Undefeated Speed

2008-12-23T20:21:00.000-08:00

The Fastest Stuff in the Universe

By Robert Roy Britt as Senior Science Writer
posted: 18 January 2005 06:29 am ET

SAN DIEGO -- If you're light, it's fairly easy to travel at your own speed -- that is to say 186,282 miles per second or 299,800 kilometers per second.

But if you are matter, then it's another matter altogether.

Nothing we know of zips along more quickly than light. Einstein, nearly 100 years ago, said it's not possible. For us, the speed limit makes strange sense: Go faster than light, and you could return before you've left, become your own grandpa, or perform other leaps of cosmic logic.

Fast forward a century. Astronomers are now measuring stuff -- material, matter, things -- that moves at so close to the speed of light you might think it'd make Einstein a bit nervous. His theory of relativity appears not to be endangered by the blazing speeds, though.

Among thee speed demons of the universe are Jupiter-sized blobs of hot gas embedded in streams of material ejected from hyperactive galaxies known as blazars. Last week at a meeting here of the American Astronomical Society, scientists announced they had measured blobs in blazar jets screaming through space at 99.9 percent of light-speed.

"This tells us that the physical processes at the cores of these galaxies ... are extremely energetic and are capable of propelling matter very close to the absolute cosmic speed limit," said Glenn Piner of Whittier College in Whittier, California.

Ponder the power of the fast moving superheated gas, known as plasma:

"To accelerate a bowling ball to the speed newly measured in these blazars would require all the energy produced in the world for an entire week," Piner said. "And the blobs of plasma in these jets are at least as massive as a large planet."

The blazar jets are running around the universe in some fast company. Slightly faster, in fact.

In another study presented at the meeting, ultra high-energy cosmic rays thought to originate in a collision of galaxy clusters are slamming into Earth's atmosphere at more than 99.9 percent of the speed of light. Measurements put the number at 99.9 followed by 19 more nines -- about as close to light-speed as you can get without splitting hairs.

The particles are not light, but actual matter. They are tiny, thought to be mostly protons, but the energy that motivates them is similarly fantastic, and the mechanisms may be intertwined.

Scientists still don't know the exact mechanisms involved in accelerating matter to such high speeds, however. In the case of a blazars, it appears a black hole is involved. Anchoring an active galaxy, a supermassive black hole draws gas inward. Some is swallowed, yet some is simply accelerated and then ejected in high-speed jets along the galaxy's axis of rotation. Intense, twisted magnetic fields may play a role.

Some ultra high-energy cosmic rays might originate in blazar jets, Piner told SPACE.com. But other phenomena may serve as particle accelerators in space, such as merging galaxies or colliding black holes.

Piner and his colleagues observed three blazars, known from previous observations to be super speedy, using the National Science Foundation's Very Long Baseline Array radio observatory.

The results confirm the previous work and pin down the speeds with greater accuracy. The phenomenal pace of the plasma blobs looks to have reached a limit.

"All the results from blazar jet observations are in agreement with Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity," Piner said. "The jets are accelerated right up to the edge of the speed-of-light barrier but not beyond, even though these are some of the most efficient accelerators in the universe."

A sequence of radio observations shows a plasma blob moving away from a blazar's core (right) over about 8.4 months. CREDIT: Piner et al., NRAO/AUI/NSF

Genius ? Hmmm

2008-12-23T19:55:00.000-08:00

Mary vos Savant at 228

Born August 11, 1946 is an American magazine columnist, author, lecturer and playwright who rose to fame through her listing in the Guinness Book of World Records under "Highest IQ". Since 1986 she has written Ask Marilyn, a Sunday column in Parade magazine in which she solves puzzles and answers questions from readers on a variety of subjects.

Biography
Born Marilyn Mach in St. Louis, Missouri, to Mary vos Savant and Joseph Mach. Vos Savant believes that both men and women should keep their premarital surnames for life, with sons taking their father's surname and daughters their mother's.[2] The word "savant", meaning a person of learning, appears twice in her family: her maternal grandmother's maiden name was Savant, while her maternal grandfather's surname was vos Savant. She is of German and Italian ancestry,[3] and is a descendant of physicist and philosopher Ernst Mach.[4] She attended Washington University in St. Louis, but dropped out to help with a family investment business, seeking financial freedom to pursue a career in writing.

