth to leave their houses, but hovered about the windows and balconys
till they were, some of them burned, their wings, and fell down. Having staid,
and in an hour's time seen the fire: rage every way, and nobody, to my sight,
endeavouring to quench it, but to remove their goods, and leave all to the
fire, and having seen it get as far as the Steele-yard, and the wind mighty
high and driving it into the City; and every thing, after so long a drought,
proving combustible, even the very stones of churches, and among other things
the poor steeple by which pretty Mrs.————lives, and whereof my old
school-fellow Elborough is parson, taken fire in the very top, and there burned
till it fell down...
-- Diary of
Samuel Pepys, Sunday, 2 September 1666.
The
wind was driving the fire westward, so he ordered the boat to go to Whitehall and
became the first person to inform the king of the fire. According to his entry
of 2 September 1666, Pepys recommended to the king that homes be pulled down in
the path of the fire in order to stem its progress. Accepting this advice, the
king told him to go to Lord Mayor Thomas Bloodworth and tell him to start
pulling down houses. Pepys took a coach back as far as St Paul’s Cathedral before
setting off on foot through the burning city. He found the Lord Mayor, who
said, "Lord! what can I do? I am spent: people will not obey me. I have
been pulling down houses; but the fire overtakes us faster than we can do
it." At noon, he returned home and "had an extraordinary good dinner,
and as merry, as at this time we could be", before returning to watch the
fire in the city once more. Later, he returned to Whitehall, then met his wife
in St. James’s Park. In the evening, they watched the fire from the safety of
Bankside. Pepys writes that "it made me weep to see it". Returning
home, Pepys met his clerk Tom Hayter who had lost everything. Hearing news that
the fire was advancing, he started to pack up his possessions by moonlight.
A
cart arrived at 4 a.m. on 3 September and Pepys spent much of the day arranging
the removal of his possessions. Many of his valuables, including his diary,
were sent to a friend from the Navy Office at Bethnal Green. At night, he
"fed upon the remains of yesterday's dinner, having no fire nor dishes,
nor any opportunity of dressing any thing." The next day, Pepys continued
to arrange the removal of his possessions. By then, he believed that Seething
Lane was in grave danger, so he suggested calling men from Deptford to help
pull down houses and defend the king's property. He described the chaos in the
city and his curious attempt at saving his own goods:
Sir W.
Pen and I to Tower-streete, and there met the fire burning three or four doors
beyond Mr. Howell's, whose goods, poor man, his trayes, and dishes, shovells,
&c., were flung all along Tower-street in the kennels, and people working
therewith from one end to the other; the fire coming on in that narrow streete,
on both sides, with infinite fury. Sir W. Batten not knowing how to remove his
wine, did dig a pit in the garden, and laid it in there; and I took the
opportunity of laying all the papers of my office that I could not otherwise
dispose of. And in the evening Sir W. Pen and I did dig another, and put our
wine in it; and I my Parmazan cheese, as well as my wine and some other things.
-- Diary of
Samuel Pepys, Tuesday, 4 September 1666.
Pepys had taken to sleeping on
his office floor; on Wednesday, 5 September, he was awakened by his wife at 2
a.m. She told him that the fire had almost reached All Hallows-by-the-Tower and
that it was at the foot of Seething Lane. He decided to send her and his gold –
about £2,350 – to Woolwich. In the following days, Pepys witnessed looting,
disorder, and disruption. On 7 September, he went to Paul's Wharf and saw the
ruins of St Paul's Cathedral, of his old school, of his father's house, and of
the house in which he had had his stone removed. Despite all this destruction,
Pepys's house, office, and diary were saved.
Selected and edited from Wikipedia – Samuel Pepys
** **
Later morning. Joe arrived as did another
plumber, Ray. They were sent two different types of faucets rather than the
same kind. One has already been installed and you and Carol were asked (when
they saw the problem) so you chose A rather than B. It turns out you ordered B
but as A is already installed they said it was okay to go with A as they would
have a problem returning it. You both like the A better so that is what it will
be because they installed it without knowing better. Basically, it is not a
change order that would cost you. – Amorella
1133
hours. That’s how I have it in my head; I hope that’s right. The water is back
on and Carol will soon be leaving for her noon hair appointment. It certainly
is busy around here. They are doing a lot of work. I can’t imagine someone
doing this as a home project. It would seemingly never get done.
Your writing project has been going on for
more than a decade and a half and isn’t done either. – Amorella
1139
hours. Good retort, Amorella. Good humor.
1225
hours. I was reading a BBC Science piece by Paul Rincon and find it interesting
that it focuses on one and two dimension in the real world no less. It is
difficult for me to imagine a one or two dimensional thread in flat forms of
matter. I didn’t know there were flat forms of matter. Life is always
interesting.
** **
BBC - Science & Environment
Strange matter wins physics Nobel
By Paul
Rincon
Science editor, BBC News website
The 2016 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to three British-born
scientists for discoveries about strange forms of matter.
David Thouless, Duncan Haldane and Michael Kosterlitz will share
the 8m kronor (£727,000) prize. Their work could result in improved materials
for electronics and is already informing one approach to super-fast computing. They
were named at a press conference in Sweden. The winners join a prestigious list
of 200 other Physics laureates recognised since 1901.The Nobel Committee said
the trio's discoveries had "opened the door on an unknown world".
Old work, new uses
When matter is in extreme conditions, such as when it's very
cold or flat, scientists start to see unusual behaviour from the atoms. These phenomena complement the familiar phases of matter, namely
when things change from solid to liquid to gas. Prof Haldane commented: "I
was very surprised and very gratified."
