[time-nuts] radioactive decay rates change? Mr Shortts, a resonate ramble.
Max Robinson
max at maxsmusicplace.com
Wed Aug 25 04:38:31 UTC 2010
I don't have any of the toys I had as a kid because I was always taking them
apart to see how they worked. Most of the time I couldn't get them back
together and my dad wouldn't put them together for me. He said "you took it
apart, you put it back together". When I got a little older I was more
careful in how I took them apart so I could put them back together. Then I
started tinkering with clocks. Dad taught me how to remove the escapement
so the hands would really fly. One of the first things I did was to put a
tinker toy wheel on the hour hand shaft and run a string belt to the wheel
of a toy tractor. That was my first home made wind-up toy.
The tiny electric motors used in slot cars didn't come along until I was
fully grown. Who knows what I would have made if they had been available
when I was 10.
Regards.
Max. K 4 O D S.
Email: max at maxsmusicplace.com
Transistor site http://www.funwithtransistors.net
Vacuum tube site: http://www.funwithtubes.net
Music site: http://www.maxsmusicplace.com
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----- Original Message -----
From: "clock trust" <contact at clocktrust.com>
To: "Discussion of precise time and frequency measurement"
<time-nuts at febo.com>
Cc: "Kyle Bosworth" <gmemdf7 at yahoo.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 24, 2010 4:42 AM
Subject: Re: [time-nuts] radioactive decay rates change? Mr Shortts,a
resonate ramble.
> First of all, please excuse the English, I suffer from dyslexia. It was
> great to see the article by Dan Stober. After reading the article, I had
> thoughts on this summers day, flooded with electro-magnetic waves from the
> sun, after heavy rain fall, with the southern hem, in winter time and
> somebody talking on Radio 4 about people trapped in winter time under
> ground, just to say a few words about a single man, that change time and
> transmission of time signals, and the 20th century. More to the point,
> what makes these great people, what facilitates them to prototype, the
> good old blue peter badges of the future. These kind of resonated with
> Dans article, don't ask me why. For those that wade through the thick soup
> of dyslexia, that make up this article, please excuse the length. If you
> don't want to read it all, please go to the end bit.
>
> Well lets start to push and feel the force that pushes back. Its nearly
> 100 years since the Shortts clock was tested by prof Simpson (hope I
> smelt, sorry, spelt that right) in Edinburgh. Its first measured the
> effect, on a pendulum, due to lunar cycles, then the sun over the year and
> then we are told the variation in gravity due to the wobble of the earth.
> Three of these clocks went to the Bell institute and refinement of quartz
> oscillators continued to open the gate towards the electronic age. We had
> gone from the Royal pendulum (1 meter 1 second) to micro seconds. A big
> jump with massive improvements on accuracy, resolution, precision....
>
> The weird thing gravity itself, with an expanding universe. Its the
> joining force that acts locally, trying to collect back mass systems. I
> know most adults have difficulty with this, they understand buoyancy, but
> gravity seen as just belonging to big things like planets. We do start are
> a very early age, to unpeel this understanding. Guess what the teaching
> aid is, a model of a shorts clock. Its an experiment that can run for many
> years, and called the race4time. (Please if you still have your pendulum
> master clock in your school keep it, grab it and get it in the physics
> lab).
>
> Every time we do the workshop on the clock, I have to say, 'Hang on, the
> pendulum, this tiny mass system, is influenced by something 670 million
> miles away', one student literally shouted out, 'space is not empty, its a
> fabric that allows for transmission of energy, gravity and
> electromagnetic...'. Just a great way to start 101 questions that make
> think. One student explained that per meter squared, we can get up to 90kw
> of energy, from the sun, which of course has equivalent mass, with
> electro-magnetic waves from the sun. Its a love story of resonance that
> continues, if you push there must be something pushing (forces in pairs,
> good old Newton) against, in the same way transmission of any energy,
> depends on the 'soup' its transmitted in. With the purest environment,
> that constant we use for the limit of everything, C.
>
> If you do one thing next year, tell your students about the marvelous man
> Mr. Shortts, a humble railways (civil engineer) that put in to production
> the master-slave clock (two pendulums one free in a vacuum, the other
> synchronized to it), that opened the door to the Quartz age, electronics
> and the computer. Apparently in 2020 we would have reached the zenith of
> the electronic (solid sate) development, looking for a new clock, or
> concurrency through parallel processing, perhaps time for Occam and the
> transputer age?
>
> We are going to need a new age of math's, physics, electrical, electronic,
> chemistry.....A new drum to beat against. Or what ever the new
> multi-disciplines will be, to enable the ever increasing length of the
> journey of discovery to be transferred to new minds, the future. With
> science being inclusive, rather than separate, sure this is possible. This
> week, two very bright students, have turned away from physics, one went to
> University and found a harsh environment, the other barely a year into his
> course. This is a great shame or do we want this survival of the fittest,
> these where bright students, it was the environment they had problems
> with. Again inclusion as early as possible, gives broad understanding to
> population, those that want to follow the journey further, the future
> scientist. Without getting political, in a money orientated world, most of
> the jumps between principle to production, by good communicators, able to
> get the funding. So it could be survival of those that can speak the gab?