Vos Savant's listing in the 1986 Guinness Book of World Records brought her widespread media attention. A profile in Parade accompanied by a selection of questions and her answers to them proved so popular that the magazine gave her a weekly column, "Ask Marilyn". In it, she solves puzzles of logic and mathematics and answers questions about philosophy, physics, politics, education, and human nature, as well as responding to more traditional requests for personal advice. "Ask Marilyn" has provided the basis for several of her books.

Vos Savant lives in New York City with her husband Robert Jarvik, the inventor of the Jarvik artificial heart, whom she married in August 1987. They have two children. She is Chief Financial Officer of Jarvik Heart, Inc., and is involved in cardiovascular disease research and prevention. She has served on the Board of Directors of the National Council on Economic Education and on the advisory boards of the National Association for Gifted Children and the National Women's History Museum, which in 1998 gave her a "Women Making History" Award, citing "her contribution to changing stereotypes about women".[5] She was named by Toastmasters International as one of the "Five Outstanding Speakers of 1999," and in 2003 received an honorary Doctor of Letters from The College of New Jersey.

Intelligence quotient score
It is generally acknowledged vos Savant has an extremely high intelligence quotient (IQ) score, and she has held memberships with the high-IQ societies, Mensa International and the Prometheus Society.[6] But there is much confusion over the actual value, with data and calculations variously yielding 167+, 186, 218, 228, and 230 (notice the high variance, which reflects the higher standard deviations which accompany high-range IQ tests).
Extremely high IQ measurement is an inexact science: high IQs are very difficult to quantify because so few people have IQs at that level, giving rise to the problems associated with small sample sizes, ceiling bumping caused by tests not designed to measure such high IQs, and fat tailing which gives the impression more high IQs exist than predicted by a normal distribution. Moreover, there are general disagreements and controversies over the validity of IQ scoring at any level.

Vos Savant was listed in each edition of the Guinness Book of World Records from 1986 to 1989 as having the "Highest IQ." Because subsequent editions have omitted the category, her column now reports her listing in "Guinness Hall of Fame." Guinness cites Vos Savant's performance on two intelligence tests: the Stanford-Binet and the Mega Test. She was administered the 1937 Stanford-Binet, Second Edition test ten,[3] which obtained ratio IQ scores by dividing the subject's mental age as assessed by the test by chronological age, then multiplying the quotient by 100. Vos Savant says her first test was in September 1956, and measured her ceiling mental age at 22 years and 10 months (22-10+), yielding an IQ of 228. This is the score listed by Guinness and in her books' "about the author" sections, and it is the one she gives in interviews. Sometimes, a rounded value of 230 appears due to the correct use of significant figures.

The 167+ IQ score is derived from school records indicating vos Savant took the Stanford-Binet in March 1957, at 10 years and 8 months, with a mental age 17-10+.[3] However, it is unclear how the recorded chronological age was derived as March is six or seven months from her August birthday. It is also unclear how this record relates to the accounts reported in Guinness and by vos Savant, but when asked about this in her column, she remarked that IQ is not very important by itself anyway[7]. It is also possible she was administered the test twice, as there were two forms of the Stanford-Binet at the time, "Form L" and "Form M".

Although test designer Ronald K. Hoeflin calculated her IQ at 218, this value was informally arrived at by using 10-6+ for chronological age, and 22-11+ for mental age, and thus seemingly has no obvious rationale. The Second Edition Stanford-Binet ceiling was 22 years and 10 months, not 11 months; and a 10 years and 6 months chronological age corresponds to neither the age in accounts by vos Savant's nor the school records cited by Baumgold.[8]

The second test reported by Guinness is the Mega Test, designed by Ronald K. Hoeflin, administered to vos Savant in the mid-1980s as an adult. The Mega Test yields deviation IQ values obtained by multiplying the subjects normalized z-score, or the rarity of the raw test score, by a constant standard deviation, and adding the product to 100. Vos Savant's raw score was 46 out of a possible 48, with 5.4 z-score, and standard deviation of 16, arriving at a 186 IQ in the 99.999997 percentile, with a rarity of 1 in 30 million.[9]

