The Geniuses' Thread

phlegms · 01-04-2010 3:15am

People need to be shown stuff like this.

I think the video pretty much speaks for itself. Anything I could say about it can be summed up a hundred times better in the video..

Davidius · 01-04-2010 8:30am

I did History for the Leaving. Got a B2 I think. Do I win something now?

phlegms · 01-04-2010 12:38pm

Davidius wrote: »

I did History for the Leaving. Got a B2 I think. Do I win something now?

Kinda, but not really.

Jay P · 12-04-2010 3:09pm

Found this joke from The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time:

"There are three men on a train. One of them is an economist and one of them is a logician and one of them is a mathematician. And they have just crossed the border into Scotland (I don't know why they are going to Scotland) and they see a brown cow standing in a field from the window of the train (and the cow is standing parallel to the train). And the economist says, 'Look, the cows in Scotland are brown.' And the logician says, 'No. There are cows in Scotland of which at least one is brown.' And the mathematician says, 'No. There is at least one cow in Scotland, of which one side appears to be brown.' And this is funny because economists are not real scientists and because logicians think more clearly, but mathematicians are best."

Pygmalion · 12-04-2010 3:36pm

Jay P wrote: »

And this is funny because economists are not real scientists and because logicians think more clearly, but mathematicians are best.

I lolled.
Great book though in fairness, a protagonist I can really relate to.

12-04-2010 4:15pm

Reminds me of this one I found yesterday:

A mathematician and his best friend, an engineer, attend a public lecture on geometry in thirteen-dimensional space. "How did you like it?" the mathematician wants to know after the talk.
"My head's spinning," the engineer confesses. "How can you develop any intuition for thirteen-dimensional space?"
"Well, it's not even difficult.
All I do is visualize the situation in n-dimensional space and then set n = 13."

Pygmalion · 12-04-2010 4:35pm

Deleted User wrote: »

Reminds me of this one I found yesterday:

A mathematician and his best friend, an engineer, attend a public lecture on geometry in thirteen-dimensional space. "How did you like it?" the mathematician wants to know after the talk.
"My head's spinning," the engineer confesses. "How can you develop any intuition for thirteen-dimensional space?"
"Well, it's not even difficult.
All I do is visualize the situation in n-dimensional space and then set n = 13."

lolled.

Another one:

A Mathematician and an Engineer are each asked to bring a box of ball bearings across the room.
The Engineer picks up the box, stumbles, drops the box and spends half an hour gathering the ball bearings before finally bringing it across the room.
The Mathematician picks up the box, throws it on the ground and declares "I have reduced the problem to one previously solved!"

syncosised · 12-04-2010 4:41pm

Since we're on nerdy jokes ...

An engineer, a chemist and a theoretical physicist are stranded on an island with nothing to eat. Luckily, a tin of beans washes up on shore, and the three discuss how best to open the tin. The engineer suggests using a rock to break open the tin, but then realises that the contents will splatter everywhere. The chemist has the idea to use seawater to corrode the tin, but decides this would take too long and they would starve. Finally, the theoretical physicist pipes up. "First, assume we have a tin opener ..."

sock puppet · 12-04-2010 4:53pm

phlegms wrote: »

Maths is ghey. History is where its at.

The following video is immensely interesting. Basically, this guy was the last surviving veteran of one of the most horrific conflicts in modern history; The Boer War. If any of ye' have a few minutes, give the video a watch. Unfortunately because of the way History is taught in Ireland at the moment, if it isn't Fenians or Nazis you don't get to learn about it. Tis a crying shame because people like this will have their story all but forgotten about because of the Dept. of Education's choice to not give kids a decent understanding of Global History.

Unless they introduce a new section on the breakup of the British Empire, then it would be a little pointless to study the Boer War on its own.

Pygmalion · 12-04-2010 4:58pm

A Mathematician, a Physicist and an Engineer are asked to investigate whether all odd numbers greater than one are prime.

