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Getting there…

Posted in Biographical, Maynooth, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , on May 23, 2025 by telescoper

Despite having to take time out today to attend an Emergency Meeting of IFUT (about matters which may or may not be public soon), my marking duties are about halfway done and roughly on schedule. For one module, I have 60% of the assessment scores for 32 students and, for the other, about 40% of the assessment for 23 students. I make that about 51.6 of the total. The last piece of the puzzle won’t arrive on my desk until Wednesday morning, by which time I hope to have completed 100% of the 32, leaving just 60% of the 23, amounting to about 16.7% of the total, to be done in the second half of next week. I hope this clarifies the situation.

Meanwhile the weather has taken a turn for the worse, no doubt because of the imminent Bank Holiday weekend in the UK. Monday 26th is a holiday there. In Ireland, the next holiday is on Monday June 2nd, Lá Saoire i mí an Mheithimh See if you can pronounce that! Next Friday (30th May) is the day of the season finale of the National Symphony Orchestra at the National Concert Hall, which is Mahler’s 9th Symphony. I hope I’ll be finished marking in time for that so I can relax over the holiday weekend after what will have been a very hectic week and take some time off the following week to do a bit of travelling to attend to some personal matters.

Next week will start off, however, with the PhD viva of one of my students. I won’t be attending the actual examination, of course, but will be there for the subsequent formalities. It’s a distraction from grading, but a nice one.

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Physics & Theoretical Physics Undergraduate Final Examinations from 1985

Posted in Biographical, Education with tags , , on May 22, 2025 by telescoper

It is May 22nd 2025, so it’s 40 years to the day since started my final examinations in Physics and Theoretical Physics in the Natural Sciences Tripos at Cambridge University. These examinations concluded what was called Part II, the third and last year of a course which started out with four subjects (Part IA), then three (Part IB) I did double-physics and mathematics for IB.

The first paper of Part II was actually Paper Zero, an essay paper which I have already posted here. The five other papers are below; all six (including Paper Zero) were of three hours’ duration. You will see that Paper 4 is a very big one, because it contains questions pertaining to many options but each student did only a few. Unlike most of the theoretical physics students in my year I offered a theoretical project in lieu of part of Paper V, which means I was spared another three-hour paper. My project, incidentally, was on the computer simulation of a laser. My “prepared essay” was also on lasers Kilohertz and picoseconds in laser physics.

Looking at the papers I find a few things are different from what we do nowadays.

One is that Paper I was a general paper, with questions about random bits of physics. Most university physics courses these days do not have such papers (although I know of at least one that does…).

Another is that the course was not really modular. Each paper covered several different topics: Paper 2 for example covers Solid State Physics, Statistical and Thermal Physics and Electromagnetism; Paper 3 is Quantum Physics, Nuclear Physics and Particle Physics. In most modern university courses each of these would have a separate examination.

Other than that, some of the content (e.g. electromagnetism) is close to what you would find nowadays but in some areas (particle physics, for example) the 1985 paper is extremely dated.

As for the level difficulty, I can’t really comment. Take a look a the papers and decide for yourself!

(There is supposed to be a PDF preview, but it seems not to work on many web browsers, so You may hev to download the paper to view it.)

Paper_1_1985Download
Paper_2_1985Download
Paper_3_1985Download
Paper_4_1985Download
Paper_5_1985Download

Comments are welcome through the box below.

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Operation Marking Garden

Posted in Biographical, Education, Maynooth with tags , , on May 21, 2025 by telescoper

Posts will be a little thin for the next ten days or so here as I am preoccupied with correcting examinations and other assessments. I am spending most of the time doing that at home to avoid interruptions. I’ve also taken the opportunity afforded by this fine spell to do some laundry which I can peg out to dry outdoors. I think this is called multi-tasking. Fortunately (barring yesterday’s thunderstorms), the weather has been nice enough to do the marking outside, in my little garden.

Yesterday evening’s thunderstorms

A few years ago I posted an item about red valerian which grows in profusion around here on verges and embankments. Red valerian (aka spur valerian, kiss-me-quick, fox’s brush, devil’s beard & Jupiter’s beard among other names) is not to be confused with True Valerian, which has white (or very pale pink flowers). I mentioned in that post It’s red valerian (aka spur valerian, kiss-me-quick, fox’s brush, devil’s beard & Jupiter’s beard among other names). I mentioned in that post that I’d like to have some in my garden. Well, it seems that the seeds I planted have grown, perhaps spurred on by the rain yesterday evening:

red valerian

It’s not exactly a profusion, but it’s a start.