Assertions that vos Savant's IQ has dropped from 228 as a child to 186 as an adult are incorrect as the two numbers represent different types of IQ. Because upper half of the population, ratio IQs seem to follow a log-normal distribution, with a standard deviation of 0.15 for the natural logarithm of the ratio of mental age to chronological age, vos Savant's Stanford-Binet ratio IQ of 228 corresponds to a deviation IQ of 188, and her Mega Test deviation IQ of 186 corresponds to a ratio IQ of 224.[10]

Although vos Savant's IQ scores are among the highest recorded, the more extravagant sources, stating that she is the smartest person in the world and/or was a child prodigy, should be received with skepticism.[11][neutrality disputed] Vos Savant herself values IQ tests as measurements of a variety of mental abilities, and believes intelligence itself involves so many factors that "attempts to measure it are useless."[12]

Controversial solutions

Fermat's last theorem

Unfavorable to vos Savant was the outcome of the controversy following the publication of her book The World's Most Famous Math Problem in October 1993, a few months after the announcement by Andrew Wiles that he had proved Fermat's Last Theorem.[13] The book, which surveys the history of the theorem, drew criticism for its discontent with Wiles's proof; vos Savant was accused of misunderstanding mathematical induction, proof by contradiction, and imaginary numbers.[14][neutrality disputed]Especially contested was her view that Wiles's proof should be rejected for its use of non-Euclidean geometry. Specifically, she argued that because "the chain of proof is based in hyperbolic (Lobachevskian) geometry," and because squaring the circle is considered a "famous impossibility" despite being possible in hyperbolic geometry, then "if we reject a hyperbolic method of squaring the circle, we should also reject a hyperbolic proof of Fermat's last theorem."

Mathematicians pointed to differences between the two cases, distinguishing the use of hyperbolic geometry as a tool for proving Fermat's last theorem, from its use as a setting for squaring the circle: squaring the circle in hyperbolic geometry is a different problem from that of squaring it in Euclidean geometry. She was also criticized for rejecting hyperbolic geometry as a satisfactory basis for Wiles's proof, with critics pointing out that axiomatic set theory (rather than Euclidean geometry) is now the accepted foundation of mathematical proofs and that set theory is sufficiently robust to encompass both Euclidean and non-Euclidean geometry.

In a July 1995 addendum to the book, vos Savant retracts the argument, writing that she had viewed the theorem as "an intellectual challenge—'to find a proof with Fermat's tools,'" but that she is now willing to agree that there are no restrictions on what tools may be used.
The Monty Hall problem

Main article: Monty Hall problem

Perhaps the most well known event involving vos Savant began with a question in her 9 September 1990 column:

"Suppose you're on a game show, and you're given the choice of three doors. Behind one door is a car, the others, goats. You pick a door, say #1, and the host, who knows what's behind the doors, opens another door, say #3, which has a goat. He says to you: 'Do you want to pick door #2?' Is it to your advantage to switch your choice of doors?" —Craig F. Whitaker, Columbia, Maryland

This question, named "the Monty Hall problem" because of its similarity to scenarios on game show Let's Make a Deal, existed long before being posed to vos Savant, but was brought to nationwide attention by her column. Vos Savant answered arguing that the selection should be switched to door #2 because it has a 2/3 chance of success, while door #1 has just 1/3. This response provoked letters of thousands of readers, nearly all arguing doors #1 and #2 each have an equal chance of success. A follow-up column reaffirming her position served only to intensify the debate and soon became a feature article on the front page of The New York Times. Among the ranks of dissenting arguments were hundreds of academics and mathematicians excoriating her for propagating innumeracy.[15]

