Not bad! Not bad at all! A number of people did managed to answer the vexer correctly, although the approach ranged from purely analytical, to writing a...
This week's vexer should be relatively easy (I know, I know! I've said this so many times when no one could answer it!). If you typically receive our group via...
It is a well-documented fact that the general public (at least in the US) have poor science literacy, even though they profess to support science. What this...
Continuing the series of countdown on the most cited papers appearing in Phys. Rev. Lett. as reported in the APS News, this time it is the 6th most cited...
The mystery of high Tc superconductivity in the Cu-O layered material, discovered in 1986, is one of the biggest question in physics that remains unanswered...
I'm not sure if people didn't participate in this because it appears to be TOO easy, or what. I can tell you that there is an important but subtle conclusion...
This is one of those things that you can solve easily (trivially?) if you know how to put those words into an algebraic equation. Consider that as a hint. You...
I feel the need to remind people of the wealth of resources that we have on our website. I frequently see people in our IRC channel (even our members) asking...
A new report by the UK-based Institute of Physics indicated that the importance of physics to the UK economy has increased significantly over the last 10...
One of the big news from the APS March Meeting last week is the experimental verification of the existence of left-handed materials or materials with negative...
As expected, it was an easy vexer if you know some basic algebra to solve it. If you recall, last time I asked: "You have a cake of soap that you put on one...
This week's vexer came from an anecdote attributed to Von Neumann. One can actually solve this by summing up an infinite series that converges to a number....
Just because someone else has spoiled the vexer for you, doesn't mean you can't get the "reward" from it. You may still go ahead and send in your answers to...
Hi all, Here is perhaps a touchy discussion question aimed primarily at younger future physicists, but anyone with an opinion should feel free to chime in. If...
... new ... Whoa!!! This is an EXCELLENT question! Why the hell didn't I think of it? :) You have saved yourself from my wet boson for another day, Tom! I must...
ZapperZ ... Btw, not many know that the Manhattan Project failed! The aim was to build the weapon and to explode it on Berlin, not in Japan. But when the...
This paper has finally appeared in print. The exact citation for it is J. Wisdom, Science v.299, p.1865 (2003). This is a long, and not an easy paper to read....
Continuing the ongoing "Group" project (I use the word group loosely here because I've been the only one contributing to this), this time we tackle one of...
I am NOT endorsing this paper. But it is such a classic case of "mental masturbation" that I had to bring it to the group's attention. Read it if you're bored,...
Hi, ... I am a physics student in the third year now. At the university where i study (Karlsruhe, Germany) we discuss this question every time the new freshmen...
OK... after the spoiler being done by one of our members here, we still managed to have people doing this the old-fashion way... they EARNED IT! Last time, I...
OK, this one is rather different than the other vexers. Let's see if I can pull this one off. You will need to refer to the picture in the Files section of our...
Warm Greetings Everyone, I'm going to be an undergraduate next year, so I've got to choose colleges. I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations for a...
... where ... the ... the ... these ... rationally ... everybody ... to ... sz: Thanks for your excellent response. I essentially agree with you. From what...
... colleges. ... major. ... focusing on ... physics ... To be honest, ANY UC school is good enough for undergraduate education. Unless you have a specific...
Hi Harold, I agree with zapper: I think you are in pretty good shape academically either place you pick. However, within the UC system, not all UC's are...
Dear Zapper and Szicarus, Thank you for your help! I'll be touring with a second year undergraduate at UCSD during my spring break, so I'll get to see what a...
Hello everybody i'm catalin an undergraduate student and i thought to write a paper for the 'First step for the nobel prize in physics' contest and i have no...
OK, it was an interesting exercise. Although it looked trivial and unimportant, last week's vexer was actually the beginning of a very important computational...
I asked nemor this question on our Undernet IRC channel a few days ago, and realized that although it looked trivial, the subtlety of this question may be...
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