Journal of Obscure Results

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#I thank the Lord for the harvest moon and the girl from the hiring fair
Some friends and I were discussing how to choose new employees, and one of the people there said that one of the things that he decided on was whether they had showered that day, on the grounds that if they didn't shower on the day of a job interview then it was likely that they would never shower and this would not make for a pleasant working environment.

Poll #1423685
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Is this a legitimate hiring criterion?

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Yes
17 (81.0%)

No
4 (19.0%)

On Sunday I visited New York, which needs no introduction. The main purpose of the visit was to watch the British Grand Prix with a university friend of mine, but I found time to do some tourism as well.

I had a wander through Central Park, passing the memorial to John Lennon:

and I also saw these little guys in the lake near to the memorial:

My destination was the New-York Historical Society, one of the oldest New York institutions, which has a fantastic collection of historical paintings relating to the city, including a lovely and dignified picture of the unfortunate Dred Scott. Among their treasures is an antique carriage:

After watching the Grand Prix and having dinner, I had a walk around Times Square before heading back.

There is a regular and fairly fast train service from Princeton to New York (arriving at Penn Station).

My pictures are all available here.

Trenton, New Jersey
On Saturday I visited Trenton, the state capital of New Jersey.

The Capitol building was very interesting; it had decayed to a very bad state in the 1970s, but money was raised to re-gild the dome and restore the painting and glass of the interior to its former glory. The tour guide was very informative although it was quite annoying that he (whose day job was as a State auditor) had heard about the late unpleasantness at Westminster and that I had to try to explain exactly what had happened there.

The State Museum, which is next to the Capitol, was also interesting, with a display about New Jersey during the ice ages and the changes in fauna since then; unfortunately much of the museum is currently being renovated so many of the other treasures were absent.

The major tourist draw is the Old Barracks Museum; these date from Colonial times and were used as a barracks and then a hospital during the wars, and later on part of the building was used as a brothel, conveniently located next to the statehouse. The guides there give a very coherent account of the Battle of Trenton, which changed the course of the Revolutionary War.

Finally I went to the Trenton Battle Monument, from which one gets a very good view of the city.

Trenton is not the wealthiest of cities (there are a large number of pawnbrokers and cheque cashing establishments on the main street) but there are enough museums to make it an interesting place to visit. It has a regular train service.

My pictures are all available here.

A thought for Good Friday
"Do not despair: one of the thieves was saved. Do not presume: one of the thieves was damned."

A Day of Firsts ...
Yesterday was quite a good day. I got my first royalty cheque for the book:

and I danced out for the first time with these guys:

Current Mood: hopeful

A funny thing from the pub last night:
Inspired by the ridiculous number of boxes present, this is sung to the tune of Pleasant and Delightful:

And the freaks all played melodeons
and the freaks all played melodeons
and the freaks all played melodeons
at the dawning of the day.

#We are Britannia ...

This weekend I played a board game called Britannia; it's an epic game which covers the history of Great Britain from the Roman invasion to the Norman Conquest. Each player controls various smaller nations (the Saxons, the Danes, the Jutes, ...) and gets points for meeting historical objectives like holding relevant territory, killing other players' war leaders, that sort of thing. It's great fun even if it does take 6 hours to play a game of it!

There is some railroading in the game; some of it is perfectly reasonable, as invasions from the rest of Europe happen due to events outside the scope of the game. Some of it is built into the actual rules; it is partly there to keep the game balanced and enjoyable, but sometimes you do want to do something that won't be rewarded in game terms.

Poll #1347158 The light at the end of the tunnel?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Railroading --- good or bad?

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Good
3 (42.9%)

Bad
4 (57.1%)

I am recently back from Indiana. There is a song by R Dean Taylor called "Indiana Wants Me", which I love but no-one in Indiana seems to have heard of.

Poll #1335637 #Indiana wants me
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Have you heard of this song?

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Yes
3 (17.6%)

No
14 (82.4%)

#We wish you a Merry Christmas ...

IMGP4616, originally uploaded by overconvergent.

Merry Christmas everyone!

A friend of mine introduced me to the following interesting problem; you and a friend are meeting for lunch at a particular time in an agreed city (in the original it was Cambridge, England).