Under the most common interpretation of the problem where the host opens a losing door and offers a switch, vos Savant's answer is correct because her interpretation assumes the host will always avoid the door with the prize. However, having the host opening a door at random, or offering a switch only if the initial choice is correct, is a completely different problem, and is not the question for which she provided a solution. Marilyn addressed these issues by writing the following in Parade Magazine, "...the original answer defines certain conditions, the most significant of which is that the host always opens a losing door on purpose. Anything else is a different question." [16] In Vos Savant's second followup, she went further into an explanation of her assumptions and reasoning, and called on school teachers to present the problem to each of their classrooms. In her final column on the problem, she announced the results of the more than a thousand school experiments. Nearly 100% of the results concluded that it pays to switch. Of the readers who wrote computer simulations of the problem, about 97% reached the same conclusion. A majority of respondents now agree with her original solution, with half of the published letters declaring the letter writers had changed their minds.[17]

"Two boys" problem

Like the Monty Hall problem, the "two boys" or "second-sibling" problem predates Ask Marilyn, but generated controversy in the column,[18] first appearing there in 1991-92 in the context of baby beagles:

A shopkeeper says she has two new baby beagles to show you, but she doesn't know whether they're male, female, or a pair. You tell her that you want only a male, and she telephones the fellow who's giving them a bath. "Is at least one a male?" she asks him. "Yes!" she informs you with a smile. What is the probability that the other one is a male?
—Stephen I. Geller, Pasadena, California

When vos Savant replied "One out of three" readers[citation needed] wrote to argue that the odds were fifty-fifty. In a follow-up, she defended her answer, observing that "If we could shake a pair of puppies out of a cup the way we do dice, there are four ways they could land", in three of which at least one is male, but in only one of which both are male. See Boy or Girl paradox for solution details.

The problem re-emerged in 1996-97 with two cases juxtaposed:

Say that a woman and a man (who are unrelated) each has two children. We know that at least one of the woman's children is a boy and that the man's oldest child is a boy. Can you explain why the chances that the woman has two boys do not equal the chances that the man has two boys? My algebra teacher insists that the probability is greater that the man has two boys, but I think the chances may be the same. What do you think?

Vos Savant agreed with the algebra teacher, writing that the chances are only 1 out of 3 that the woman has two boys, but 1 out of 2 that the man has two boys. Readers argued for 1 out of 2 in both cases, prompting multiple follow-ups. Finally vos Savant started a survey, calling on women readers with exactly two children and at least one boy to tell her the sex of both children. With almost eighteen thousand responses, the results showed 35.9% (a little over 1 in 3) with two boys.

	Woman has
	young boy, older girl	young girl, older boy	2 boys	2 girls
Probability:	1/3	1/3	1/3	0

	Man has
	young boy, older girl	young girl, older boy	2 boys	2 girls
Probability:	0	1/2	1/2	0

Stephen Hawking at 209

- How high is Stephen Hawking's IQ? Steven answers the question here:
- How high is Hawking's IQ? The physicist replied that he didn't know. "People who boast about their IQ are losers," he said. (from this MSNBC, Nov 17, 2005 article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10086479/.
- Hawking originally became known by working on the Big Bang theory, followed by studying Black Holes.
- Hawking's family was from North London, but he was born in Oxford because ,after the second world war, Oxford was considered a safer place to have children.
- Hawking wanted to concentrate on Mathematics during his last years in high school, but his father wanted him to focus on chemistry because his alma mater (Oxford) did not have a mathematics program. Hawking's father wanted him to attend Oxford, also.
- What disease does Stephen Hawking have?
During Hawking's last year at college, in 1962, he noticed that he was becoming very
clumsy. After extensive medical testing during 1963, he was diagnosed with amyotrophic
lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's Disease). His physical condition continued to deteriorate,
and the doctor's thought that he would not live to complete his doctorate.
- In 1985, while Hawking was working on his first book A Brief History of Time, he fell ill with pneumonia while at CERN (a large particle accelerator) in Geneva, Switzerland. It was suggested that Hawking be taken off life support, but his family chose against this. He was flown to Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, England where a tracheotomy was performed. The tracheotomy saved his life, but left him without use of his voice. As a supplement, he uses a computer system equipped with an electronic voice.

Education:
- St. Albans High School for Girls (accepted boys up to age 10)
- St. Albans School
- University College at Oxford: Awarded a First Class Honours degree in Natural Science.
- Doctorate Degree from Cambridge in 1966.

