Author: Sam

Special Relativity and General Relatity Notes

It’s been a while since my last post. However, I’ve been working on new content during that time. Specifically, I published notes on special relativity – about a year ago, actually; hard to believe it’s been that long. And today, I published notes on general relativity. A few sections of the latter page are still under construction. I hope you find these pages useful.

Update after a heck of a year

It’s been a heck of a year. Have managed to avoid COVID-19 with a combination of masks, social distancing and vaccination. Am disappointed at the reluctance of people to adhere to measures that could’ve made this pandemic much less devastating. Social distancing is difficult – we are a social species – but wearing a mask just isn’t that hard. I’m particularly astounded at peoples’ hesitancy to get vaccinated. These vaccines, especially the mRNA vaccines, are nothing short of a God-send (Pfizer and Moderna both 95% effective and incredibly safe). Yet here we are, still struggling with this thing. Like my father always told me: you sleep in the bed that you make.

But enough of this soapbox banter. Because of the nature of my day job, unlike many, the COVID pandemic has kept me hopping. Despite being busy with work, I’ve managed to finish the first draft of my novel “To Catch the Wind” and am in the process of editing. In addition, I’ve started on a nonfiction work on science and religion. I’ve also made some notes about some topics in quantum mechanics/quantum field theory that I’d like to talk about, as much to solidify the concepts in my own mind as anything. Of course, putting them together into a presentable form on the website is the hard part. Hopefully, I can find the time to post more frequently in the coming months.

The Formula – new addition, free

The Formula, 2nd edition, has now been published and is free from Sunday 5/17/2020 through Thursday 5/22/2020. Some of the math has been removed from the novel to improve the flow of the story. However, more detailed versions of chapters that have been shortened are available on this website as well as other supplementary material, for readers so inclined.

Problem rendering equations

Some of the equations in my Linear Algebra page and other longer pages on this website do not render properly. Such pages just shows the LaTex code I used to build the equations. Reloading the page usually eventually causes the site to render the equations properly so I’ll leave the offending pages up for now. (Note that this may take more than one reload to work.) Equations seem to look like they should on short pages. Therefore, I may ultimately need to convert these problematic long pages into a page containing links to shorter pages (like I did on my page on Calculus). I’m currently looking into this and hope to have a better solution soon.

Update: The Formula, To Catch the Wind and other things

I have been debating what I should do next.

My novel, The Formula, which I published independently, continues to have a slow but steady stream of sales. Reviews have been mixed – either 5’s or 1’s (which doesn’t average out very well). People either love it or hate it. The main criticism that readers level is that the novel contains incomprehensible mathematics and physics. Unfortunately, the understanding of the novel depends on the understanding of the math and physics, or at least their philosophical implications. I believe, however, that I might be able to remove the drawn-out explanations which readers seem to dislike while still communicating their implications. I can always leave links to this website for readers who are interested in the details. Accordingly, I have begun attempts to edit out the hardcore math/science (and edit the manuscript, in general – there has been criticism regarding typos, spelling, etc., which, to some extent, has merit). This editing process will take some time, though. Ultimately, when I have a more concise version of the book completed, I’d like to submit it to a few agents to see if I can get it into the mainstream publishing scene.

Meanwhile, I have been anxious to get going on my next novel, To Catch the Wind, a tale about a neurosurgery resident, the American medical system and the meaning of life. (What do these things have to do with each other, you ask? You’ll have to read the novel and find out:) At any rate, I have also begun work on this project simultaneously.

Finally, I’ve noted that the articles that constitute the background material for The Formula show a lot of inconsistency in style and format. This is because my knowledge of WordPress and programming was evolving as I was writing. In the future, I’d like to make these articles more visually appealing/user friendly.

Accomplishing these tasks will take a lot of work – and time. Hopefully, I’ll have more of the latter in the near future although, in life, this is never a certainty.

Until next time …

The Formula: Supplemental Material

On 9/12/2019, I made a post indicating my intention to publish articles on 4 topics – topics designed to provide explanatory material to supplement my novel, The Formula. These 4 topics were:

  1. RSA encryption
  2. Quantum encryption
  3. Bell’s Theorem
  4. Bohmian mechanics

My articles on these 4 topics have finally been published. Here are the links to those articles:

Some additional background material is also needed to understand the rather complicated subject of Bohmian mechanics. Here are links to those pages:

This project (at least for me) has been a massive undertaking. As noted in my last post, I’ve attempted to edit as best I could, but if any errors or inaccuracies have gotten by me, please let me know by clicking on the “Contact” link in the right upper corner of the page.

Bohmian Mechanics

My page on Bohmian mechanics has finally been published. Despite my initial (unrealistic) ambitions to the contrary, this could not have been made understandable without providing extensive background information. Accordingly, multiple additional articles have been published simultaneously. They include the following:

I attempted to edit this material as best I could but the project has been extensive. Therefore, it’s likely that some errors have slipped past me. If anyone finds any typos, inaccuracies or other problems, please let me know and I’ll attempt to address them.

I hope that you will find this material interesting and informative.

One-year Anniversary of The Formula

Today is the first anniversary of the publication of my novel The Formula. Although sales have been modest, The Formula has been downloaded for free over 30,000 times. Reviews have been mixed. Some seem to love it but there is a significant contingent of negative reviews that criticize the excessive use of math and physics. Frankly, the physics and its philosophical implications are central to the theme of the book. Still, I believe I can take some of the more complex parts out and still convey the main idea, referring the interested reader to this website for further explanations. A second criticism that has been leveled on multiple occasions is the manner in which the characters’ Brooklyn accents are conveyed. This should be an easier fix.

I think that publishing the novel independently has been useful; it has served as the ultimate premarket test. My plan, eventually, is to edit the book and attempt to publish it traditionally. At this point, though, I’d like to move on and begin my next project, a novel entitled To Catch the Wind.

However, I made a commitment to publish 4 articles on this website that provide supplemental information regarding some of the more complicated concepts expressed in The Formula. The last of these, an introduction to Bohmian mechanics, is nearing completion (although additional background material on requisite mathematics will probably also be needed).

I suspect my OCD tendencies will not allow me to move on until this last piece is wrapped up – hopefully soon.

Until then …

New Articles on Classical Physics

I have recently published three articles on non-Newtonian formulations of classical physics:

These articles provide important background information for a forthcoming article on Bohmian mechanics, an article that has been a long time in the making. Hopefully, it will be completed soon.