
Random Surfaces Hide an Intricate Order - theafh
https://www.quantamagazine.org/random-surfaces-hide-an-intricate-order-20190702/
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AstralStorm
I wonder how many people were confused by this "water is boiling at 212
degrees" bit. Sloppy, no unit, no pressure and not a typically used unit
either.

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lopmotr
It's usually a fair bet that if a writer on the general internet uses
ambiguous units, date formatting, or seasons, it's the American ones.

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jhoechtl
So where is the intricate order? I read the article, waiting to be surprised
by that intricate order but didn't see it.

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atomack
I think it means order in a way that's quite specific to the study of phase
transitions. In a phase transition a system switches between a disordered
phase (eg a gas) and an ordered phase (eg a solid) as measured by a so-called
'order parameter'. Here the transition is that of percolation (google it, or
percolation theory, for detail - it's a big subject by itself) which, in 2
dimensions say, transitions between a phase where the order parameter is zero
and there are just disconnected clusters with an expontential size
distribution, and a phase where the order parameter is non-zero and a cluster
is connected across the entire system. The critical point at which the
transition actually occurs tends to be the point of most interest and it's
characterised by power law distributions. So it's a slightly broader
definition of order than people outside the subject might be accustomed to.

Here, they analyse percolation on a random geometry and look at how this
influences the percolation transition. For instance, how the size of the
largest cluster scales with system size. This isn't new in itself, it's been
an interesting problem for at least a couple of decades. Just skimming the
paper, I _think_ what's new here is one or two new results for the combination
of this particular random geometry and percolation. I have to say, I didn't
quite get the sense of novelty from the paper that I felt the title of the
article promised.

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rappap
"How To Be An Artist - The Math Way"

* random data

* crunch through algorithm with audio/visual output

* sprinkle in constants - the algorithm itself counts

* re.: the article, make some arbitrary division between the constants

* tweak constants until it looks "interesting" \- take note that for some algorithms and styles of visualization certain constants help (1/2 in the article) - aaah fundamental truth about the universe whee whoo!

* art!

* discover that this is an obvious property of the relation between arbitrary set of constants A and arbitrary set of constants B

* endless, hopeless, bleak dispair - as befits an artist

* profit

The French are masterfully vapid, as ever. Nothing new under the sun.