"The prevailing attitude at Oxford at that time was very anti-work. You were supposed to be brilliant without effort, or accept your limitations and get a fourth-class degree. To work hard to get a better class of degree was regarded as the mark of a grey man - the worst epithet in the Oxford vocabulary."

Employment and Research:
- Cosmology Research at Cambridge under the supervision of Denis Sciama.
- Research Fellow at Gonville and Caius College.
- Professional Fellow at Gonville and Caius College.
- Institute of Astronomy in 1973 ??
- Professor of Gravitational Physics at Cambridge in 1977
- Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge since 1979. This position had previously been held by Sir Isaac Newton in 1669.

Concepts and Accomplishments:
- Studied the basic laws that govern the Universe.
- 1965 + 1970: Hawking studied the exceptions to Einstein's theory of general relativity, often in collaboration with Roger Penrose. He created various new mathematical techniques to study this in relation to cosmology.
- 1970: Hawking began to study black holes, and was able to show that black holes give off radiation. Also, he and Penrose showed that Einstein's General Theory of Relativity implied that the Big Bang was the beginning of the universe, and that Black Holes will be the end of it. From this, Hawking and Penrose concluded that the theory of General Relativity and Quantum Theory had to be combined.
- 1971: Hawking studied the creation of the Universe.
- 1983: Hawking's and Hartle's No Boundary Proposal stated that time and space have no boundaries, and therefore the laws of science would hold true everywhere, including at the beginning of the universe.
- 1988: Hawking's A Brief History of Time was published, despite the struggles he encountered due to his health. It was on the Sunday Times best-sellers list for 237 weeks, breaking all previous records. This is recorded in the 1998 Guiness Book of Records. The book has been translated into 33 languages and has sold 9 million copies.

Publications:
The Large Scale Structure of Spacetime, with G F R Ellis
General Relativity: An Einstein Centenary Survey, with W Israel,
300 Years of Gravity, with W Israel.
A Brief History of Time
Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays
The Universe in a Nutshell

Honours and Memberships:
- Twelve honorary degrees
- Awarded the CBE (1982)
- Companion of Honour (elected 1989).
- Fellow of The Royal Society (elected 1974).
- Member of the US National Academy of Sciences.

Awards
1975 Eddington Medal
1976 Hughes Medal of the Royal Society
1979 Albert Einstein Medal
1982 Order of the British Empire (Commander)
1985 Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
1986 Member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences
1988 Wolf Prize in Physics
1989 Prince of Asturias Awards in Concord
1989 Companion of Honour
1999 Julius Edgar Lilienfeld Prize of the American Physical Society
2003 Michelson Morley Award of Case Western Reserve University
2006 Copley Medal of the Royal Society

