Feynman Day At The Bloomsbury

Last Saturday, I went to ‘A Day Celebrating Richard Feynman’ held at the Bloomsbury Theatre in London.

Feynman is well-known to physicists the world over (he won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1965) but also much more widely through his books (such as ‘Surely You’re Joking Mr Feynman?’) as well as through his role on the Commission into the Challenger disaster. It was the 95th anniversary of his birth.

I was fortunate enough to meet Feynman in person as I co-organised the last conference he went to (held at Wangerooge, an island off the coast of North Germany) so I was very interested to join in the celebration! I went along with a friend, Ron Donaldson, who is a consultant in creativity and innovation (hence the interest in Feynman). The full event spanned the afternoon and evening – we attended just the afternoon session (for travel reasons, we both live outside London).

The Bloomsbury is a small but quite intimate theatre, well suited to this sort of event. The afternoon session was split into two one-hour parts; the first was technical and the second oriented around the videos made about him.

The first talk was by John Butterworth, Professor of Physics at nearby UCL. It focused on what a Feynman Diagram is and how the idea is incredibly useful in figuring out the complicated interactions of fundamental particles, including the recently discovered Higgs particle.

I was familiar with this material as I’d previously worked in this area (when an academic) and it was interesting to see how he went about his explanations (of some quite complicated physics) in the relatively short space of time allowed, something that is always tricky. There was a good selection of questions afterwards so it obviously hit the mark!

The second part centred on some captivating interviews with the producers Christopher Sykes and Christopher Riley.

Christopher Sykes is a TV documentary producer who made three very well-known programs with and about Feynman (he’s done loads of other interesting work as well, including contributing to the fascinating Web of Stories video collection). Christopher Riley produced the latest documentary on Feynman, The Fantastic Mr Feynman, which was aired on BBC2 last Sunday. Robin Ince handled the interviewing well, using a light touch and encouraging some really interesting insights from both speakers.

Talking about his well-known video work with Feynman in the ‘80s, some of the stories that Sykes told that particularly caught my attention were (I’m going on memory here):

1. Feynman and Dyson

The idea for the series of interviews with Feynman came about as a bit of an accident. Freeman Dyson, another celebrated physicist, had written a well-received book ‘Disturbing The Universe’ (well worth a read by the way) and Sykes thought that this might be a good basis for a programme. However in discussions about this, Dyson strongly recommended interviewing Feynman instead! This was along the lines of ‘Feynman is so special, capturing anything about him is incredibly important’. Not a ‘good thing to do’, important! This response obviously tells you quite alot about Dyson himself as well as his high respect and admiration for Feynman. He’s written a perceptive review of a couple of recent books on Feynman here.

2. Talking From The Chair

It says alot about Feynman’s charisma and presence that he can hold your attention whilst just sitting in a chair and talking. No glitz or props at all! Here’s an example in case you’ve not seen any of the videos (produced by Sykes in the ’80s):

This particular video is interesting in it’s own special way as it gives such a brilliant example of a productive and imaginative conversation. It starts from the question of how can you understand the feeling you get when you move two magnets together i.e. the sense of repulsion or attraction.

In the video, there’s some very reasonable confusion at the start, and most non-scientists would identify with the questions that Sykes asks. The key point comes when Sykes says ‘I must say I think that’s a perfectly reasonable question’ and Feynman agrees with him (‘an excellent question’) and then goes off on a fascinating discussion of the role and limitations of the question “Why?”. The main point is that you can only explain something in terms of concepts that the other person understands and is used to. However, talking around this point and elucidating it in different ways and guises is incredibly illuminating. The clip also gives a glimpse of Feynman’s inimitable personality as well as his determination (and ability) to make things exceptionally clear.

3. Buffoon and Genius

Feynman has a great reputation as a showman, and this sometimes leads to criticisms. However Sykes offered the suggestion that this was a method that Feynman used to handle the fact that he was so different from other people but still needed to get on with and communicate with them. A tantalising insight.

4. Feynman’s Problem Solving Algorithm

• Write down the problem.
• Think very hard.
• Write down the answer.

Unfortunately this doesn’t have general applicability, especially to mere mortals!

