
Claude Shannon and Juggling - wallflower
http://www.juggle.org/claude-shannon-mathematician-engineer-genius-juggler/
======
chch
The mathematics of juggling definitely continues out from there, as well! [1]
is a video to get a taste of some of the ideas of the mathematics of the
patterns of juggling.

Then, when you figure out that a certain set of patterns are jugglable, you
try to figure out state diagrams for things like "What are all the possible
rhythms for juggling three objects, under some maximum number of beats in the
air?" [2]

I've definitely caught myself idly drawing ladder diagrams[3] before, then
plugging the mathematical results into Juggling Lab[4] to see what it would
look like, e.g. [5]. :)

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1zSlvQtKM4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1zSlvQtKM4)

[2]
[https://plus.maths.org/issue52/features/polster/state1.jpg](https://plus.maths.org/issue52/features/polster/state1.jpg)

[3]
[https://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/juggle/images/b/ba/0123...](https://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/juggle/images/b/ba/0123456_ladder.png/revision/latest?cb=20120709004920)

[4] [http://jugglinglab.sourceforge.net](http://jugglinglab.sourceforge.net)

[5]
[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/juggle/images/8/8f/86x4x...](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/juggle/images/8/8f/86x4x6_200.gif/revision/latest?cb=20120926190101)

~~~
eterm
I once around age 12 saw a talk of the mathematics of juggling and it inspired
me to go home and download some old software for playing around with juggling
patterns which I then did for hours and hours on end.

I'm now wondering if it's the same software, although this would have been
circa 1998. I recognise the use of "siteswap notation" though.

~~~
ColinWright
That may have been me.

~~~
ismail-s
Off-topic a bit, but just want to say your juggling talk is very good (and
IIRC got me to start juggling again). Although my friends found it odd when
they saw it a second time and realised how even your off-hand jokes were all
deliberate and planned.

~~~
SimonPStevens
I worked at a comedy club during university and this is totally normal.

We would usually have a set of comedians booked for the whole weekend, and in
the main their performances over the three nights would be identical. There
was the very occasional one who would do some ad-lib back and forth with the
crowd for a few minutes, but even those you would start to notice a pattern of
repeated jokes, or types of jokes if they were booked for more than a few
nights.

What was interesting was seeing the same acts return months later and find
their set was still 80% the same. They evolved material slowly over time.

------
ColinWright
I used to think people were "odd" for saying that a particular font was hard
to read, or that there were significant differences in the typeface used, but
this is nearly impossible for me to read. I copied the text out into an editor
and read it there.

It's a great read, and there were quite a few snippets I didn't know - for
example, I didn't know that it was Arthur Lewbel who tried to juggle upside
down.

Thank you for this.

~~~
uoaei
The newest Firefox version has a fantastic "Reader View"[1] that strips and
normalizes the formatting for easy reading, with larger text and a relatively
narrow column.

In addition to refusing to collect more data than it needs, this is a good
reason to switch away from Chrome/Safari/whatever.

[1] [https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-reader-view-
clu...](https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-reader-view-clutter-free-
web-pages)

~~~
feelin_googley
"... strips and normalizes the formatting for easy reading..."

While I applaud your comment, I think there is more to consider. Initially the
text has no formatting. Someone had to insert the markup. And why did they add
the markup? Why not just give us the text and let us add our own, if we want
it?

If we have a program, e.g. a custom text-filter, that can strip html tags and
other markup (formatting) from original text (content), then why do we need a
browser?

As a matter of practice, I use a text-only browser in VGA textmode. All text
looks the same, same VGA font, and the look of every website is much more
consistent than with a graphical browser, not to mention other benefits such
as text being larger, no bright white page backgrounds, less eyestrain,
complete absence of web ads, no auto-loading of tracking elements, etc.

With a text-only browser and without javascript many website design choices
become irrelevant. All websites more or less look the same. This makes reading
much easier and faster. It allows me to focus on the content, i.e., the data,
instead of potentially being distracted by web design i.e. the presentation of
data.

Needless to say it would be easy to write html "targeting" a text-only
browser. It is very forgiving and "normalizes" variation that might otherwise
be a problem.

(Do not misinterpret this comment: I have great respect for talented web
designers but there are sometimes situations where design can get in the way
of consuming data, as in the case of the OP.)

"Reader View" appears to be solving a problem that graphical browsers
themselves created. These browsers make web design relevant and thereby enable
not only spectacular, creative web design, but also difficulties in reading
for some users, among other problems.

