June 10, 2008
Life is a little busy as we are heading into our assessment period. I can’t quite believe that first Semester is over , marking work from that and we are planning the next. Where did the first half of the year go! Anyway things may be a bit sparodic for a little while.
May 19, 2008
I will be out of action this week as most of what I do has come to a screaming halt. I have put my back out. I am standing at the key board to write this! I wont be blogging for a week or so .
February 8, 2008
Toyota has developed a robot with such dexterity that it can play a violin. It is fairly soulless as music goes but as an achievement in robotics it’s pretty impressive.
Thanks for link goes to Four Strings
January 15, 2008
The winners of the 2007 Benoit Mandelbrot Fractal Art Contest have been announced. The site houses the top 49 entries and there are some stunning examples of fractal based art to be browsed.
Benoit Mandelbrot, the mathematician responsible for coining the term “fractal ” is the Honorary Chairman of this contest. For the introduction of this contest he writes
“What distinguishes fractal geometry within mathematics is an exceptional and uncanny characteristic. Its first steps are not tedious, hard, and unrewarding, but playful and extraordinarily easy, and provide rich reward in terms of stunning graphics. To the mathematician, they bring a bounty of very difficult conjectures that no one can solve. To the artist, they provide backbones around which imagination can play at will. To everyone, a few steps in about any direction bring extraordinary pleasure. Nothing is more serious than play. Let’s all play.”
December 12, 2007
I am taking a short break as its a busy time year here in OZ. Our academic year runs from Feb to November so I will back the second week in the new year . I don’t usually write posts like this but since Jude left a comment I thought I had better let people know.
October 23, 2007
Things will be quite around here for a couple of weeks or so as I am off to New Zealand for a little break.