Mathematician: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is not, therefore the statement is false.

Physicist: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 isn't, 11 is, 9 must be a measurement error, the statement is most likely true.

Engineer: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime, 11 is prime...

phlegms · 12-04-2010 5:38pm

sock puppet wrote: »

Unless they introduce a new section on the breakup of the British Empire, then it would be a little pointless to study the Boer War on its own.

I wasn't referring to the Boer war specifically, I just think the Dept. of Education fails miserably in covering any of the other major events in History other than the World Wars.

sock puppet · 12-04-2010 6:09pm

phlegms wrote: »

I wasn't referring to the Boer war specifically, I just think the Dept. of Education fails miserably in covering any of the other major events in History other than the World Wars.

Maybe but the Cold War is covered, as is Europe in the 19th century. Actually now that I think of it, the breakup of European empires is covered. I didn't do either of the European topics so I've no idea what they entail though.

Davidius · 12-04-2010 6:16pm

It's a shame that the syllabus only covers the 'hip and past-happening' topics that get covered inaccurately by films anyway.

It's a bit like how Project Maths is all about the maths that's boring as hell but everybody wants to see because "herp-a-derp everyday applications".

Jay P · 12-04-2010 6:18pm

Davidius wrote: »

It's a shame that the syllabus only covers the 'hip and past-happening' topics that get covered inaccurately by films anyway.

It's a bit like how Project Maths is all about the maths that's boring as hell but everybody wants to see because "herp-a-derp everyday applications".

Matrices aren't in the course though :rolleyes:
They're the foundation of a ridiculous amount of engineering and computers, I do believe.

Pygmalion · 12-04-2010 6:24pm

Davidius wrote: »

It's a bit like how Project Maths is all about the maths that's boring as hell but everybody wants to see because "herp-a-derp easy as **** to rote-learn".

FYP

sock puppet · 12-04-2010 8:32pm

Jay P wrote: »

Matrices aren't in the course though :rolleyes:
They're the foundation of a ridiculous amount of engineering and computers, I do believe.

They're not taught in any meaningful way. The course doesn't even go into explain basic terms such as determinants. Leaving Cert covers nothing a college student couldn't learn in a few days of study. I suppose there's a value in introducing students to the concept of matrices though. Also I suppose you could argue that the extra statistics introduced (there seems to be a lot) is also nothing a college student couldn't learn in a weeks study.

edit:

Pygmalion wrote: »

FYP

Not sure about that. It looks easier definitely, but I'm not sure if it's easier to rote learn.

12-04-2010 10:42pm

I think there's probably no need to go into so much statistics for Leaving Cert level.

That said, the main arguments against Project Maths that I've heard are that many of the teachers need training themselves in the new statistics questions (maths degrees often allow students to drop stats) and that Ordinary and Foundation Level have become too difficult.
Seeing some of the foundation level questions, I don't think some of the students I'm giving grinds to at OL could do them, never mind foundation students.

sock puppet · 12-04-2010 11:06pm

Deleted User wrote: »

I think there's probably no need to go into so much statistics for Leaving Cert level.

That said, the main arguments against Project Maths that I've heard are that many of the teachers need training themselves in the new statistics questions (maths degrees often allow students to drop stats) and that Ordinary and Foundation Level have become too difficult.
Seeing some of the foundation level questions, I don't think some of the students I'm giving grinds to at OL could do them, never mind foundation students.

Yeah I'm not sure what the perceived benefit in the extra stats questions is. I never looked at the Ordinary papers but maybe it needs to become more difficult? I know loads of people who did ordinary level maths for their Leaving Cert who went into science and business courses and are now struggling because of the maths element. For example from what I've heard from people doing BESS in Trinity they pretty much spend the first term of their maths and stats course dragging the students up to Leaving Cert standard.