However, you have failed to agree where to meet, so you each have to decide on a place to be independently, and only if you are within sight of each other will you be able to meet up. Where do you choose?

(I think that "outside King's College Chapel" is a common answer to the problem as stated).

Can you think of other places in Cambridge, or places in other cities that would be as canonical?

The book meme, from

tree_and_leaf
* Grab the nearest book.
* Open the book to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post the text of the sentence in your journal along with these instructions.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.

Ahem.

You may wish to consider how many cusps Gamma_0(2) has; does this knowledge help you here?

I was going to write a sensible LJ post, but ran out of enthusiasm
I found out about the Japanese word tsujigiri today; it means ``"to try out a new katana on a passer-by''.

Poll #1282805 Cromulence or otherwise
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Is this a useful word?

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Perfectly so; I find it very useful
10 (83.3%)

It's completely useless
2 (16.7%)

Current Mood: amused

My country is Kiltartan Cross, my countrymen Kiltartan's poor
An article about the experiences of a journalist during her time at Oxford University at a college I know quite well has just been published. It tells a harrowing tale of her unhappiness there, which may not have been a majority experience (at least according to the comments underneath it).

One thing I would have changed in Oxford (that could have been changed) would be to lengthen the terms. (There are other changes I might have wanted to make that would be completely impossible to make). What would you choose to change?

Old books that make you go wtf
I was reading the rather outdated but seemingly reasonable Witchcraft, by Pennethorne Hughes, when I found the following gem on page 14 (below the cut; don't read if you're offended by bizarre racist nonsense):

( Read more... )

No scientific study is given to back up this ``fact''.

Do you ever find yourself stopped dead by such weirdness in the books you read?

Current Mood: wtf

Yesterday I got a letter from the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications about the proposed merger between the Institute and the London Mathematical Society. The goal of the merger would be to unify the learned societies for maths (like physics or chemistry).

I was curious to know how many people reading this are members of such bodies.

Poll #1254859 #A lawyer or a doctor or a civil engineer
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Are you a member of a learned or professional body related to your work or study?

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Yes
18 (85.7%)

No
3 (14.3%)

A love poem for the Bodleian (posted by an exile)
Bibliotheca Bodleiana, by Geoffrey Grigson

Edwardus Comes Clarendoniae
Clamped to his niche by an iron brace
Lifts to the white mercy of sparrows
His foppish foolish face.

Primus Anglicae Cancellarius,
He's joined the race of stone.
I belong still to your race
Of warm mouth and bone.

Bibliotheca Bodleiana,
My library is love for a while.
O Illuminatio mea, I wait
For your entering smile.

Poll #1223590 On Libraries
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Should there be more love poems addressed to libraries?

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Yes
10 (100.0%)

No
0 (0.0%)

"Forthcoming" papers
I was doing a literature search for a new project and found the following gems from reviews:

This work is the first of two papers designed to prove the Lehmer conjecture ... Part II is to be devoted to the derivation of a contradiction ...

and

The author announces a theorem whose proof will appear in Mathematische Annalen.

Oddly enough, the second paper was not as forthcoming as one might have hoped.

Poll #1210075 Ghost references
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Have you ever encountered ghost references like these?

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Yes
3 (50.0%)

No
3 (50.0%)

Jock --- a Cairn Terrier
by Jane Prothero Nott

( Read more... )

#I Will Derive

Poll #1206162
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Which do you prefer?

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Gloria Gaynor
3 (50.0%)

The mathematicians
3 (50.0%)

I was made aware of this in a seminar today:

The Derived Functor Rap

Paul Bressler

This is a new rap on the oldest of stories
Functors on abelian categories.
If the functor is left exact
You can derive it and that’s a fact.
But rst you must have enough injective
Objects in the category to stay active.
If that’s the case no time to lose;

Resolve injectively any way you choose.
Apply the functor and don’t be sore
The sequence ain’t exact no more.
Here comes the part that is the most fun, Sir,
Take homology to get the answer.
On resolution it don’t depend:
All are chain homotopy equivalent.
Hey, Mama, when your algebra shows a gap
Go over this Derived Functor Rap.

Poll #1203203 #I hardly knew her ...
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What do you think of this song?

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Weeble weeble sculp
8 (66.7%)

A useful teaching aid
4 (33.3%)

Current Mood: mathematical