The stormtrooper-fruit link

I just read a science fiction book where the protagonist has a genetic anomaly that makes her unique.  The details aren't important but some aliens at one point clone her so they can use the clones (and their abilities) to their own ends.

How bizarre, no?

No.

I think that almost all of the fruit we eat have been grafted from a single plant from the past that was uniquely tasty or uniquely resistant to disease.  We keep grafting or budding over and over and raising these genetically identical fruit.  Clones, actually.

Next time you are in the supermarket look at all those bananas and think about that...

Fruit Fish-stick Train

The five year old mind is a wonder...
(of course he ate it afterwards!)

2 fish stick base with half strawberry, blueberries, and grapes

Tomatoes, Swimming, and Learning

I transferred some tomatoes that we'd grown from seeds to the backyard.  They sat there without growing for what seemed like weeks.  Now, all of a sudden, they've grown a couple of feet in the past couple of weeks!

Isabelle has been taking swim lessons on and off for years.  Now, this week, all of a sudden, she is breathing to the side, learning to dive, and just generally actually starting to swim.

"Mr. Rideout - I don't get it." "Mr. Rideout, this is too hard!" and then, at the end of the year, "Oh, I really thought that stuff we did at the beginning of the year was easy!"

I'm told the tomatoes are working on their roots, out of sight, underground for those first couple of weeks.  Then, when they're ready with their root structure, they shoot up above ground.  Is this why teaching and learning is so hard?  So much unrewarding (for both student and teacher) laying down of roots?

My son may be a muppet

Chongers did his piano recital first and this video picks up with him hopping off the stage.  Then Isabelle performs (very nicely!), but Sebastien is the star of the show:

http://www.chrislyonsphotography.com/misslily/h323b659e#h323b659e

One Note to Bind Them All

I've been teaching about standing waves and their connection to music for years. But I recently discovered I haven't been making the connection explicit enough.  For instance, in a recent class when I remarked "See, that relationship between math and music is for real!", a student then responded "You mean the rhythm?"  But I was talking about pitch!

For standing waves:

Even though a note is identified by the fundamental frequency (the largest wave pictured above), it will have many higher harmonics buried within.  It is this distribution of higher harmonics (all obeying the mathematical relationship: Frequency of higher harmonic = N * Frequency of the fundamental), that give a musical note its timbre or unique sound.  It allows us to distinguish a middle A played on trumpet from the same note played on a piano.

Let's run some numbers.  If a string tuned to be a very low pitched "A" is plucked it will vibrate at all of the following frequencies:

N	Frequency
1	55
2	110
3	165
4	220
5	275
6	330
7	385
8	440
9	495
10	550

Compare this to the frequency of musical notes:

 Note that every octave is a frequency doubling.  So our low pitched A string actually contains all of the higher octaves within (N=2, N=4, N=8). What about the other harmonics? N=3, N= 6 are both the note "E".  A and E are perfect "fifths". Also, the N=5 is close to  C#.  Wait a sec!  A- C# - E; isn't that the A major chord??

Let's do another.  Take a string tuned to a low "C".  The first few harmonics would be:

N	Frequency
1	65.406
2	130.812
3	196.218
4	261.624
5	327.03
6	392.436
7	457.842
8	523.248
9	588.654
10	654.06

 N= 3 is a "G", N=5 is very close to "E"  C-E-G:  the classic C major chord!

The complete major chord is already contained within the first note and relationship between the musical notes is, just like everything in this universe, all about the physics!

Thanks to student KO for staying after and helping me investigate the perfect 5th relationship between the tuning fork held far from the ear and then close to the ear which led to this post.



 

Powers of Two

  Friday afternoon, my students are taking a test and I check my school email.  The Tech department sent out a URL for us to consider blocking in our classroom because the students are playing some kind of addictive game.
  You know what I'm thinking at this point, right?  I promptly surf over to the site and start playing the game.  Gotta check out what the student are up to these days, right?

Do you think the exams were graded super-fast? Well, I had an important weekend project...

Saturday Conversation at the Rideouts

Isabelle (2nd grade):  "Daddy, tell me again about the multiverses and how there could be other universes?"
Me: "Well, everything we can currently or will ever be able to see is the Universe, but there are (or could be) other universes out there but we'll never have any evidence for it."
Isabelle: "Then it's not really science, is it?  It's just an idea."
Me: "True, but the idea of multiverses is consistent with the science we do know."
Isabelle: "But why would you say we'll never be able to see something far away? If we wait long enough, won't the light eventually get here?"
Me: "Good point, but the universe is expanding so the distant objects are actually getting more distant all the time"
Isabelle: "But the light it emits now, before it moves away, will still get to us eventually, right?"
Me (starting to sweat): "Yes it seems that way, but it's actually the space between us that is expanding and so that makes it hard for the light to get to us."
Isabelle: "Expanding faster than the speed of light?  I don't understand that"
Me: "Um, yes, well, if the object is really far away then there is a lot of space and every piece of it is expanding, then the object could actually be moving away from us faster than the speed of light."
Isabelle: "But the light should still get to us!"
Me: "But the light is traveling through space that is expanding too, so it's like the light is running towards us while the floor itself is getting bigger and it's as if the light is running in place."
Isabelle: "I don't get it"
Me: "Me neither."(thinking: maybe I shouldn't show her any more episodes of Cosmos)