12-04-2010 11:20pm

sock puppet wrote: »

Yeah I'm not sure what the perceived benefit in the extra stats questions is. I never looked at the Ordinary papers but maybe it needs to become more difficult? I know loads of people who did ordinary level maths for their Leaving Cert who went into science and business courses and are now struggling because of the maths element. For example from what I've heard from people doing BESS in Trinity they pretty much spend the first term of their maths and stats course dragging the students up to Leaving Cert standard.

On the other hand, most of the ones I tutor are horrible at maths. I guess the net result will be in front of us in a few years.

jumpguy · 15-04-2010 10:35pm

Good evening genii. I am here to ask you all a chemistry question.

Please explain to me how to calculate the reaction ratio in the sodium thiosulphate + KMnO4 solution titration. And the sodium hypochlorite and iodine (from KI) (bleach titration).

If y'all need any more info just ask.

Craguls · 15-04-2010 11:16pm

jumpguy wrote: »

Good evening genii. I am here to ask you all a chemistry question.

Please explain to me how to calculate the reaction ratio in the sodium thiosulphate + KMnO4 solution titration. And the sodium hypochlorite and iodine (from KI) (bleach titration).

If y'all need any more info just ask.

Ugh. That titration

Sodium thiosulfate:
2MnO4 + 10I- + 16H+ -> 2Mn2+ + 5I2 + 8H2O
Forms Iodine from 2 moles of MnO4-

2S2O32- + I2 -> 2I- +S4O62-

Iodine reacts with S2O32- in 1:2 ratio

Thus if two moles of Mn04-react with iodine which reacts again with double the amount of S2O32- (comparing to Iodine)
The ratio of Mn04:S2O3
2:10 or 1:5

Hypochlorite:
ClO- + 2I- + 2H+ ->I2+ Cl- + H2O

I2+ 2S2O32-+ I2 -> 2I- = 2I-+ S4O62-

The hypochlorite reacts with the iodide and makes Iodine, which reacts against the S2O32-

Since the amount of Iodide and by extension the amount of S2O32- that reacts is dependant on the amount of hypochlorite initially used the ratio boils down to.
Hypochlorite:Thiosulfate
1:2

That alright?

jumpguy · 15-04-2010 11:30pm

Craguls wrote: »

Ugh. That titration

Sodium thiosulfate:
In progress just need to check something

Hypochlorite:
ClO- + 2I- + 2H+ ->I2+ Cl- + H2O

I2+ 2S2O32-+ I2 -> 2I- + 2I-+ S4O62-

The hypochlorite reacts with the iodide and makes Iodine, which reacts against the S2O32-

Since the amount of Iodide and by extension the amount of S2O32- that reacts with iodine is dependant on the amount of hypochlorite initially used the ratio boils down to.
Hypochlorite:Thiosulfate
1:2

Okay then. After reading that over about 40 times, and looking at the formula, I kinda see what you're on about. Amount of ClO- initially used will dictate the amount of iodine that will react with the thiosulphate. (It also explains that whole excess KI stuff)

So for every 1 ClO- molecule, it reacts with 2 thiosulphate molecules? This is because every ClO- molecule will dictate the amount of iodine released, and hence the amount of iodine the thiosulphate will react with!

I pray that's right. If so I totally gettit and shall be printing out this wonderful post of realisation (I'll leave out this paragraph). Thank Craguls!

Craguls · 15-04-2010 11:33pm

jumpguy wrote: »

Okay then. After reading that over about 40 times, and looking at the formula, I kinda see what you're on about. Amount of ClO- initially used will dictate the amount of iodine that will react with the thiosulphate.

So for every 1 ClO- molecule, it reacts with 2 thiosulphate molecules? This is because every ClO- molecule will dictate the amount of iodine released, and hence the amount of iodine the thiosulphate will react with!

I pray that's right. If so I totally gettit and shall be printing out this wonderful post of realisation (I'll leave out this paragraph). Thank Craguls!

Yup that's it. Anytime man.

sock puppet · 20-04-2010 2:40pm

Could someone who can program help me with a problem I'm having?