5. Reputation as a Womaniser

Feynman has a (somewhat vague) reputation as a womaniser, as well as perhaps giving a rather macho view of women. Sykes strongly questioned this viewpoint and was curious where it originated from as he’d never come across any solid facts to support it.

On this theme, when I was a postdoc at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, I’m sure I remember seeing a poster for some talks at Caltech where one of the speakers was jokily mentioned as Fine Dickman!

Anyway, maybe this was all part of the deliberate smoke-and-mirrors act, perpetuated by Feynman as well as others?

6. Death

Feynman died of cancer in February 1988 and Sykes spent time with him during the terminal stages. One of the delicate issues that cropped up was whether they could or should discuss his views on dying and death. In the end he decided to bring it up and after thinking about it, Feynman decided it was best not to talk about it.

This is a rather poignant topic. When I invited Feynman to a specialist workshop I was organising (I’d heard through the grapevine that he’d been working on the subject area), I wasn’t aware of his illness. To our surprise and delight, he accepted and the meeting was held in September 1987. Together with a colleague, we transcribed his talk. Afterwards, via his secretary, Helen Tuck, he complimented us on our write-up. She also told us that he’d reviewed the paper from his hospital bed, which naturally came as quite a shock.

Feynman at the workshop held in Wangerooge, Germany in 1987. He’s in the middle, just to the right.

7. Living Life

It was impressive that Sykes and Riley both had the strong view that Feynman communicated and encouraged an irrepressible enthusiasm for life, as, for example, typified in this quote:

“Fall in love with some activity, and do it! Nobody ever figures out what life is all about, and it doesn’t matter. Explore the world. Nearly everything is really interesting if you go into it deeply enough. Work as hard and as much as you want to on the things you like to do the best. Don’t think about what you want to be, but what you want to do. Keep up some kind of a minimum with other things so that society doesn’t stop you from doing anything at all.” – Richard P. Feynman

Something for us all to think about…

Top picture credit: here.

It’s All In The Way You Move

I’ve suffered from insomnia over the last ten years and, as I’ve not found any simple solution to this, I decided to read up on it. One of the standard things they all emphasise is the need to keep a ‘sleep diary’ so that there is an initial assessment of the condition. Then, after carrying out the various recommendations, you can monitor progress against this baseline. For example, it’s common to make progress and then suffer a temporary relapse (so having the data behind this will be reassuring).

Unfortunately I found this quite hard to do in a reliable manner – I even kept a notebook on my bedside table to jot down the times I woke. Having some real data is obviously important but I found the overall process awkward.

So I was quite amazed when I came across an iPhone app, Sleep Cycle, that automatically monitors your sleep by sensing your body movements (see picture below). It can also act as an alarm to wake you up during your lightest sleep phase (which is the best time).

A really innovative use of modern technology! It’s also incredibly cheap (UK 69p).

From their site:

“This isn’t really something new. These so called bio-alarm clocks have been around for years and work very well, but they usually come with a hefty $200 price tag. I realized that the iPhone has all the components needed, and decided to make an alarm clock that works exactly the same, but sell it for a dollar or two instead.” Maciek Drejak, the programmer behind the application, says.

The only problem I can imagine is that you knock the iPhone off the bed and damage it (that might easily keep me awake…) – see picture below. Anyway, it’s worth a cautious try just to see what I can learn.

There’s a recent review of different sleep monitoring apps here (Android and iOS) and a detailed review of the Sleep Cycle app can be found here.

Coursera Courses

I noticed that there are some very interesting (free) courses provided by (US-based online university) Coursera:

We are a social entrepreneurship company that partners with the top universities in the world to offer courses online for anyone to take, for free. We envision a future where the top universities are educating not only thousands of students, but millions. Our technology enables the best professors to teach tens or hundreds of thousands of students.

From BBC News:

Online universities have become increasingly high-profile – with the California-based Coursera one of the emerging major players.

Coursera, backed by venture capital, offers a platform for universities to deliver courses on the internet, currently without any charge to the student.

In its first term it is offering more than 200 courses.

I’m thinking of signing up for the ‘Model Thinking‘ course given by Scott Page:

I start with models of tipping points. I move on to cover models explain the wisdom of crowds, models that show why some countries are rich and some are poor, and models that help unpack the strategic decisions of firm and politicians. The models covered in this class provide a foundation for future social science classes, whether they be in economics, political science, business, or sociology….

