In the spirit of Thanksgiving, a thanks to the readers of this blog : Thanks to the readers of this blog For staying with me thus far (Some of you now probably are Enjoying turkey and eggnog) In a month this blog will complete Three years (a hundred and fifty Posts). As a milestone that's nifty I thank the readers for this feat The book reviews are read the most I enjoy writing them as well I think if I can help books sell Then it was worth writing the posts The Nobel Prize

This post is about Occam's razor, i.e. the statement, that when presented with competing explanations for the same phenomenon, the one with the fewest assumptions is likely the correct one. It is often used prescriptively in its abbreviated form - "Choose the simplest explanation." Occam's razor is not a law, it is a rule of thumb. It is often useful and leads to the right answer. This post is about some major exceptions to the statement. I wrote it because I find people ofte

This is a review of the book This Amazingly Symmetrical World by L. Tarasov. Published in 1982, it is nonetheless an all-time Russian science popularization gem issued from Mir Publishers in the last century. It is very well-written and gorgeously illustrated, with arresting pictures on almost every page. The discussions are accessible, yet quite profound and revealing. Symmetry plays an incredibly fundamental role in physics. Nature seems to use symmetry as a way of imposin

A colleague from economics recently said he was interested in how physicists think, and more specifically, how they come up with research ideas. I thought it would be a good idea to try to set up a list, based on my reading and experiences, of the various techniques, voluntary or involuntary, that I have seen physicists use: Yielding to inspiration : These ideas come from the subconscious. First one has to fill the brain with a lot of information, then a lot of thinking has t