"The work was a long time ago but it's only now that a lot
of tremendous new discoveries are based on this original work, and have
extended it."
All three researchers used maths to explain strange physical
effects in rare states of matter, such as superconductors, superfluids and thin
magnetic films. Kosterlitz and Thouless focused on phenomena that arise in
flat forms of matter - on surfaces or inside extremely thin layers that can be
considered two-dimensional. This contrasts with the three dimensions (length,
width and height) with which we usually describe reality. Haldane also studied
matter that forms threads so thin they can be considered one-dimensional.
Much of the work involves a field of maths known as topology, which describes properties of matter at large and
small scales. Acting chairman of the Nobel committee, Prof Nils Mårtensson,
commented: "Today's advanced technology - take for instance our computers
- relies on our ability to understand and control the properties of the
materials involved. "And this year's Nobel laureates in their theoretical
work discovered a set of totally unexpected regularities in the behaviour of
matter, which can be described in terms of an established mathematical concept
- namely, that of topology. "This has paved the way for designing new
materials with novel properties and there is great hope that this will be
important for many future technologies."
Phase transitions occur when matter changes from one phase to
another, such as when ice melts and becomes water. Kosterlitz and Thouless
described a type of phase transition in a thin layer of very cold matter. In
the cold, vortices form (diagram) as tight pairs, but at higher temperatures,
as the phase transition occurs, they separate and "sail" off in
different directions.
One aspect of the work, known as the Quantum Hall effect, has
led to a real-world application. Prof Nigel Cooper, from the University of
Cambridge, told BBC News: "The Quantum Hall effect is used in metrology to
give a precise definition of the Ohm in resistance.
Just as a kilogram or a metre requires an exact definition, the
maths behind today's Nobel prize has helped precisely describe the unit of
electrical resistance - how a device or material reduces the electrical
conductance flowing through it.
As an application, he said, "it's not in your iPhone, but
it's used in government labs around the world."
"There are many aspects of topology people point to that
could be relevant in future, but these are not things that are working
today."
For instance, Prof Cooper explained, scientists are exploring
whether topological concepts could be used in "robust quantum devices
which can do things that classical computers or classical circuit elements are
unable to do".
Microsoft's Station Q project is taking just such an approach to
the development of powerful quantum computers.
"The topological aspects can give the quantum information a
robustness against being destroyed by the usual noisy environment," said
Prof Cooper. In addition, he said, topological metals could be used in the
manufacture of improved conductors or transistors.
Selected and edited from --http://www.bbc dot com/news/science-environment-37486373
[ My underlining above.]
** **
Transitions is something of your liking boy,
only your focus is on transition to conscious life from the unconscious life
and the further transition of unconscious life into and through consciousness
of being physically dead and consciously alive at the same time. Do you disagree?
– Amorella
1235
hours. No. That is concise but it is difficult to gain much if any focus on
transitions that border on the metaphysics. I think of the transitions between
different divisions of physics.
** **
What are the major divisions and subdivisions
of physics?
QUICK ANSWER
There
are two major divisions of physics: classical and modern. Within classical
physics, the major subdivisions are mechanics, thermodynamics, acoustics,
optics, electricity and magnetism. The subdivisions of modern physics consist
of chaos theory, relativity, string theory, cryogenics, crystallography and
nanotechnology. The field also includes quantum-level, atomic, molecular,
chemical, computational, high-energy, high-pressure and laser physics.
FULL ANSWER
Classical physics is often described as the study of physics on
the macroscopic level, meaning questions are generally investigated without the
aid of highly technological equipment, such as electron microscopes. The
inception of classical physics dates back to the late 1500s. Mechanics is the
oldest subdivision of classical physics. The field is inspired by the work of
Isaac Newton.
The
study of modern physics takes place at the sub-microscopic level. This division
of physics investigates the behavior of very small particles, such as electrons
and atoms. Modern physics developed in the early 1900s when physicists began to
realize that the laws of classical physics did not always hold true for
sub-microscopic particles. Notable advances in modern physics include
Einstein's theories of relativity and Heisenberg's principle of indeterminacy.
Because even the world's most advanced microscopes cannot make sub-microscopic
particles visible, expensive tools and equipment, such as particle
accelerators, are required to explore the world at this level.
Selected
and edited from -- https://www.reference dot com/science/major-divisions-subdivisions-physics-23ca799d974e9099#
** **
1244
hours. Then I think about transitions that border on metaphysics.
1331
hours. After raking up dead grass clumps (Carol was trimming bushes and now
watering) I realize that I can still use my experiences to discover insights
into the borders of metaphysics and if reasonable go with them, not science in
the usual sense but a human observation is still a human observation. The
spiritual and transcendental have had a life long influence on my inner self
which shows subtlety in how others see me and how I see them; this is a social
reality that is important to each of us, each person, her or his family,
friends and enemies. The influence is real even if the metaphysical aspect is
not. The love of friends and family is real, science not withstanding. I can
live with this because the part as well as the whole if understood reality is
who I am; and likewise, who we all are in our basic nature. So, on to the
borders of metaphysics – the present ever within – the soul filled with
heartanmind, ever in place, ever present. (1358)
1518
hours. Reading over this I shouldn’t have thought, “I can use my experiences to
discover insights into the borders of metaphysics”. I don’t even like “I can
try to use”, The concept is arrogant.
You are arrogant. What you wrote is
what you thought. – Amorella
1524
hours. Well, shit.
Well put. Post. – Amorella
1526
hours. Probably my last words.
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