I want to sort an array of objects by its attributes.

So far I'm using nested for loops to compare the current object with each object after it and switching the two objects if the first has a higher value. To compare them I have a getSuit method which returns a value of 1,2,3 or 4 depending on what the user enters.

public static void Sort(Card[] card){
		Card temp;
		
		for (int i = 0; i < card.length; i++){
			for (int j =i+1; j < card.length; j++){
				if (card[i].getSuit()> card[j].getSuit()){
					temp = card[i];
					card[i] = card[j];
					card[j] = temp;
				}
			}
		}

Pygmalion · 20-04-2010 3:54pm

sock puppet wrote: »
Could someone who can program help me with a problem I'm having?

I want to sort an array of objects by its attributes.

So far I'm using nested for loops to compare the current object with each object after it and switching the two objects if the first has a higher value. To compare them I have a getSuit method which returns a value of 1,2,3 or 4 depending on what the user enters.
public static void Sort(Card[] card){
		Card temp;
		
		for (int i = 0; i < card.length; i++){
			for (int j =i+1; j < card.length; j++){
				if (card[i].getSuit()> card[j].getSuit()){
					temp = card[i];
					card[i] = card[j];
					card[j] = temp;
				}
			}
		}

You never said what problem you're having (apart from using Bubble-sort of course :P).
I don't really see anything wrong with that, although obviously I haven't run it so maybe I'm just missing something

sock puppet · 20-04-2010 4:48pm

Pygmalion wrote: »

You never said what problem you're having (apart from using Bubble-sort of course :P).
I don't really see anything wrong with that, although obviously I haven't run it so maybe I'm just missing something

Actually nevermind. That particular fragment of code works fine. I've to sort them by two attributes and it was actually the other method that gave me problems. The problem was that it was sorting the objects correctly, and then sorting them the wrong way in the second loop. Think I've it worked out now. Thanks anyway.

What's wrong with Bubble-sort btw? Which way is better?

edit: Just done a bit of reading and it's not very efficient apparently.

Pygmalion · 20-04-2010 4:58pm

sock puppet wrote: »

What's wrong with Bubble-sort btw? Which way is better?

This would be a better one, still a bit bad, but like, better than bubble-sort and just as easy to do (pretty much).

This wiki page has a huge discussion on them and links to mad, crazy complicated stuff, Quicksort and stuff would be good, but like more effort to program.

sock puppet · 20-04-2010 5:09pm

Pygmalion wrote: »

This would be a better one, still a bit bad, but like, better than bubble-sort and just as easy to do (pretty much).

This wiki page has a huge discussion on them and links to mad, crazy complicated stuff, Quicksort and stuff would be good, but like more effort to program.

Cool thanks. The exam's in 8 days so I think I'll stick with bubble sort for now. Tbh with the rate at which I've been progressing they'll probably be astonished I could get even that running.

jumpguy · 20-04-2010 8:22pm

Ohh God this is frustrating. It's the simplest co-ordinate geometry question (of the line) EVER.

Find the perpendicular distance from (2, -4) to 3x - 4y - 17

Yeah so as you'd expect I just plugged it into the formula and bam, I came out with 1. 1 seemed like a grand answer.

Check back of the book, the answer is 3. WTF. I've checked everything like 3 times... :eek:

HAAAAAAAAAAAAALP!

Davidius · 20-04-2010 8:27pm

jumpguy wrote: »

Ohh God this is frustrating. It's the simplest co-ordinate geometry question (of the line) EVER.

Find the perpendicular distance from (2, -4) to 3x - 4y - 17

Yeah so as you'd expect I just plugged it into the formula and bam, I came out with 1. 1 seemed like a grand answer.

Check back of the book, the answer is 3. WTF. I've checked everything like 3 times... :eek:

HAAAAAAAAAAAAALP!

I haven't actually checked what you're doing but you did remember to use the absolute value in the formula, right? (Ex: |-3| = |3|= 3)

The Geniuses' Thread

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