The Net Advance of Physics RETRO:
WEBLOG:
2013 June

Summer (Vivaldi's L'estate from Le quattro stagioni) on the streets of Warsaw.
Charles Babbage would not approve.

• FIVE LATEST BLOG ENTRIES: No, I can't count. See also Complete list, 2012 Oct 15 - Present
  • 2013 June 24: Irrlicht
  • 2013 June 17: Ringworld
  • 2013 June 3: Henri Poincaré's The Relativity of Space: An Illustrated, Annotated Edition in six parts, one new part released each day.
  • 2013 May 27: Through the Then-Unpaved Stars, the Turnpike Road (epilogue to A New Approach to Experimental History of Science)
  • 2013 Apr 08: A New Approach to Experimental History of Science in seven parts, plus an epilogue, released over two months.
  • 2013 Apr. 01: News from the Centre of the Universe
  • 2013 Mar. 11: Hermann Minkowski's Space and Time: An Illustrated, Annotated Edition
  • 2013 Mar. 04: Out of a Blizzard, "Dainty Hieroglyphics"

• INTERESTING ITEMS ELSEWHERE:
  • The Appendix: a journal, founded in December 2012, devoted to cenochronic history, although not mainly of science. Note in particular the interesting "Letters" section.
  • Is mathematical history written by the victors? by Jacques Bair et al. [Notices AMS 60, 886 (2013)]
  • Einstein's "Prague field-equation" -- another perspective by Domenico Giulini [2012/06] Re-examines one of Einstein's non-GR attempts at a theory of gravity.
  • Sur deux formules de Frobenius et Stickelberger et inversion de Lagrange by Roger Gay et al. [2013/06] Old mathematics lives on.
  • Note on Malmstèn's paper De Integralibus quibusdam definitis seriebusque infinitis by Alexander Aycock [2013/06] "We present a proof of the functional equation of the Dirichlet eta-function, which proof seems to be new but follows almost immediately from Malmstèn (1849)."
  • A critique of Sadi Carnot's work and a mathematical theory of the caloric by N. D. Hari Dass [2013/06] A paraphrase of Carnot's work in modern language, but including all of Carnot's assumptions, e.g. the existence of caloric. Cenochronic history-of-science at its best.
  • Instants in physics - point mechanics and general relativity by Domenico Giulini [2013/06] Attempts to revive, and apply to time, an approach to space investigated by James Thomson (brother of Lord Kelvin) and P. G. Tait.
  • Forty two years counting spots: solar observations by D. E. Hadden during 1890-1931 revisited by V. M. S. Carrasco et al. [2013/05] "We have recovered the sunspot observations made by David E. Hadden during 1890-1931 from Alta, Iowa. We have digitized the available data published by Hadden in different astronomical journals. This data series [has] been analyzed and compared with the standard sunspot number series. Moreover, we provide additional information on two great sunspot groups, previously not described, that originated two important extreme episodes of space weather on February 1892 and September 1898."
  • Central differences, Euler numbers and symbolic methods by Stuart Dowker [2013/05] Reviving some forgotten Nineteenth Century mathematics.
  • A Curious History of Sunspot Penumbræ by David H. Hathaway [2013/05]
  • The Giants' Shoulders #59: Roundup of history-of-science blogs, 2013 May.
  • Picturing science: inside a Georgian observatory by Rebekah Higgitt [2013/05] Carefully examines the details of a 1778 mezzotint depicting two assistants at work in Shirburn Castle Observatory.
  • Merrrrdrrrre!: Alfred Jarry and Père Ubu by Ian Pindar [TLS, 2013/04/17] Review of Alastair Brotchie's biography of the celebrated "pataphysicist" Jarry.
  • Fizeau's experiment: The original paper with translation and commentary. [Skull in the Stars, 2013/03/31]

• NEW ENTRIES: PEOPLE:
  • James Challis: A very distinguished Establishment astrophysicist who took the blame for Britain's failure to discover Neptune, advocated an unpopular hydrodynamic æther theory, and (in his capacity of Anglican clergyman) wrote about the identity of the Beast 666. [ÆTHER; ASTRONOMY; CELESTIAL MECHANICS; FLUID DYNAMICS; METEORS; MOON; PLANETS]
  • Hertha Ayrton: Electrical pioneer, feminist educator, saviour of many lives in the trenches of the Western Front: not a person in the eyes of the law, however, and therefore denied election to the Royal Society. [ELECTRICITY; FLUID DYNAMICS; WATER WAVES]

THE NET ADVANCE OF PHYSICS --- RETRO