Rear Admiral Harry Hess proposes seafloor spreading
I am doing a lot of reading on deterministic and stochastic computational methods. If you’re in the field, it’s the usual stuff: parameters vs. probability distributions, Bayesian prior and posterior probability density factors, Markov Chain Monte Carlo.
Wikipedia on the Monte Carlo method:
The term “Monte Carlo method” was coined in the 1940s by physicists working on nuclear weapon projects in the Los Alamos National Laboratory … The Rand Corporation and the U.S. Air Force were two of the major organizations responsible for funding and disseminating information on Monte Carlo methods during [the 1950s], and they began to find a wide application in many different fields.
Then, I read this over at the AGU Blog: How Nuclear Weapon Treaties Led To The Discovery That Thunderstorms Produce Antimatter
So how could we be sure the Russians were not testing nuclear weapons without us knowing about it? Easy. Nuclear fission produces a very high energy form of light called gamma rays. This extremely short wavelength radiation could be detected. So all that was needed was to launch a series of satellites that would warn us if gamma rays were detected.
Guess what. The satellites started seeing lots of gamma ray flashes. HUGE FLASHES. These flashes were brighter in energy for a few seconds than the entire Universe! Were the Russians cheating? It turns out not. The gamma ray flashes were coming from all over the sky. The military folks let astronomers in on it and, to say the least, they were very intrigued.
It never ceases to amaze me that a lot of science that extends or helps us understand better our lives on earth comes from our desire to blow each other up. And vice-versa.
That is all.
Kinda-funny, kinda-related update: China bans Bayesian statistics textbook “… told me that in China they didn’t teach Bayesian statistics because the idea of a prior distribution was contrary to Communism.”
Markov chains make my head hurt. I had to learn how to program HMMs in bioinformatics a couple of years ago. What do you use them for?
(I have roughly a small math minor in information theory and statistics, mostly by accident and needing electives.)
Mostly to determine probabilities of occurrence of a certain fluid type in a given reservoir rock. The terminology used to describe statistical algorithms is usually a lot more contorted and complex than the concept itself. Makes for some heavy reading sometimes.
Nothing really intelligent to add, just want to thank you for this post and observations.
Recent confirmation of the thunderstorm/anti-matter stuff — some NASA site, but I don’t have it bookmarked on this computer. There was a pretty nice little video. You may be able to find it before I can get back here with a link.