For each model, I present a short, easily digestible overview lecture. Then, I’ll dig deeper. I’ll go into the technical details of the model. Those technical lectures won’t require calculus but be prepared for some algebra. For all the lectures, I’ll offer some questions and we’ll have quizzes and even a final exam. If you decide to do the deep dive, and take all the quizzes and the exam, you’ll receive a certificate of completion. If you just decide to follow along for the introductory lectures to gain some exposure that’s fine too. It’s all free. And it’s all here to help make you a better thinker!

I’ve done alot of modelling in my time, mainly in the physical sciences. It would be interesting to learn how modern modelling methods are used in wider (and much more complex) situations – anything involving people!

Do You Know How Your Brain Works?

Brain Facts – A Primer On The Brain And Nervous System

The free 96 page book (pdf download) is available here.

From the Preface:

Over the past two decades, scientific knowledge about the structure and function of the brain and nervous system and understanding of brain-based disorders have increased exponentially. Neuroscientists are using remarkable new tools and technologies to learn how the brain controls and responds to the body, drives behavior, and forms the foundation for the mind. Research is also essential for the development of therapies for more than 1,000 nervous system disorders that affect more than 1 billion people worldwide.

As these strides occur, it is crucial that scientists communicate with the general public, helping students, teacher, parents, medical caregivers, policymakers, and others stay informed of developments in neuroscience. In particular, students — the scientists, policymakers and scientifically literate citizens of the future — need access to clear, easy-to-use information on this important topic.

And from the Introduction:

THE HUMAN BRAIN — a spongy, three- pound mass of tissue — is the most complex living structure in the universe. With the capacity to create a network of connections that far surpasses any social network and stores more information than a supercomputer, the brain has enabled humans to achieve breathtaking milestones — walking on the moon, mapping the human genome, and composing masterpieces of literature, art, and music. What’s more, scientists still have not uncovered the extent of what the brain can do. This single organ controls every aspect of our body, ranging from heart rate and sexual activity to emotion, learning, and memory. The brain controls the immune system’s response to disease, and determines, in part, how well people respond to medical treatments. Ultimately, it shapes our thoughts, hopes, dreams, and imaginations. It is the ability of the brain to perform all of these functions that makes us human.

Why does this subject area interest me particularly?

One reason is that neuroscience is becomingly increasingly important on a practical level – I’m reading more and more about ‘neuroscience studies show/suggest that…’ a whole host of things, many of which have direct applications to business.

The other reason is a bit more personal.

When I finished my undergraduate degree in theoretical physics, the Head of Department recommended I get into the (slowly emerging) field of neuroscience rather than particle physics. I ignored this advice – I couldn’t see much connection between what I’d been doing and what he suggested and particle physics sounded infinitely more sexy and interesting!

I then successfully carried out research in particle physics for about 15 years (before moving to the commercial sector) but always wondered if he was right! There’s obviously no simple yes/no but what is now ‘neuroscience’ would certainly (in hindsight) have been a tantalising choice.

Knowledge Can Be Fragile

“I don’t know what’s the matter with people: they don’t learn by understanding; they learn by some other way – by rote, or something. Their knowledge is so fragile.” – Richard Feynman (physicist)

Posts on Feynman on this blog can be found here, here and here.

Picture credit: here.

The Higgs Effect

One side-effect of the discovery of an extremely strong strong candidate for a Higgs particle (first announced by the LHC in July 2012) is certainly the rapid publication of books!

I was in Waterstones in Farnham recently to have a look around and, under Popular Science, I was surprised to see that they already had two on the subject:

Higgs: The invention and discovery of the ‘God Particle’ by Jim Baggott (314 pages)
Higgs Discovery: The Power of Empty Space by Lisa Randall (64 pages)

To get a flavour of the former see here (extract below)

The mechanism works like this. Without the Higgs field, elementary particles such as quarks (the constituents of protons and neutrons) and electrons would flit past each other at the speed of light, like ghostly will o’ the wisps. The elementary particles that make up you, me and the visible universe would consequently have no mass. Without the Higgs field mass could not be constructed and nothing could be.

What actually happens is that these elementary particles interact with the Higgs field and are slowed down by it, as though swimming in molasses. We interpret this ‘slowing down’ as inertia and, ever since Galileo, we have identified inertia as a property of things with mass.

and the latter has got a very positive review here.

