Binary data Updated +Created
Binary large object Updated +Created
Less evil are BLOBs that come from Reproducible builds.
Bipolar junction transistor Updated +Created
As of 2020, not used anymore in logic gates, but still used in amplifiers.
Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture Updated +Created
The BSD conjecture states that if your name is long enough, it will always count as two letters on a famous conjecture.
Maybe also insert a joke about BSD Operating Systems if you're into that kind of stuff.
The conjecture states that Equation 1. "BSD conjecture" holds for every elliptic curve over the rational numbers (which is defined by its constants and )
Equation 1.
BSD conjecture
. Where the following numbers are defined for the elliptic curve we are currently considering, defined by its constants and :
The conjecture, if true, provides a (possibly inefficient) way to calculate the rank of an elliptic curve over the rational numbers, since we can calculate the number of elements of an elliptic curve over a finite field by Schoof's algorithm in polynomial time. So it is just a matter of calculating like that up to some point at which we are quite certain about .
The Wikipedia page of the this conecture is the perfect example of why it is not possible to teach natural sciences on Wikipedia. A million dollar problem, and the page is thoroughly incomprehensible unless you already know everything!
Figure 1.
as a function of for the elliptic curve
. Source. The curve is known to have rank 1, and the logarithmic plot tends more and more to a line of slope 1 as expected from the conjecture, matching the rank.
Video 1.
Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture by Kinertia (2020)
Source.
Video 2.
The $1,000,000 Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture by Absolutely Uniformly Confused (2022)
Source. A respectable 1 minute attempt. But will be too fast for most people. The sweet spot is likely 2 minutes.
CEA Paris-Saclay Updated +Created
Centerpiece of the CEA since the beginning of the French nuclear weapons program, headquarters since 2006.
As of 2023 the place was blurred on Google Maps satellite view, no wonder.
Quantum resistant cryptosystem Updated +Created
Undecidable problem Updated +Created
Is a decision problem of determining if something belongs to a non-recursive language.
Or in other words: there is no Turing machine that always halts for every input with the yes/no output.
Every undecidable problem must obviously have an infinite number of "possibilities of stuff you can try": if there is only a finite number, then you can brute-force it.
bitcoin.org Updated +Created
Official Bitcoin domain registered by Satoshi Nakamoto.
Registration: 2008-08-18 by www.namecheap.com, an American company. But using a privacy oriented registrar: bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/89532/how-did-nakamoto-untraceably-pay-for-registering-bitcoin-org It is unknown how he could have paid anonymously, so it seems likely that the true identity could be obtained by law enforcement if needed.
First archive 2009-01-31: web.archive.org/web/20090131115053/http://bitcoin.org/ Also from the archive history web.archive.org/web/20100701000000*/bitcoin.org, things really started picking up on July 2010. This is almost certainly due to the opening of
Encyclopedia Britannica Updated +Created
Ciro Santilli is old enough to remember his parents whispering its name with a respectful tone.
Genius: Richard Feynman and Modern Physics by James Gleick (1994) mentions several times how Richard Feynman was a reader of the encyclopedia. E.g. in youtu.be/ivxkd98mDvc?t=50 Richard's sister also talks about it.
Then the Internet came along and killed it.
The motivation model for collaborators was simple: to get famous. To be able to be selected contribute an article meant that you knew something or two! There was some physicist Ciro read the biography of who was really glad to be able to write an article on the encyclopedia after having worshiped it for so long, TODO find the reference.
While this is somewhat a part of Wikipedia motivation, it is much less so because there is no single article authorship. This is something OurBigBook.com aims to improve.
Enriched uranium Updated +Created
Multivariate polynomial Updated +Created
A polynomial with multiple input arguments, e.g. with two inputs and :
as opposed to a polynomial with a single argument e.g. one with just :
Phylogenetic tree Updated +Created
It is important to note that due to horizontal gene transfer, the early days of life, and still bacteria to this day due to bacterial conjugation, are actually a graph and not a tree, see also: Figure "Graph of life".
Definitely have a look at: coral of life representations.
Underlying field of a vector space Updated +Created
Every vector space is defined over a field.
E.g. in , the underlying field is , the real numbers. And in the underlying field is , the complex numbers.
Any field can be used, including finite field. But the underlying thing has to be a field, because the definitions of a vector need all field properties to hold to make sense.
Elements of the underlying field of a vector space are known as scalar.
UNION (SQL) Updated +Created
Basic example tested on SQLite 3.40.1, Ubuntu 23.04:
sqlite3 :memory: 'select 1 union select 2'
output:
1
2
Two columns two rows:
sqlite3 :memory: <<EOF
select * from (values (1, 2), (2, 3))
union
select * from (values (2, 3), (3, 4))
EOF
output:
1|2
2|3
3|4
Note how duplicates are removed, to keep them we UNION ALL instead:
sqlite3 :memory: <<EOF
select * from (values (1, 2), (2, 3))
union all
select * from (values (2, 3), (3, 4))
EOF
output:
1|2
2|3
2|3
3|4
Physics 253a by Sidney Coleman (1986) Updated +Created
United Kingdom Updated +Created
The United Kingdom is one big field.
Everything is extremely uniform and fully controlled by humans. Maybe this is partially due to it being an island with extensive flood plains. Loots of white mana floating around there.
Some impressively sounding natural parks look more like cute countryside that is slightly hillier than the surrounding countryside.
This uniformity does however make it quite comfortable for its Hobbit inhabitants.
It also means that whenever slightly out of the ordinary happens, e.g., a bit of slightly heavier rain, everything floods. In some way however, the Brits are very pragmatic, and as long as the flood is not too bad, they just let it be, it might be cheaper.
Universe Updated +Created
Epsilon (letter) Updated +Created
Confusingly, in LaTeX:
  • \varepsilon rendered , is the default modern Greek glyph
  • \epsilon rendered is the lunate variant

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