Next on BBC1 : Not Jay Hunt

Right! That's it! No more on this subject until next time.

On to more worthy things. Ionian enchantment has been achieved and I now know (sort of) how E=mc² is derived from Minkowski Space-Time. Maybe I could not explain it back to you without sitting down and going through the whole chapter again - making notes of course and possibly using a few Excel graphs. There is however a sneaking feeling that something is not quite linking together. I realise that the derivation is proved through experiment and that the truth of the equation is the result of the brilliant deductions by Einstein and others but there is nothing to explain the mechanism of why it is true. Of course that is all probably to do with particle physics which comes later in the book and may well be explained but at the moment it seems a little too much to take for granted. Possibly I may just have to accept the truth but that is not empirical enough is it? Do I even mean empirical? Maybe I mean epistemological.

Tonight of course there is a new BBC2 series which might be a little easier to understand - The Story of Science with Michael Mosley. After his history of surgery I feel we can expect a great programme - full of fact and large-scale demonstration.

Stand Back! Give Mr. Minkowski Some Space!

Heavier and Heavier gets Mr Cox's and Mr Forshaw's book. Having to re-read quite a bit though it is definitely worth it for the Ionian Enchantment though my version of it is like a stuttering lawn-mower engine compared to the well-tuned purr of a Bentley. The current chapter is on Hyperbolic or Minkowski Space where space-time rules rather than just space and suddenly from out of the fuzz that is the perception of the position in the Cosmos of the authors' waking and breakfasts, comes the sudden appearance of the Lorentzian Transformation equation derived in the previous chapter. This is the enchantment - the sudden realization that the laws which govern everything in the Universe are natural and intertwined with each other. Imagine the ecstasy of this for people who really do understand the maths.

Maths is consistent within itself, though of course Godel had something to say about that didn't he? If this incompleteness extends from the abstract world of numbers to the real physical world, what is the implication for A Theory of Everything? I've often wittered on about the retreat of the details so that the more we understand about the detail of something the more it reveals further levels of complexity. Is it possible that one day an intelligence will be able to define everything about the physical world - not only all the "stuff" we already know exists but cannot yet explain the links between but also any possible "stuff" that we don't know about for sure - or are not even aware of? Or will the details keep increasing in a cosmic two-fingers held up to Occam and his razor? One day scientists hope to link our models of the mind to the physical characteristics of the brain through bio-chemistry and electronics. I always wonder whether this is possible. I think that we will keep drilling deeper into both sides, never finding a link point. This can be seen as as inverse analogy to the Seven Layer Network Model. This defines networks from the bottom up - starting with the physical connection and working its ways through various degrees of complexity to the top levels defining the human experience of networking. The mind/brain link starts at the high level using big concepts and builds under that more complex levels of connectivity, hopefully one day to reach a lower limit which relies on simple, small details.

Enough mind, brain and Relativity. I read the phrase "political fugue" the other day. It had no explanation and made me wonder what it actually meant. Ignoring the fact that it might just be a mistype, I suppose it must relate to the psychological condition rather than any complex piece of classical music to celebrate the upcoming democratic festivities. Could it be that we are all in the midst of an "episode" from which we will emerge blinking into the light with no memory of the fight?

Which End of Him is Thick Then?

BBC4 are going for a week of map-related stuff pivoting on the four-part Beauty of Maps (narrated incidentally by the steely-voiced, Scottish X-Wing Pilot and Uncle of Obi-Wan - Denis Lawson). Last night this was about the Mappa Mundi which despite being in Hereford and close to where I grew up, I have never seen. This is a map which would probably keep me happy for hours (once I'd learnt to read Latin I suppose) though Grayson Perry's tribute/homage to MM, Map of Nowhere is a modern substitute. Give me an atlas an I am happy for some time.

And also keeping me busy is the band-wagon-jumping of Why Does E=mc²? (and why should we care?) by intellectual de-jour, Professor Brian Cox and equally clever Professor Jeff Forshaw. This is a readable book and jumps straight in with the explanation of why light speed is fixed and why this means that time and distance is not. It uses the standard light-clock-on-a-train method and Pythagoras to explain the changes and this is fine. However, it then avoids the standard historical narrative of Special Relativity followed by General Relativity and all the standard means of trying to explain them and goes into a real-world example of why space-time is a signal entity using the example of the time and distance between waking up and finishing your breakfast from both your point of view and that of a passing observer. I have to admit I have had to go back and read this bit again but the promise of a beautiful revelation at the end of it draws you in to quite happily repeating the difficult bits. I am hopeful for a full path to understanding all of relativity rather than just isolated bits of the equations.