The Nucleus staff have chosen the winners in the Poetry Contest.  They are Brendan Diamond and Ava Pope.  Congratulations to all who submitted entries.  The winners will be contacted shortly about their prizes.  Look for a new contest soon!

Dave

Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value -- Albert Einstein

Dr. Smart, with sweeping dioramics,
summarized theory accepted today:
"The first few laws of thermodynamics:
You can't win, break even or get away.

"No matter speed of acceleration,
the universe runs down since the Big Bang.
The fate of order is dissipation.
The spring, once sprung, can't be re-sprung.  It sprang.

"A system needs energy to survive
or it's unable to do work, of course.
On galactic scales or like us, alive,
complexity is the result of force.

"And though the second law says we can't win,
it's only 'law' to a statistician."

               (to Anthony Smart, February 22, 2008)

They granulate the universe to pulp
Crashing particles only newly found.
They figure their trajectories and gulp,
"So much data upon which to expound!"
Their energies unbound by quantum course,
They separate the world we think we know.
They rip particles into force by force.
Unification's where they say they'll go.
When they finally prove life's illusion,
Where do you think they'll publish the result?
They may just ascend beyond confusion
And leave us in the lurch of the occult,
For once that testimony's imparted,
Expostulation just seems false-hearted.

OK, this contest has been running pretty long now, so I think it's time to put it to bed.  Get your entries in now, because Monday, Feb. 25th is when we will start picking winners.

Dave

Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value -- Albert Einstein

Einstein and his crazy hair
About his looks, he did not care

It was physics that occupied his mind,
An equation for relativity he would find

m c squared is energy
because of Einstein this we see

His Nobel prize we cannot disguise
The photoelectric effect we cannot reject

Time dilates and length contracts
Einstein is awesome, these are the facts.

Due to quantum flux in which it is caught,
Schrödinger's cat's both still and a breather.
Something that has to be either or not
Can also be both while it is neither.
The observer is the important part,
Determining the final feline fate.
By measurement, there beats a feline heart:
By measurement, the purring does abate.
But there's a factor often overlooked
When staging this experiment in thought:
Before the box is closed and latch is hooked,
There's the observer within who's been caught.
Before the box opens on judgment-day,
The cat in the box has something to say.

Per perceiving predilections effect,
researchers search precautions to assure
that their constructed theories won't be wrecked
by accredited critics who abjure
results from lax experimentation
which funnels too few affecting factors.
Scientist's psyches lack isolation --
all audiences are also actors.
Objectivity varies with the minds
involved whose realities rarely budge;
what one expects to see is what one finds.
One must watch "blind" to impartially judge --
so data's distinct from observations
which bind to belief's anticipations.

If God wanted us to know everything
The universe would have stopped expanding,
Or, at least, its speed should be lessening,
Allowing us to gain understanding.
If we are limited to speed of light,
While God stretches the fabric far faster,
Then as long as we're here, try as we might,
We've got a horizon; past, it's vaster.
We'll never reach the end of what we see,
So how can we accurately surmise
God's unlimited creativity?
We can't ever grasp the whole enterprise.
We follow carrots of conjecturings
Beyond our "branes" and "tied" to superstrings.

Since we ourselves learned how to create,
We've pondered our night sky's creation.
"Twinkle, Twinkle," was the song we sang,
Till Science showed stars are condensate
Of dust and background radiation
From the silent light of the Big Bang.

We thought their movements controlled our fate,
Reflecting Divine machination --
Shining destinies placed out to hang --
But Physics has informed us of late,
Through sub-atomic perspication,
Uncertainty's the first law which sprang
From the Chaos that fostered our state,
And this precludes predestination;
Phenomenology's the harangue.

Dwarfed by the studies that make us great,
Adrift in cosmic segregation,
We find quark-serpents sharpest of fang.

The Universe is expanding,
Faster than the limit of light,
Beyond common understanding.

Cosmology is demanding.
Its study is by no means slight.
The Universe is expanding.

We have heroes quite outstanding
Who've applied their full mental might,
Beyond common understanding.

There's no point in reprimanding,
As we gaze out into the night,
The Universe is expanding.

The truth of fact is commanding.
Whatever is has to be right,
Beyond common understanding.

Einstein's physics notwithstanding,
Much quicker than what we call bright,
The Universe is expanding
Beyond common understanding.