Over the last ten years, I’ve been amazed at how popular expositions of quite complex science have really taken off (which is great). I guess, in part, it’s due to scientists becoming much more media savvy and realising that funding and general opportunities can be strongly influenced by public profile. But I also like to think that most people still retain a basic interest into why things are the way they are and how our understanding has progressed (even if some of that curiosity has been accidentally knocked out of them at school).

In ordinary conversations these days, I’m even hearing “Large Hadron Collider” and the “Higgs”!

How The Higgs Relates To Other Particles

There’s an interesting personal historical note here. When I was doing my doctorate in particle physics at Imperial College in the 70′s Abdus Salam was a Professor in the Department as well as Tom Kibble.

Salam was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1979 (shared with Steven Weinberg and Sheldon Glashow) for his work on unifying the weak and electromagnetic forces and the so-called Higgs mechanism (for giving some key particles mass) would be a critical ingredient in this.

Furthermore, Tom Kibble played an important role in the clarification and understanding of the Higgs mechanism.

So I was lucky enough to be at Imperial during an incredibly exciting period.

Professor Abdus Salam (1926 – 1996)

I seem to remember that Salam used to visit Imperial for a week or so every month (he held another position at an International Centre in Trieste, Italy) and there was generally quite a hubbub when he was around. On one occasion word went out that he wanted to interview each of the particle physics PhD students. There was a handful of us and no reason was given. This was quite unusual as we interacted with all the other staff on a regular and easy basis and communication was excellent.

In my interview somehow or other I started going on about the low public profile of particle physics even though some amazing advances were being made and they weren’t being well communicated to the public. He agreed with me, said it was an important topic and suggested I seize the opportunity and do it myself! This totally shocked me as this wasn’t the sort of career I had in mind, although with hindsight it might have been excellent and prescient advice.

I’ve often thought about this and how best to benefit when being in the (rare) situation of talking to someone who can give advice from a genuinely big picture. My guess is that they’ll always say something you don’t expect and you might even find a bit odd!

However I think the smart thing to do is to write it down, leave it a while, and then just openly think about it even if it contradicts practically everything else you’re doing. I’m not saying I would have been good at popular science or that I would (in reality) have enjoyed it but I did lose an opportunity by not giving it the attention it deserved.

As we’re often told, chance favours the prepared mind. In this case, being prepared for the unexpected!

Picture credits: top, middle, bottom.

What The World Is Made Of

For more on science and stories, see here.

Picture credit: here.

Feynman In Pictures

Based on two very positive reviews (Dyson, Physics Buzz) I bought ‘Feynman’ by Jim Ottaviani and Leland Myrick a few months ago.

Last week I got round to looking at it and was completely transfixed! Although it wasn’t my intention, I ended up ‘reading’ most of the book in one sitting. I write ‘reading’ as it has a comic/manga book style and an example page is given above (most of the book isn’t as technical as this).

In my opinion the pictorial approach works really well and is a good complement to the many biographies that are already available (see here). It may also introduce Feynman and physics to a much wider audience.

The book is structured via topics that cropped up during his life eg computing machines (1945), trust (1984), you’re joking mr feynman (1985) and some of the themes that are brought out include:

• He was a very visual thinker – he even saw equations in colours
• He liked to think things through his way and not be too influenced by others
• He worked very hard
• He had wide interests, including women!

Where it didn’t work quite so well for me was where they tried to explain some of the physics ideas – I think for this you really do need to go into a bit more detail. However as the text in this type of book is necessarily very limited, maybe the taster they give is perhaps a reasonable compromise. Thinking about it, a hybrid book may be the best option, a fluid mixture of annotated pictures and pure text. The authors give a good commented bibliography at the end if you want to find out more.

On a personal note I first came across Feynman when I was a physics undergraduate at Queen Mary College. I was in a problem-solving session one day and my tutor (Dr William Yeung I think it was) had some research journals lying around. I took a look, as I was hoping to get into research myself, and was amazed to see lots of pictures (Feynman Diagrams) all over the place! Up to then physics had been all equations. Somehow it didn’t seem ‘serious’ but he assured me that it was and very clever too. Some examples of Feynman diagrams are given in the image above.

