This is another one full of freaking out about math, posted in the vain hope that some omniscient logician will hug me and make everything better, so I expect most of you will scroll past.

( I feel really smart whenever I say the word 'existential' )

Oh God. I'm taking Mathematical Logic this semester, which has some of the most vicious algebra I've ever encountered. I have this vague memory of math involving numbers. Those were the good old days. I've had entire assignments in this class that do not involve a single numerical value, just lots of fun made-up symbols related to set theory ( Read more... )

Tomorrow is the first day of classes. It's funny how that sounds so much less exciting than the first day of school, which is what you get to call it when you're a kid.

I am so excited for learning. And I've decided to audit, like, seven classes, which is obviously not actually going to happen, but still! School!

I was just doing some reading on Wikipedia about the new xkcd, and I remembered what nerdiness feels like and it feels amazing.

( I don't get it, though. )

The sum total of what I know about this topic consists of

1) Everything I gleaned from skimming through Angels and Demons
and
2) Information from the first three lectures of Physics 200.

But I still find this really cool: McGill physicists to help launch world's most powerful particle accelerator

There are going to be, like, actual festivities for this ( Read more... )

Here is the score ( Read more... )

On the Want of Money by William Hazlitt, who is getting to be one of my favorite essayists (and Mr. English Teacher's, too, I think.)