Eideard

An odd number of pandas

Ron Gordon would like you to take a moment or three to think about what an odd day Saturday was.

Why? Because 7/9/11 is one of only six dates this century that features three consecutive odd numbers. Next up, 9/11/13.

Gordon, a retired teacher from Redwood City, Calif., has set up a website to celebrate “Odd Day,” and offers some ways to celebrate: Do odds ‘n ends, root for the odds-on-favorite or watch the “Odd Couple.”

Gordon has been fascinated with curious dates since some 30 years ago when he noticed the upcoming date 9/9/81 while writing a check. That, Gordon saw, was a Square Root Day – one in which the day and the month are the same number and, when multiplied, yield the year as it’s expressed in one or two digits.

It led Gordon to begin thinking about Odd Days, which he has continued to do through the years…

After 9/11/13, the next Odd Day will be 11/13/15 – and that will be it until next century.

Though we still have 4/4/16 to look forward to – the next Square Root Day.

I love this. I’m marking my online calendar right now.

A belief that heaven or an afterlife awaits us is a “fairy story” for people afraid of death, Stephen Hawking has said.

In a dismissal that underlines his firm rejection of religious comforts, Britain’s most eminent scientist said there was nothing beyond the moment when the brain flickers for the final time.

Hawking, who was diagnosed with motor neurone disease at the age of 21, shares his thoughts on death, human purpose and our chance existence in an exclusive interview with the Guardian…

The incurable illness was expected to kill Hawking within a few years of its symptoms arising, an outlook that turned the young scientist to Wagner, but ultimately led him to enjoy life more, he has said, despite the cloud hanging over his future.

“I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I’m not afraid of death, but I’m in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first,” he said.

“I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark,” he added.

Hawking’s latest comments go beyond those laid out in his 2010 book, The Grand Design, in which he asserted that there is no need for a creator to explain the existence of the universe…

The physicist’s remarks draw a stark line between the use of God as a metaphor and the belief in an omniscient creator whose hands guide the workings of the cosmos…

In the interview, Hawking rejected the notion of life beyond death and emphasised the need to fulfil our potential on Earth by making good use of our lives. In answer to a question on how we should live, he said, simply: “We should seek the greatest value of our action.”

In answering another, he wrote of the beauty of science, such as the exquisite double helix of DNA in biology, or the fundamental equations of physics…

He argues that tiny quantum fluctuations in the very early universe became the seeds from which galaxies, stars, and ultimately human life emerged. “Science predicts that many different kinds of universe will be spontaneously created out of nothing. It is a matter of chance which we are in,” he said.

Hawking’s writings are brilliant and inspiring. In fact, like much of the work described by John Brockman as “The third culture – those scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, through their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectual in rendering visible the deeper meanings of our lives, redefining who and what we are.”

Most of the authors thought their answers would be proven within 50 years.

We all know the problem: given half a chance, headphone cords, electric flex and the like will tie themselves into a hopelessly tangled knot. How do they do it – and what can we do to prevent it?

This week sees the launch of the first-ever mass experiment aimed at untangling the science behind this annoying everyday phenomenon.

Schools from around the country are being invited to take part in The Great British Knot Experiment, collecting data that an Aston University scientist believes could lead to a simple remedy to the problem – and possibly much more.

Over the years, a host of methods have been put forward for preventing tangling, from carefully coiling rope to the use of special reels and anti-knotting gadgets.

Robert Matthews, Visiting Reader in Science at Aston, has developed a mathematical theory which suggests the risk of knots forming can be dramatically reduced much more easily – and without any gizmos. According to the “Loop Conjecture”, all that’s required is that the loose ends of cord, flex etc be clipped together, forming a simple loop. Rough estimates based on the mathematics of so-called “Self Avoiding Walks” suggest looping could produce up to a ten-fold reduction in the risk of knots forming in headphone flex…

“The results will do more than help understand this everyday problem, though”, says Matthews. “Despite its apparently trivial nature, the phenomenon of spontaneous knotting is of great significance in other areas, including polymer chemistry and molecular biology”.