Not knocking use of "Reader View" \- it is very useful - but just providing a
different perspective on why markup is being used to begin with and other ways
to achieve easier reading with larger text (and easily adjustable column
width).

~~~
adrianratnapala
_If we have a program, e.g. a custom text-filter, that can strip html tags and
other markup (formatting) from original text (content), then why do we need a
browser?_

The very early ideology of HTML was to describe structure and content fairly
minimally so that browsers could display it in whatever manner was right for
the user.

But it turned out that content producers had more influence with browser
makers than did content users (who after all don't pay anyone but the ISP).
And they want to have control over the user's screen, speaker and (ultimately)
brain. Hence pixel-perfect formatting, advanced CSS and of course JavaScript.

But that has sort-of changed for Mozilla. Their competitors have all the close
relationships with content producers, so they are trying to become friends
with users again. And thus their incentives have shifted to trying to recover
the original virtues of the web out of the current set of technologies.

It's a tricky thing to do, and I wish them luck.

------
dboreham
The other day my neighbor dropped 'round. We were chatting about wireless
networks. He asked if I knew anything about 5G deployments, citing the very
high data rates he'd heard of. I responded that I doubted Shannon was going to
allow the Marketing guys to fulfill their promises. He said "Oh that guy - he
was weird, always riding a unicycle around". Turns out my neighbor attended
MIT.

~~~
tzs
> He said "Oh that guy - he was weird, always riding a unicycle around". Turns
> out my neighbor attended MIT.

I bet that most top science/engineering schools have some interesting
eccentric characters like that. A book collecting the stories of such people
could be interesting.

For example, at Caltech when I was there in the late 70s and early 80s there
was a guy in his 60s people called "Renaissance Ralph" because he was usually
wearing a tutu and purple pantyhose that put one in mind of some kind of
jester. He'd hang around the library and sit in on lectures, and most people
had no idea who he was. We just figured he was some local eccentric who
enjoyed attending science lectures.

The school paper ran a story about him and told us who he was. He was Edward
E. Simmons, born in 1911. He got a B.S. degree from Caltech in 1934 and an
M.S. in 1936, and then continued at Caltech. In 1938 he invented the strain
gauge. Caltech claimed the patent rights, but Simmons sued and won the rights.

That made him a lot of money, and he apparently retired to a life of just
hanging around Pasadena and indulging his sartorial eccentricities until he
died in 2004 at the age of 93 from prostate cancer.

Here's some information about him:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_E._Simmons](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_E._Simmons)

[https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-
bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=79907...](https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-
bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=79907149)

------
nafey
Is a Claude Shanon biopic or theme park in work? There has been a flood of
articles about him in the last few weeks. This reminds me of the time a few
years back when general public discovered Nikola Tesla.

~~~
stagger87
This article as well as all of the others I have seen on the front page are
written by the two authors of a recent biography of Shannon. Smart
marketing...

~~~
oxymoron
Yep, pretty intense gerilla marketing on HN. Worked on me though... After the
first article I thought "I want to read that at some point." After the second
one, I added it to my wishlist. After they got Vincent Cerf to review it in
nature I gave up and ordered it. Finished reading it a few weeks ago. A bit
short, but well worth its money.

~~~
grzm
> _pretty intense gerilla marketing on HN_

It doesn't need to be targeted at HN: members of HN are members of the general
population, and the publishers/marketers of the book are understandably going
to be doing their jobs which includes getting articles written,w which members
of HN come across in the course of their lives. It's not surprising they would
then share these articles on HN.

Say an actor is making appearances on a bunch of different talk shows
promoting their upcoming movie. The fact that Alice and Bob find out they
happened to see the same actor on different shows while at the water cooler
doesn't mean the actor was targeting this particular water cooler or Alice and
Bob in particular.

------
ocrimgproc
I would be interested in creating a program that makes use of deep learning to
recognizes tricks and siteswap notation in a juggling video. If anyone is
interested in collaborating on this, drop me a line.

------
kdoherty
I haven't seen it posted yet here, but for anyone unfamiliar with mathematics
in juggling (or anyone with an hour to kill watching something entertaining),
there is a lecture/performance by Allen Knutson
([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38rf9FLhl-8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38rf9FLhl-8))
that I found to be a great intro (before I even knew I was looking for one!)
and got me excited about the subject.

------
foreigner
If you're interested, juggling mathematics has continued to advance since
Shannon's day. Google siteswap, prechac transformations, causal diagrams...

------
ColinWright
Among the other resources is the lecture I gave at the series of lectures
sponsored by MoMath:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNKFSpJIBO0#t=7m30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNKFSpJIBO0#t=7m30)

Intended for a general audience.

------
luxpir
His biographer was just interviewed on the latest ep of Chat with Traders if
anyone wants to hear more.

