Not looking forward to the morning alarm...

[DrDrew]

Anyone else up this late?

Been working like a nutter right through till now. Not looking forward to the early alarm call to start another day

-Thought I'd get in early/late for pointless thread of the day -

 

[Monster Detail]

Anyone else up this late?

Been working like a nutter right through till now. Not looking forward to the early alarm call to start another day

-Thought I'd get in early/late for pointless thread of the day -

I'm still up, mate. What's your job?

 

[DrDrew]

I'm a researcher (pure maths for CAGD with engineering applications mainly) and university teacher. Up late trying to meet my own deadline (late night & complex number theoreys don't really mix that well), and got to be up in the morning to teach. What's keeping you up?

 

[Monster Detail]

I'm a researcher (pure maths for CAGD with engineering applications mainly) and university teacher. Up late trying to meet my own deadline (late night & complex number theoreys don't really mix that well), and got to be up in the morning to teach. What's keeping you up?

That sounds really cool. I'm always up at this time, just a screwed up body clock really, lol.

Something that I don't really understand about mathematic research etc is that surely all of the theories and equations have been done before, haven't they?

 

[DrDrew]

That sounds really cool. I'm always up at this time, just a screwed up body clock really, lol.

Something that I don't really understand about mathematic research etc is that surely all of the theories and equations have been done before, haven't they?

Fair play. I always used to be up at this time during my student days. Don't think I could keep up with it all the time now though.

There's lots of research which has been done and proven, but there is still so much out there to do. In relative terms we've only done the tip of the iceberg really. As well as coming up with new stuff, there's all sorts of research around just improving existing systems etc with new ideas. For instance the new equation I've come up with, and am working through at the moment, should hopefully increase the accuracy of certain manufacturing processes almost 1000 times, whilst cutting the run-time computational overhead hugely. And this is replacing something which was only done a few years ago.

There's also consumer need & industries driving some of the research, like the need for more efficient graphics algorithms to speed up the graphics card in your pc.

There's lots of things we know lots about, but don't know how to solve yet too. Some of them have very hefty rewards to solving, but will take something incredible to solve.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P_versus_NP_problem

The main problem that's going to start to face modern research before too long, is how massively in-depth you need to be before you can even start doing new research. You need to know so much about a field to even just compare existing stuff now, so getting new people in and up to speed will be more difficult.

P.S. sorry for the essay, my mind's running wierdly tonight

 

[Monster Detail]

That sounds really cool. I'm always up at this time, just a screwed up body clock really, lol.

Something that I don't really understand about mathematic research etc is that surely all of the theories and equations have been done before, haven't they?

Fair play. I always used to be up at this time during my student days. Don't think I could keep up with it all the time now though.

There's lots of research which has been done and proven, but there is still so much out there to do. In relative terms we've only done the tip of the iceberg really. As well as coming up with new stuff, there's all sorts of research around just improving existing systems etc with new ideas. For instance the new equation I've come up with, and am working through at the moment, should hopefully increase the accuracy of certain manufacturing processes almost 1000 times, whilst cutting the run-time computational overhead hugely. And this is replacing something which was only done a few years ago.

There's also consumer need & industries driving some of the research, like the need for more efficient graphics algorithms to speed up the graphics card in your pc.

There's lots of things we know lots about, but don't know how to solve yet too. Some of them have very hefty rewards to solving, but will take something incredible to solve.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P_versus_NP_problem

The main problem that's going to start to face modern research before too long, is how massively in-depth you need to be before you can even start doing new research. You need to know so much about a field to even just compare existing stuff now, so getting new people in and up to speed will be more difficult.

P.S. sorry for the essay, my mind's running wierdly tonight

I must say that all sounds surprisingly interesting considering it's basically just maths.

 

[singlespeed]

It's starting to get light outside and theres still a couple of hours left for the 6pm till 6am shift.

Only 12 shifts left, before a break

 

[Monster Detail]

It's starting to get light outside and theres still a couple of hours left for the 6pm till 6am shift.

Only 12 shifts left, before a break

That doesn't sound great, mate. Although at least you're being paid to be up at this time, by the sound of it. What is your job? I really must go to bed now, I'm going to force myself :!:

 

[singlespeed]

In the middle of the North Sea, suffering from a severe case of groundhog day, waiting on the drill floor as usual.

I plan on being in bed by 7, for some serious kip

 

[Al]

Mr Drew are you like the genius maths guy from Numb3rs? I love that show and what he (as a character) can do is amazing!

 

[Monster Detail]

In the middle of the North Sea, suffering from a severe case of groundhog day, waiting on the drill floor as usual.

I plan on being in bed by 7, for some serious kip

Are you in the Navy or Army then? Pretty cool that you've got internet there

 

[Al]

Are you in the Navy or Army then? Pretty cool that you've got internet there

There's just something utterly hilarious about that! The Navy? With an Internet connection? Never! :lol: :lol:

 

[Leanne]

Are you in the Navy or Army then? Pretty cool that you've got internet there

There's just something utterly hilarious about that! The Navy? With an Internet connection? Never! :lol: :lol:

^^^ PMSL

 

[Monster Detail]

Are you in the Navy or Army then? Pretty cool that you've got internet there

There's just something utterly hilarious about that! The Navy? With an Internet connection? Never! :lol: :lol:

In the middle of the North sea though, lol.

 

[DrDrew]

Mr Drew are you like the genius maths guy from Numb3rs? I love that show and what he (as a character) can do is amazing!

Am afraid I don't get to consult for the NSA or FBI etc , or work on quite such diverse topics

I do however have a massive whiteboard which is continuously updated with new equations as I derive them.

I do like Numb3rs, but doing much more crazy maths does ruin little bits of the show, knowing the lack of correlation between the what they're trying to do, and some of the maths they actually show - but that's to be expected really. If I was a medical doctor, I'm sure I'd think the same about programs like House.

 

[Al]

Ah, dam I was going to tell everyone I knew a Numb3rs genius

It sounds really interesting what you do though; I'd love to be able to formulate new equations but alas my mathematics skills are minimal.

 

[DrDrew]

Most maths is actually pretty simple. It's just that mathematicians know which steps they can skip/combine etc which makes it look more difficult. I think there's a great quote from Einstein which unfortunately a lot of maths teachers need to take note of

Most of it is just understanding where things originally come from and their relationships to basic items, which most people never see. I'll give a couple of gif's to demonstrate.

where the values of tan come from (sorry you'll have to rotate this one round 90 degrees clockwise)

The kind of curves and surface's I commonly work with, even in basic form look quite complicated
General form surface equation:

Example of a surface with control points showing

Curve equations:

but the way they work is relatively straightforwards - it's just the maths being very explicit.

If you brake appart the individual terms of the equations and explain them it's pretty straight forwards. It's often just a case of figuring out some notation. For example

is essentially a list of control points, with a weighting (how far the curve is dragged from a straight line towards the control point), and each point has a variable to control how far along the total line you are.

(Sorry for how the post turned out, it got quite long and didn't want to re-write it by the time I was at the bottom. Plus I can get quite excited by maths )

 

[Al]

To be honest it means nothing to me, but like most things I want to know. Things like this I'd have to sit with you and you explain it. There's no greater way to learn something than by experiental learning from someone who knows.

I am exactly the same with films; I get excited by the tiniest things related and end up rambling

 

[Leanne]

DrDrew can I marry your mind!! Love it!!

 

[HigtonA]

DrDrew can I marry your mind!! Love it!!

Just his mind.... :lol: pure genius