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what a coincidence, edu-Youtuber Brady Haran just uploaded three videos about the Vatican Observatory, a long interview with brother Guy and the their collection of space rocks:

The Pope's Space Rocks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OI4wb2XIZc

The Pope's Telescopes - Deep Sky Videos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccoGKAL6Qas

The Pope's Astronomer - Sixty Symbols

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0DAKaR16cY


Oh, Robert Langlands!

I worked on a short film about him, for the Abel Prize ceremony, last March.

http://www.abelprize.no/artikkel/vis.html?tid=73176


Nice short film. Langlands was a theory builder as opposed to someone like Erdos who was more interested in solving problems. Theory builders are often admired, but because the endeavor is so broad, very few of them emerge and even fewer are actually successful.

I like the part where he said he began to write before he understood everything, and in order to write he had to discover many things, and even had to discover them after he started to write.

It underscores the crucial role of writing in discovery. Most writers will tell you they are exploring the space during the writing process. Writing isn't a process of committing what you already know to paper; it's a process of learning what you don't know and or haven't considered. It often leads you down paths you would never expect. (this happens to me with my HN comments too -- I often myself writing a very different comment from the one I set out to write)

This is why I think a Ph.D. dissertation should be a continuously evolving collection of notes, and not something you "write-up" in the end after all the work is ostensibly done.


> as opposed

From The Rising Sea: Grothendieck on simplicity and generality by C. McLarty:

Grothendieck describes two styles in mathematics. If you think of a theorem to be proved as a nut to be opened, so as to reach “the nourishing flesh protected by the shell”, then the hammer and chisel principle is: “put the cutting edge of the chisel against the shell and strike hard. If needed, begin again at many different points until the shell cracks—and you are satisfied”. He goes on to say: "I can illustrate the second approach with the same image of a nut to be opened. The first analogy that came to my mind is of immersing the nut in some softening liquid, and why not simply water? From time to time you rub so the liquid penetrates better, and otherwise you let time pass. The shell becomes more flexible through weeks and months—when the time is ripe, hand pressure is enough, the shell opens like a perfectly ripened avocado!"


Incidentally, I have heard Serre's work described as the exemplar of the hammer-and-chisel approach. (McLarty goes on to say that Bourbaki's work fits in the rising-sea approach, which is surprising to me.)


That's also why I detested the formal, algorithmic writing method you learn in English classes. They always wanted you to turn in an outline before you had even begun your paper. How are you supposed to organize a paper before you even have anything to organize?


> Langlands was a theory builder as opposed to someone like Erdos who was more interested in solving problems.

No 'was' about it, by the way; he's still alive, and (last I heard from him) still working.


This is a charming film! How did you decide to include things like that little bit about him paying for the lectures he had posters of? Or the scene where you were peaking in from outside (which I suppose is a metaphor for the craft of creating character films in the first place).


What is the background music you used for this video? Thanks


I would say that the Arri Alexa SXT is a better camera than most of the cameras listed there.


I suspect the Arri Alexas are not on the list because they do not have "a true 4K sensor (equal to or greater than 4096 photosites wide)." The SXT has a 3404 x 2202 resolution when used in open-gate format.



The Alexa SXT doesn't match the first requirement - a true 4K sensor. It has a 3424x2202 sensor.


That's valid. And kinda surprised it's not listed. Any other cameras that would make sense to be on the list?


Apparently Stephen Wolfram and his son were involved in the making of Arrival http://blog.stephenwolfram.com/2016/11/quick-how-might-the-a...


(Finally something I can contribute to, on HN)

My father plays in a baroque orchestra (the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra), and I know that when they play a repertory, e.g. Dieterich Buxtehude, the orchestra tunes to 465 meantone.


I suspect the temperament makes a dramatically larger difference than shifting every note sharper by a bit less than (95.7% on a log scale) a semitone compared to A440.


And Al Gore


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