Born to Do Math 182 – Noether’s Theorem: “My methods are really methods of working and thinking…”
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner
Publication (Outlet/Website): Born To Do Math
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2020/08/22
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Scott Douglas Jacobsen: What’s going on with Noether’s Theorem?
Rick Rosner: I know of it. I know it is amazing. It was a theory discovered in 1918. Basically, as far as I know, it says that things not changing as you change position in space implies conservation laws.
Jacobsen: Angular momentum of the system is conserved as a consequence of the laws of motion. The part that is interesting to me. The system doesn’t have to be symmetric.
Rosner: It is a deep theory. Deeper than me. If you like that stuff, then you should probably follow John Baez. You guys (Canadians) say, “Zed.” He is a physics guy and a deep math guy at UC Riverside. He is good on Twitter. Today, he was talking about Noether’s Theorem. He also created the crackpot test. Because he is a physics guy in a densely populated state. If you are a physics guy in a densely populated state, lunatics will approach you with their own theories of the universe. Nobody who is crazy enough to have a theory of the universe would take the test, probably.
Jacobsen: Just pulled it up. Some examples of 1 point, 3 point, 5 point, 10 point, 20 point, and the 50 point.
Rosner: It is a 37-question questionnaire. If you are above a certain level, then you are a crackpot likely.
Jacobsen: “1 point for every statement that is widely agreed on to be false,” “2 points for every statement that is clearly vacuous,” “3 points for every statement that is logically inconsistent,” “5 points for each mention of “Einstien”, “Hawkins” or “Feynmann…” [Laughing].
Rosner: [Laughing].
Jacobsen: [Laughing] “5 points for using a thought experiment that contradicts the results of a widely accepted real experiment,” “5 points for each word in all capital letters (except for those with defective keyboards).”
Rosner: That should apply to Twitter. People who type in all caps on social media, including our fucking president.
Jacobsen: “10 points for each new term you invent and use without properly defining it,” “10 points for claiming that your work is on the cutting edge of a ‘paradigm shift,’“ “20 points for every use of science fiction works or myths as if they were fact,” “20 points for suggesting that you deserve a Nobel prize.” I suspect these are based on real emails.
Rosner: Yes, there’s a story my buddy Chris tells, who got his doctorate at CalTech. He watches into the faculty office of the physics department there. He’s behind a guy. The office secretary is blowing the guy off, “Professor so-and-so isn’t here.” My friend is like, “What is up with that? The guy is here. It is kind of rude to blow this person off.” The guy turns around to leave. His glasses are covered by tinfoil to block signals from space.
Jacobsen: [Laughing] “30 points for claiming that your theories were developed by an extraterrestrial civilization (without good evidence).”
Rosner: In 1984, I had a bad breakup.
Jacobsen: Is this the bouncer girlfriend?
Rosner: Yes.
Jacobsen: She was very attractive.
Rosner: She was cute. Before she was a bouncer, she was a dancer. But the thing that made her a good bouncer was this free floating anger. There was a certain amount abuse from here. It added spice and weird psychological underpinnings, which are hard to recover from.
Jacobsen: That doesn’t sound good to me.
Rosner: You know baby ducks imprint the first thing they see.
Jacobsen: So, you imprinted on very aggressive sexual experience.
Rosner: If you mix fear with everything else, then it makes a lasting impression.
Jacobsen: In 2020 terms, I am sorry for the emotional abuse that you went through.
Rosner: I am a big boy-ish. To get over it, I made a deal with myself that I would do something stupid every week. One time, I was walking across campus. I just dumped into a hole, not knowing what was in it or how deep it was. There wasn’t that much rebar in it.
Jacobsen: Back to the John Baez: “40 points for claiming that the “scientific establishment” is engaged in a “conspiracy” to prevent your work from gaining its well-deserved fame, or suchlike,” “50 points for claiming you have a revolutionary theory but giving no concrete testable predictions.” I can think of several people who fit those categories and function as crackpots.
Rosner: He may not have offered a cutoff. It would be like a physics guy to offer a probability cloud. Anyway, one of the stupid things I did. I met my wife at a Jewish singles’ dance. Before I went, I knew they were stupid. Nevertheless, I forced myself to go and it worked out. Another is writing to the National Inquirer. I scored well on an IQ test and was published in Omni. I wrongly considered myself famous, no.
Jacobsen: [Laughing].
Rosner: Omni was this science-y and science fiction-y publication for people who liked Penthouse. I wrote a letter to Penthouse Letters. It is someone writing in to talk about the great sex that they happened into. I wrote one tied to my Omni persona. I wrote one to the National Inquirer about how I got my high-IQ based on ‘being kidnapped by aliens.’
Jacobsen: [Laughing] They thought you were a little off.
Rosner: Because it was stupid. If I had any actually degree of fame, then they might have done something with it, but they don’t know anything about this.
Jacobsen: Knowing you personally, you are one of the funniest people I know.
Rosner: Thank you.
Jacobsen: You are the least pretentious high-IQ person I know.
Rosner: That’s my shtick. On the inside, I am.
Jacobsen: So, you would have substantive internal prudery with the perfect score on the Titan Test.
Rosner: I worked in bars for years. I just finished watching some movie about a high-functioning autistic guy who is training himself to have normal interactions. I think Temple Grandin did that. Working in bars, it was the equivalent of that because I met three-quarters of a million people.
Jacobsen: So, you know what the range of American citizenry are like.
Rosner: That’s not the point. The point is I was never fully Aspergery or autistic. I was that off, but I wasn’t great.
Jacobsen: I don’t think you have Asperger’s. I think you have lack of socialization earlier on.
Rosner: I don’t even know if that’s the right term now.
Jacobsen: That’s true. It’s a spectrum. If you look at these individuals, I have some experience.
Rosner: You don’t hear about autism much. I think one reason it has been abused is because people not in the field abused it. When a supermodel goes on a late night talk show and says, “I was so nerdy in junior high,” which they all say, they probably were. To be a supermodel, you need to not get any boobs until you are 19. Unless, your parents are each 6 feet tall. You will not get womanly curves until older because when you get the estrogen that goes with having boobs. It shuts down the bone growth. It is annoying when a supermodel says, “I was Skeletor and nerdy in 8th grade.” It’s not necessarily not true because she probably was 5’9” in 8th grade and 103 pounds because this would allow her to grow to supermodel proportions.
There were probably some supermodels who when she went on one of the late night Jimmys said that. It was one of the most self-diagnosed characteristics out there. If you felt awkward, then you might go on social media and claim having Asperger’s.
Jacobsen: Concluding statements on Noether’s Theorem: How does it relate to IC? How about that?
Rosner: The deal with physics or one of the main quests of physics is an attempt for a unified field theory. On single theory that explains everything. Elegant physics theorizes one thing, but that theory when pursued along a number of different lines generates a number of surprising results that are consistent with observations of the universe, e.g., General Relativity. There is some quote from Einstein where somebody asked him, ‘Is it really true of the universe?’ Einstein who liked to talk about ‘God,’ said, ‘If God did choose it as a thing that describes the universe, then he fucked up because it is a beautiful theory.’ It is something like that. What makes a theory beautiful in physics is that it is simple and does way more than you’d that it would do, it is unexpected. I know Noether’s Theorem does this big time without remembering or ever even knowing how.
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