>
> If we look at the past, from Harrison with the chronometer, Lord
> Grinthorpe with gravity arm, Hope Jones and the synchronome (radio
> transmission of time signals soon after Marconi, the Horophone and good
> old Brillie master clock system and effile tower) and Mr. Shortts free
> pendulum. The jumps, to resonating strips of metal, to quartz, atomic,
> light and nuclear, we have gone from the heavens to the elementary
> particles, almost in 100 years. (By the way the development of the Shortts
> clock was delayed, he had to serve in the first world war). What is so
> breath taking, given the opportunity, these normal individuals with the
> Great Britain Island mentality, change the world.
>
> I wonder who will be developing the new clock/oscillator/synchronizer for
> the 21st Century? In ever increasing transmission and electro magnetic
> interferences, from eco LED lights, that should be run of low voltage
> power supplies to cars that will need charging, but need an
> inter-changeable battery system, park and swap, to vehicles that optimize
> the roads we all use, we push and push harder. But as we know with the up
> and coming Olympics, this is not a linear push, the nearer you get to
> physical limitations the harder it becomes to push, not even Top Gear can
> change the fabric and fundamental physics of space, well not yet. This is
> the realms of imagination, but the most wonderful thing, is as soon as are
> parents had some fun, we became part of science, its all inclusive, we
> make it controlled (simpler) with white coats and labs, experiments, but
> science surrounds all of us, you push against your pedals, with your bike,
> the mixture of refined fossil oil and air, though the throttle of your
> car, in the jet engine, those great hair dryer in the ski, to the humble
> hovercraft, we keep on pushing.
>
> So science is inclusive, its the very fabric of space-time. The big
> challenge now is to close the loop on consumerism, designs, where products
> go back to manufacture, looking for the exact materials to repair, reuse
> or recycle, to make again in a sustainable way. Its a complex world, not
> an open ended one with assumption of no limitations, to ones with
> sustainable loops. Again without getting too political, the slight tilt of
> the earth, giving counter seasons from north to south and as we explain to
> very young children with a model of a solar system, the goldilocks story,
> we are not to close, warm, or to far away, we are just right in the
> middle. It would be a shame to waste this! Whether the Earth can cope with
> us, we are using materials that took millions of years to form, great for
> plastic, but just burning them seems daft? Are we made as hatters, mixing
> up nappies, sanitary towels, old tomatoes with materials that can be
> recycle. The composting of one gives heat, gases and compost, the other
> valuable materials.
>
> I was told by a good control engineer, all constants are assumptions,
> until proven other wise. Again the lovely article by Dan, reasoning this
> point, if its pushing out and at a certain velocity, something is pushing
> back. We did a lovely session, 'do atoms die', 'why are all electrons and
> photons' the same. Its the discovery, the magic, the treasure trail,
> sometimes simple fact and figures don't resonate will all children. The
> beauty of the mechanical age is its visible, and the core reason we set up
> the center, we have water meters that teach calculus! It would be
> interesting to know what the great scientist did as children? Well lets
> ask this big question to this group now:
>
>END
>BIT----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> 1st Response
>
> 1) Motivation: What would you list the reasons you followed the path to
> becoming a scientist and the ability to teach it?
> 2) Choices, Creative Opportunities: Where would you say the cross-roads
> where?
> 3) Effort and Reward: What/Who encourage you, what hurdles?
> 4) Consequences: What would you have done if these hurdles to high?
> 5) Future Motivation: You got through all the hurdles as scientist and now
> teachers of science, how?
>
> Then read this, no cheating.
>
> 2nd Response. This is to map a journey. It may simply not apply to you.
> That's fine, but we would still like to know. We want to know if it
> started, the progression of this. WHO, WHAT, WHY, WHEN, HOW as your
> childhood developed. You may wish to avoids the clumsy attempt to
> structure a set of questions and just give your account. That's fine. We
> are not here to measure just to see if their is a link between taking
> things apart as a child and the development of mapping skills, how things
> work. The accounts of your childhood experiences can be un-named, but
> would be a shame to be so. We want to develop the www.reclaimfun.com
> website and we need to show the link and have some great stories that
> inspire.
>
> 1) Were you able to take items apart when you where young?
> 1a) Who did you do this with and when did it start?
> 1b) How did this progress?
> 1c) Where were the places that this took place?
> 2) Were your family/friends (please state) ones that allowed you to
> explore and take the risk of creative opportunities?
> 3) If you did take things apart, did you discover how they worked?
> 3a) Who assisted with this understanding or what sources of information
> 4) Did you make things from the things you took apart?
> 5) Have you ever thought of the process of taking something apart as a
> child, fundamental to your passion and career development?
> 5a) Do you still take things apart, if you stopped when was this?
>
> Obviously, would be nice to get some replies, but please do this using
> contact at clocktrust.com . We are trying to find out the 'importance of
> taking things apart'. Please feel free to pass this on to the great and
> the good. Its a simple question we feel at the very core of inventorship,
> those creative opportunities. If you have read the main article, just one
> real question, where you allowed to take things apart as a child? By
> reference to Mr. Shortts and tolerant family, his house, like mine full of
> dis-assembled items, waiting for the creative opportunity of them becoming
> something else. One thing Mr. Shortts had, was a lot of washing machine
> bits, apparently, but he witnessed the first controller of a potential
> automatic washing machine, in 1920, the synchronome bell ringer, with
> programmable clock and two motors, for Westminster/Winchester/wittering
> chimes and strike motors, they could have been equally wash and spin.
> Sometimes you have to push in un-know terriritory, but their is always
> something pushing back.
>
> Very best wishes Paul
> Dr Paul Strickland
> www.timemachinefun.com
>
>
>
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