Circles, social circles and Pi Day
Tuesday was Pi Day. The choice of which constant to celebrate probably had to do with its notoriety, but to celebrate a constant at all has much deeper roots. Continue reading Circles, social circles and Pi Day
Tag: Waves
The sound of silence
Think about the most quiet place you’ve ever been to. Now imagine something even quieter. What does that sound like? If you can’t figure it out, physics can help: let’s start by looking at how sound works. Loudspeakers, vocal folds and instruments all function by the same principle: rhythmically push and pull on air. The air molecules, in turn, push and pull on their neighbors, … Continue reading The sound of silence
What the eff is an fMRI?
Some parts of the brain “light up” when we feel certain feelings, or listen to music, or tackle math problems. Certainly you’ve stumbled upon such news, given how frequently they end up in mainstream media. The technique used for these studies (and many others in neurosciences) is called functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (or fMRI), which is an amazing thing, but also seems to have a … Continue reading What the eff is an fMRI?
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