CMS meeting in Charlottetown and CanaDAM at Ryerson
At a nice meeting here in beautiful Charlottetown. After some rain on Saturday, it is now gloriously sunny. The Canadian Mathematical Society summer meeting is one of the largest meetings of mathematicians in Canada. There are public lectures, various keynotes, business meetings, and the scientific session. Our session is on Graphs, Hypergraphs, and Designs. It…
Mind and action
When visiting the Curie Museum in Paris this May, I became aware that much of Marie Curie’s later work was devoted to the medical uses of radiation. Here was one of the most brilliant scientists of all time, two-time nobel prize winner, with a clear view towards the applications of her theoretical work. While I had…
How to burn a network
We have been taught since we were children not to disrupt the world around us. Keep quiet… Don’t make waves… Don’t start fires… What would you do, however, if you were encouraged to set fires? That is, burn things down as quickly as possible. It may seem like an odd question, and such thoughts in real…
Zombies vs Mathematicians!
A horde of ravenous zombies descends on a sole survivor loose in a ravaged city, filled with deserted streets and no help in sight. The survivor happens to be a Mathematician, and so has no weapons to use other than his mind. He has, therefore, no choice but to make a run for it. Which way…