Below subatomic, the particles
slip through Heisenberg's uncertainty nets.
They cannot even be called articles;
they're just mathematical epithets.
Though we may say they have up or down spins
(we may even find them charming or strange),
like angels that dance on the heads of pins,
it takes metaphysics to find their range.
They have no shape we can define, except
as bleary fields of energy.  Until
we measure them, there's no place where they're kept;
their locus is totally vibratile.
They pluck at space like an instrument string,
at this scale.  Quark!   The hadron angels sing!

There once was a fellow named Heaviside,
Whose step function gave current, electrified;
While it resembled his name,
This small claim to fame
Was peanuts to his Maxwell simplified.

Post edited October 30, 2007 at 11:31 AM EST.

Post edited October 30, 2007 at 11:35 AM EST.

Post edited December 11, 2007 at 12:40 PM EST.

Adjunct Professor of Physics, Editor of The Physics Teacher, and GWU SPS Chapter Advisor

Ok, so I'll go ahead and apologize to Dave for having a slightly more epic poem then I think he wanted but it's his own fault. He kept asking for poetry on facebook and once I got started and I just couldn't stop. So here's my physicists poem.


There's a wonderful story,
filled with sadness and glory,
on how we did fathom,
The plain simple atom.

Old India and Greece,
both had the first piece,
but it took a true hero
to bring doubt down to zero.

Many had fears,
to think the world spheres,
for how could we be,
just the same as a flea?

macro familiar,
micro peculiar,
all seemed just fine,
with a finely drawn line.

But Boltzmann suspected,
the two were connected,
by mathematics non trivial,
but rather statistical.

he formed an equation
with a mean distribution,
quite fiendish but solvable,
it was truly laudable.

Though Ludwig was troubled,
his mind sometimes stumbled,
from motion atomic,
to things far less comic.

We'll always remember,
that fateful September,
you ended your play,
in a most tragic way.

But your soul we did save,
for on top of your grave,
is a beautiful truth shown in full view.

That which I speak of,
is a physicist's true love,
S equals k Log W.

Most people think you need to see
To be able to do astronomy
But Kent Cullers showed differently
Though blind, he earned his physics PhD

After he graduated from Berkley
Kent started searching for ET
With the telescopes of SETI
Now he is their director of R&D!

(I was not hired for my poetry skills)

SPS Program Coordinator & Assistant Editor American Institute of Physics

There are only a few submissions so far.  I know we have some budding poets out there!  Show us what you've got!

Dave

Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value -- Albert Einstein

Rebel with a clue and cause
Broke the rules but knew the laws
of physics

In his youth, what a ham!
Well loved for his diagram(s)
Like all the best-a common link
You should not care what others think

A Challenger will find the smallest thing
As simple as a broke O-ring
So while you read this silly rhymi'n
You should think of Richard Feynman

a.k.a.- Pixie Tourette # i (imaginary number) Hotrod Honeys Texas Rollergirls

Do i use physics

planes, trains, and automobiles

god bless you Newton




one more hiaku for all of you......
this has been a great break from homework!!!!

Post edited October 2, 2007 at 2:15 AM EST.

photons, a particle or a wave

matter, could it be the same

physicists said this will be your grave

DeBroglie said that they were all lame

electron diffraction, could it be his save

or would DeBroglie go down, in shame

people thought that it was all lies.....

some one give DeBroglie the piece prize.





Okay....so im pretty sure i for got the rules to most poetry.  Either way i just thought this one was fun......

Post edited October 2, 2007 at 1:59 AM EST.

Schrodinger once said
is the cat dead or alive
he's a dog person




so that my hiaku......maybe that last line should have been "he's a cow person".

Since no one else has submitted, here's my contribution.

     Newton was not going to have it he

     Wanted to understand gravity

     It's said he saw an apple fall

     And then he could explain it all

     The force on projectiles was the same one

     That made the planets go 'round the sun


Show me what you can do!

Dave

Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value -- Albert Einstein

Hi Everyone,

     Here are the rules for the new contest:

We want you to write a poem about a famous physicist.  Poems can be in any form you want, but should not be "epic poems".  One to two stanzas should be the goal.  The poems be original, and should describe the life and work of the physicist in question.  Limericks are acceptable, but other styles of poetry are also encouraged.  For example (taken from "Color Me Physics"

Galileo was no dope
Looking through his telescope.
He would have to be much stupider
Not to see the moons of Jupiter.

Or,

Men said women can't do science
Marie Curie showed defiance.
She was not afraidy 'um
She discovered radium.

Up to three winners will be chosen by The Nucleus staff, and will receive either rainbow glasses and bubble pens, or a choice of t-shirt from the SPS store.

Have fun!

Dave

Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value -- Albert Einstein