Recent content by bryanosaurus

A friend of mine posed the idea of having magnets on the bottom of cars drive over a large cage of conductor material buried under the pavement on the highway, as a way to generate electricity. Does this pose any practical application? Any immediate problems/concerns come to mind? I haven't had...

I just realized that was what I was over looking. Thanks, if I use i + j / |i + j| i get the correct answer.

The gradient I computed was: -2xi - 8yj If I am supposed to calculate \mathbf{\hat u} \cdot \nabla f, what unit vector am I supposed to use? As you said, i + j isn't a unit vector...

I am given z = 32 - x^{2} - 4y^{2} Starting at the point (3,2) in i + j direction, find if you are going up or down the hill and how fast. The way I thought to proceed was that the gradient would tell me if I was going down or up hill and that \left|\nabla z \right| would give me...

Thank you, yes I can solve from here. But I still don't understand why this was in the separation of variables chapter's problem set.

This is in a problem set for variables separate but I can't seem to separate them, and I do not know how to proceed. (x^2)dy + 2xy dx = (x^2) dx The solution given is: (3x^2)y = x^3 + c

Okay I got it now, I was fudging a sign when getting rid of the natural logs. Thanks :)

I am reviewing differential equations, going through H.S. Bear's book Diff Eq: Concise Course. The problem set for the variables separate section were pretty easy and straightforward except for this one, which I can't see how to arrive at the answer given in the book. I'm probably just missing...

Okay so if I am correct, what you are asking now is that for the electron to be detected, it must ionize whatever material the screen is made of, and if the electron is absorbed it remains in motion so therefore should still be described by the wave equation - and if it is still being described...

You are taking what I said out of context and failing to see the logic here. The wave function gives probability and collapses when the actual results are observed. Yes the dots would appear on the screen, but without someone looking at them the knowledge of where the particles wound up is still...

This is the reason why this experiment's results are so fascinating. Yes, sea waves through a naval port would give the same interference pattern. When you talk about sea waves, you are talking about pure waves propagating through a medium. The double slit experiment was done first with photons...

In the original post, you asked for a simple example for the collapse of the wave function. The double-slit experiment is the most basic example I can think of. The information given from a wave function is, in the most simplest terms, probability. When the particle hits the screen/film/whatever...

I know how to use Gaussian, but when I originally worked it out I had put the starting equations in wrong. That's why in the OP I thought I was wrong for using that method. Now that you posted the correct starting equations, I see my error. Thanks a lot, I sure wasted a lot of time getting hung...

Thank you. So I get something like this (eliminating x): x + 2y - 1.5z = 0 -y - .5z = 0 -3y - 1.5z = 0 I can't remember how to solve a set of equations like this where they are all set to zero. I thought the process was once a variable is eliminated, to solve for say cy = z then set...

Going through a mathematical physics book in the section about vector spaces, in the section showing how to prove vectors are linearly dependent their example is: Two vectors in 3-d space: A = i + 2j -1.5k B = i + j - 2k C = i - j - 3k are linearly dependent as we can write down 2A...