With nothing but a good model, a few definitions, and some math, we’ll derive a fundamental relationship of chemistry.
Anyone who has ever taken a chemistry class has seen the Ideal Gas Law:
We misunderstand entropy because we’re taught it’s a measure of disorder, but the real definition of entropy is far more useful and intuitive.
Look, I get it. You can’t throw a textbook at someone with no formal understanding of statistical mechanics when they ask a question. An answer that someone cannot understand is worth as much to them as no answer at all. Even taking this fact into account, you shouldn’t give someone a wrong answer because you think they can’t understand the right answer.
In this article, I’m going to explain entropy and how it has nothing to do…
How pop-science can lead to science denial.
In appealing to the general public, pop-science must simplify science. While science communicators must often leave out the math in their simplifications, they can go too far and leave out other important information. Worse, some of these simplifications change the facts, giving false information undue credibility. Pseudoscientists can then exploit this false information to then push their narrative. In this article, I want to talk about a case of simplification gone wrong — Creationism and Entropy.
The Creationist Entropy Argument
While they may add their own spin on their entropy argument, the base of the argument is…
Back to School
From nothing but the definitions of derivatives and limits, we’ll prove one of the first derivative rules you’ll learn in undergrad calculus.
Becoming a master at physics requires a lot of work, but learning the techniques and guidelines in this article is taking the first step.
People often talk about physics as if it were merely a set of facts and equations: F=ma, energy can neither be created nor destroyed, E = mc², stars are giant balls of hydrogen fusing into helium and heavier elements, etc. These facts and equations can either form the base of our understanding or result from our understanding, but to do physics is to connect the two. …
Many people have rightly criticized Yandere Simulator’s overuse of if statements, but the issue is much more than switch statements can fix.
Disclaimer
I am only going to talk about one commonly proposed solution to the excessive use of if statements in the code of Yandere Simulator and nothing else about its development or any controversy surrounding it.
The Context
Yandere Simulator is filled to the brim with if else chains (sections of code in which the computer goes down a list of conditions to check and executes the code for the first satisfied condition) and extremely nested if statements (if statements inside if statements inside if statements, etc.), both of which are bad practice.
In this article, we’re going to explain how your computer uses memory and how you can work with your computer to write code that runs fast. To be clear, using memory properly will not make poorly written code easy to understand nor will it make a bad algorithm a good algorithm. Understanding how memory works, however, will help you find potential bottlenecks in your program and give you a way to solve them.
I once had to clean up some poorly written code for a job I had. When I say poorly written, I don’t mean something minor like it…
Joseph Mellor
Currently an Undergrad Student Majoring in Physics, Computer Science, and Math with a Minor in High Performance Computing. I intend to get a PhD in Physics.