For more information on The Great British Knot Experiment, visit www.thegreatbritishknotexperiment.net.

My kind of experiment.

America’s future math teachers, on average, earned a C on a new test comparing their skills with their counterparts in 15 other countries, significantly outscoring college students in the Philippines and Chile but placing far below those in educationally advanced nations like Singapore and Taiwan.

The researchers who led the math study in this country, to be released in Washington on Thursday, judged the results acceptable if not encouraging for America’s future elementary teachers. But they called them disturbing for American students heading to careers in middle schools, who were outscored by students in Germany, Poland, the Russian Federation, Singapore, Switzerland and Taiwan…

“The study reveals that America’s middle school mathematics teacher preparation is not up to the task,” said William H. Schmidt, the Michigan State University professor who was its lead author. To improve its competitiveness, Dr. Schmidt said, the nation should recruit stronger candidates into careers teaching math and require them to take more advanced courses…

“There are so many people who bash our teachers’ math knowledge that to be honest these results are better than what a lot of people might expect,” said Hank Kepner, professor of mathematics education at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, who is president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. “We show up pretty well here, right in the middle of the pack.”

Sorry, folks; but, I can’t get excited about “middle of the pack”.

We have lost too much to be happy with half-measures.

Parental influence and access to mathematics courses are likely to guide students to careers in science, technology, engineering, mathematics or medicine (STEMM), according to research from Michigan State University.

The findings of Jon Miller, MSU Hannah Professor of Integrative Studies, and colleagues were presented at a symposium titled “Tomorrow’s Scientists and Engineers” at this year’s meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science…

“Failure to build and maintain a competitive scientific work force in the decades ahead,” Miller said, “will inevitably lead to a decline in the American standard of living.”

Miller used data from the Longitudinal Study of American Youth, which kept track of nearly 6,000 students from middle school through college, attempting to determine what led them to or guided them away from STEMM careers.

According to Miller, “The pathway to a STEMM career begins at home (.pdf).” He said this is especially true in families in which children were strongly encouraged to go to college.

“Only four percent of students who experienced low parent encouragement to attend college planned to enter a postsecondary program and major in a STEMM field,” he said. “This compares to 41 percent of students whose parents strongly encouraged college attendance…”

The research also reinforced the role mathematics plays in the pursuit of a STEMM career.

“Mathematics is a primary gateway to a STEMM career,” Miller said, “beginning with algebra track placement in grades seven and eight, and continuing through high school and college calculus courses.”

Makes sense to me. Reflecting on the article, I can still hear my father encouraging me to go to night school to study engineering even I had to start work at 17 as an apprentice machinist to contribute to the family income.

For a kid growing up in the downhill end of a New England factory town, I think I received solid support for STEMM.

Thousands of people have signed a Downing Street petition calling for a posthumous government apology to World War II code breaker Alan Turing…

In 1952 Turing was prosecuted under the gross indecency act after admitting to a sexual relationship with a man. Two years later he killed himself.

The petition was the idea of computer scientist John Graham-Cumming. He is seeking an apology for the way the young mathematician was treated after his conviction. He has also written to the Queen to ask for a posthumous knighthood to be awarded to the British mathematician.

Alan Turing was given experimental chemical castration as a “treatment” and his security privileges were removed, meaning he could not continue work for the UK Government Communications Headquarters.

“This added insult and humiliation ultimately drove him to suicide,” said gay-rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, who also backs the campaign. “With Turing’s death, Britain and the world lost one of its finest intellectual minds. A government apology and posthumous pardon are long overdue.”

No one expects bumbling Brown to follow the thoughtful requests of folk – ranging from geeks to civil libertarians – for an apology. He doesn’t seem to get the quality of humanity that distinguishes genuine political leaders. Still, the petition campaign has managed official status on the Downing Street website and the Blimps can’t avoid seeing what people feel on the issue.

Hopefully, we can move a few more people of conscience to act. You can sign here.

UPDATE: PM Gordon Brown has apologized on behalf of the British government.