
Studying impossible systems with analogues - orcul
https://physicsworld.com/a/studying-impossible-systems-with-analogues/
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gjstein
Some of the most thought-provoking work I came across when I was studying
optics (laser physics) is referenced in this paper on "Optical Rogue Waves":
[https://arxiv.org/pdf/1410.3071.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1410.3071.pdf)

Rogue waves, made popular by their often ship-sinking behavior out at sea, are
extremely rare and therefore difficult to study by waiting around for them to
happen. Here, researchers inject noise into an otherwise stable laser system
(recall that light is also a wave) that has some small nonlinear properties
and rely on the high rate at which we can generate laser pules to observe
rogue waves at a high enough volume to study their properties.

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base3
A classic (quirky) electronics textbook teaches basic electronics with
analogies from high-school physics (mechanics and acoustics).

Dynamical Analogies, by Harry Olson:
[https://archive.org/details/DynamicalAnalogies](https://archive.org/details/DynamicalAnalogies)

It's in the public domain. I love it so much I had it printed and bound.

The book is based on lectures given in the 1930s & the math is nothing like
what we use now. I can't follow a lot of it. But the tables are intuitive &
the explanations are very clear.

~~~
btrettel
How is the math unlike anything used now? I have a BS in mechanical
engineering and the math in this looks entirely standard to me. Then again, I
did get a heavy dose of similarly theory as an undergraduate, and that's
rarely taught outside of fluid dynamics and heat transfer. Part of this seems
pretty similar to that.

The math might be unusual for a CS graduate, but my impression is that many CS
graduates seem unjustifiably afraid of continuous math, probably from a lack
of familiarity. Often the continuous case is easier, so being familiar with
both approaches can be useful.