Family:
A Wife, Three Children, One Grandchild

Another list of GENIUS Man that ever lived :
=============================
1. Leonardo da Vinci Universal Genius,asal Italy, IQ 220
2. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe — Germany 210
3. Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz — Germany 205
4. Emanuel Swedenborg — Sweden 205
5. William James Sidis — USA 200
6. Kim Ung-Yong — Korea 200
7. Thomas Wolsey Politician England 200
8. Hugo Grotius Writer Holland 200
9. Sir Francis Galton Scientist & doctor England 200
10. John Stuart Mill Universal Genius England 200
11. Christopher Langan Bouncer & scientist & philosopher USA 195
12. Sarpi Councilor & theologian & historian Italy 195
13. George H. Choueiri A. C. E Leader Lebanon 195
14. Blaise Pascal Mathematician & religious philosopher France 195
15. Ludwig Wittgenstein Philosopher Austria 190
16. Phillipp Melanchthon Humanist & theologian Germany 190
17. PierreSimon de Laplace Astronomer & mathematician France 190
18. Philip Emeagwali Mathematician Nigeria 190
19. William Pitt (the Younger) Politician England 190
20. Voltaire Writer France 190
21. Albrecht von Haller Medical scientist Switzerland 190
22. George Berkeley Philosopher Ireland 190
23. Garry Kasparov Chess player Russia 190
24. Sir Isaac Newton Scientist England 190
25. Friedrich von Schelling Philosopher Germany 190
26. Arnauld Theologian France 190
27. Bobby Fischer Chess player USA 187
28. Marilyn vos Savant Writer USA 186
29. Galileo Galilei Physicist & astronomer & philosopher Italy 185
30. Joseph Louis Lagrange Mathematician & astronomer Italy/France 185
31. Ren Descartes Mathematician & philosopher France 185
32. Lord Byron Poet & writer England 180
33. David Hume Philosopher & politician Scotland 180
34. John H. Sununu Chief of Staff for President Bush USA 180
35. James Woods Actor USA 180
36. Madame de Stael Novelist & philosopher France 180
37. Charles Dickens Writer England 180
38. Thomas Chatterton Poet & writer England 180
39. Alexander Pope Poet & writer England 180
40. Buonarroti Michelangelo Artist, poet & architect Italy 180
41. Benjamin Netanyahu Israeli Prime Minister Israel 180
42. Arne Beurling Mathematician Sweden 180
43. Baruch Spinoza Philosopher Holland 175
44. Johannes Kepler Mathematician, physicist & astronomer Germany 175
45. Immanuel Kant Philosopher Germany 175
46. Robert Byrne Chess Player Irland 170
47. Johann Strauss Composer Germany 170
48. Hypatia Philosopher & mathematician Alexandria 170
49. Richard Wagner Composer Germany 170
50. Andrew J. Wiles Mathematician England 170
51. Sofia Kovalevskaya Mathematician & writer Sweden/Russia 170
52. Dr David Livingstone Explorer & doctor Scotland 170
53. Donald Byrne Chess Player Irland 170
54. Martin Luther Theorist Germany 170
55. Judith Polgar Chess player Hungary 170
56. Plato Philosopher Greece 170
57. George Friedrich H?ndel Composer Germany 170
58. Raphael Artist Italy 170
59. Felix Mendelssohn Composer Germany 165
60. Truman Cloak — – 165
61. JohnLocke Philosopher England 165
62. Ludwig van Beethoven Composer Germany 165
63. Charles Darwin Naturalist England 165
64. Carl von Linn Botanist Sweden 165
65. Johann Sebastian Bach Composer Germany 165
66. James Watt Physicist & technician Scotland 165
67. Friedrich Hegel Philosopher Germany 165
68. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Composer Austria 165
69. Jola Sigmond Teacher Sweden 161
70. Dolph Lundgren Actor Sweden 160
71. Bill Gates CEO, Microsoft USA 160
72. Albert Einstein Physicist USA 160
73. George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans) Writer England 160
74. Paul Allen Microsoft cofounder USA 160
75. Nicolaus Copernicus Astronomer Poland 160
76. Joseph Haydn Composer Austria 160
77. Benjamin Franklin Writer, scientist & politician USA 160
78. James Cook Explorer England 160
79. Stephen W. Hawking Physicist England 160
80. Sir Clive Sinclair Inventor England 159
81. Honor de Balzac Writer France 155
82. Anthonis van Dyck Artist Belgium 155
83. Miguel de Cervantes Writer Spain 155
84. Ralph Waldo Emerson Writer USA 155
85. Rembrandt van Rijn Artist Holland 155
86. Jonathan Swift Writer & theologian England 155
87. Sharon Stone Actress USA 154
88. John Quincy Adams President USA 153
89. George Sand Writer France 150
90. Rousseau Writer France 150
91. Jayne Mansfield — USA 149
92. H. C. Anderson Writer Denmark 145
93. Bonaparte Napoleon Emperor France 145
94. Richard Nixon Ex-President USA 143
95. Hjalmar Schacht Nazi officer Germany 143
96. Adolf Hitler Nazi leader Germany 141
97. Shakira Singer Colombia 140
98. Hillary Clinton Ex-President wife USA 140
99. Geena Davis Actress USA 140
100. Jean M. Auel Writer Canada 140

The Question is what is your IQ ?

They Are The Most

The Fastest Creature

Undefeated Speed

Genius ? Hmmm

The Beginning