Later, when doing my doctorate in particle physics at Imperial College, I decided to read some of Feynman’s original papers. I still remember being struck by this phrase in one of his most important papers:

It is as though a bombardier flying low over a road suddenly sees three roads and it is only when two of them come together and disappear again that he realizes that he has simply passed over a long switchback in a single road.

All the other papers I’d been reading were written in a very academic and conservative style – I was really surprised at his almost conversational (although very effective) way of describing new ideas!

Finally I had the good fortune to meet him in the late 80′s. I co-organised an international workshop on an approximation method (in quantum field theory) that I’d been working on. As I’d heard through the grapevine that Feynman was also working on this topic, I thought I’d take a chance and invite him. To my surprise and delight he accepted and he took part in the meeting that was held on the island of Wangerooge (photo below), off the coast of Germany, in September 1987.

I’m planning on writing a few of the Feynman stories up from this meeting as I’ve never found his visit there mentioned anywhere else. He unfortunately died of cancer in early 1988.

Picture credits: bottom.

This post was accidentally dated 31 July – it was actually published on 8 August. To avoid further confusion I’ll keep things as they are!

Cafe Scientifique And The Future Of Data

I’ve been meaning to go to (my first) Cafe Scientifque for quite a while now

Cafe Scientifique is a place where, for the price of a cup of coffee or a glass of wine, anyone can come to explore the latest ideas in science and technology. Meetings take place in cafes, bars, restaurants and even theatres, but always outside a traditional academic context.

Finally the timing was good and last week I managed to get to a meeting in nearby Winchester, which was held in a very pleasant patisserie (great cakes!). Hugh Proudman, a Program Director at IBM, was the speaker and the topic was

‘The future of Data: will we be swamped or can we manage it?’

Hugh is based at the IBM Hursley Park site which is near Winchester.

The format was a 30 min presentation, a break for refreshments and then a period of Q&A. After some general introductory material, Hugh went on to talk about the leading-edge IBM computer system Watson. This hit the popular headlines last year through winning the US quiz show Jeopardy! against top human contestants.

The talk generated a very lively and varied discussion ranging from technical to ethical issues!

Coincidentally there’s an interesting article on Watson and it’s possible applications to the healthcare market in today’s Wired:

“Watson will give you the confidence and say: ‘I”m 90 percent sure of this, or I’m only 10 percent sure of this.’ You can immediately see how that is useful in medicine or in finance. The other thing we can do is we can tell the user why is this answer here. What kinds of evidence do we use, what facts did we use, what were we sure about, and what were we not sure about? And were the documents we used from very reliable sources or from less-reliable sources.”

The Cafe Scientifique is a useful way of bringing together people with a common interest in science (and it’s ramifications) that may not otherwise connect. In fact, by pure coincidence, I sat down next to someone who used to work for my previous employer (QinetiQ) but who I’d never met before – it really is a small world!

The cafes are free and have locations worldwide.

Why not try one? You can find your local one here.

Alternatively, perhaps you’d like to help start one up (info here)?

Picture credit: here (cropped).

Power Steering For The Mind

Following on from ‘starting to code again‘, I spotted a thoughtful piece by John Naughton in The Observer yesterday on the (more general) topic of teaching computer science in UK schools.

His key points are (this is an edited and extracted version):

One – Jettison Some Baggage From The Past

As a result, educational thinking about the importance of computing and information technology in this country has been stunted for well over a decade. We’ve taken a technology that can provide “power steering for the mind” (as a noted metaphor puts it) and turned it into lessons for driving Microsoft Word.

Two – Teach Computer Science Not ICT

The idea that there’s a major body of knowledge in this field – complete with a stable and intellectually rigorous conceptual framework that is independent of today’s or yesterday’s gadgetry – is probably unfamiliar to residents of Whitehall, who think ICT is trivial because it’s always becoming obsolete.

Three – Yes, It Really Is That Important

There are actually far more important reasons (than purely economic ones) why our children should emerge from school with a deeper understanding of information technology and computational thinking than is the case at present. They are to do with citizenship and democracy.

The world our children will inherit is one that will be shaped and controlled not just by physical realities, such as climate change, but by computer software.

In the same section of the newspaper there’s also an interesting article on ‘how to write an app in just one day‘!