UPDATE: 31/05/25 On my way into Dublin by train I saw Red Valerian and True Valerian together by the railway tracks.

Anyway, I spent this morning marking until I remembered a couple of things I had to do on campus. That’s only 20 minutes’ walk for me so I went there at lunchtime, getting a haircut on the way. I stayed for lunch in Pugin Hall and then came back to continue with my correcting duties.

When I took a break for tea I suddenly remembered (for some reason) that the debit card on my UK bank account was about to expire and I hadn’t updated the address since I sold my house in Cardiff. Strangely, I couldn’t update my details online but instead had to use the telephone banking service. One can change to another address in the UK using the online banking app, but can’t do that if you’re moving abroad. Although it took longer to do than I had anticipated it might, the person I spoke to was very helpful. Fortunately they hadn’t yet despatched a replacement card and/or PIN so all was well.

So there you are. Another exciting day in the life of an academic has passed.

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R.I.P. Jayant Narlikar (1938-2025)

Posted in Biographical, R.I.P., The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , , , on May 20, 2025 by telescoper
Professor Jayant Vishnu Narlikar (1938-2025)

I heard this morning of the death at the age of 86 of renowned Indian cosmologist Jayant Vishnu Narlikar. I understand he died peacefully in his sleep in Pune after a brief illness.

Scientifically, Jayant Narlikar is probably best known for his work with Fred Hoyle on a conformal gravity theory and as an advocate of the Steady State theory of cosmology. In India however his fame extended far beyond the world of research, as an educator and science popularist, as well as Founder-Director of the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune. Those who met him – as I was lucky enough to do – will also remember him as a kind and gracious man, and a self-effacing inspirer of young scientists. During my visit I gave a talk there, which Narlikar attended, and we had a very nice conversation afterwards from which I learnt a huge amount.

The Directorship at IUCAA came with a house which had a very nice lawn, on which I remember playing croquet with Donald Lynden-Bell and others, but that’s another story. Another random thing I remember is that I remember is that Narlikar’s username on the IUCAA email system was “jvn” and he was often referred to informally by that name.

Although he never really abandoned the Steady State cosmology, despite the weight of evidence in favour if the Big Bang, it is to Narlikar’s great credit that he didn’t try to impose his own scientific ideas on those working at IUCAA. In fact he assembled an excellent group of cosmologists and astrophysicists and encourage them to do whatever they liked.

I first visited IUCAA in 1994 to work with Varun Sahni. In those days Westerners mainly went to Pune to visit an ashram (usually the one run by the guru Rajneesh). I remember when I arrived on the train from Mumbai and tried to get a taxi to the IUCAA campus, the driver asked me “which ashram?” I had long hair and a beard at that time, so I looked a potential hippy. I said, “No ashram. Professor Narlikar”. He knew exactly where to take me; “Narlikar” was a household name in India, where the newspapers are awash with tributes today (e.g. here) and where his loss will be keenly felt.

Rest in peace Jayant Narlikar (1938-2025)

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Botanical Garden

Posted in Biographical, Maynooth with tags , , , on May 13, 2025 by telescoper 
How many kinds of sweet flowers grow
In an English Irish country suburban garden?
I'll tell you now of some that I know
And those that I miss you'll surely pardon..
Bush Vetch (Vicia sepium)
Cowslip (Primula veris)
Scarlet Pimpernel (Lysimachia arvensis)
Meadow Foam (Limnanthes douglasii) aka Poached Egg Plant

These are all wild flowers, often considered to be weeds, but I like having them in my garden!

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Marking Time

Posted in Biographical, Education, Maynooth with tags , , , on May 12, 2025 by telescoper

So here we are, then, with only a few days before examinations start (next Friday, 16th May). The examinations for my two modules take place on Monday 19th and Tuesday 27th May, and after that I’ll be busy with marking for a while.

 

Marking doesn’t just mean written examinations. I have been teaching a module on Computational Physics to 3rd Year students here in Maynooth, and 40% of the assessment for that is a mini-project (usually done in groups of two or three). Early on the term, I put up a list of  16  projects and asked them to pick first second and third choices so I could form groups in such a way that most students get to work on a project they have actively chosen.

Anyway, the deadline for projects to be handed in passed last week so I’ve got a stack of those to mark which, you will realise, why I am indulging in a displacement activity by writing this blog post. My plan is to mark these during this week so that they’re done before the written examinations come in, which means by next Monday (19th). This year we have had a bigger class than usual, so this I have quite a lot of marking to do.

Last week also saw the deadline for the last assignment in Particle Physics to be handed in. I want to mark those as soon as possible, but I’m not sure I’ll have time this week, but I should be able to do them before the exam on the 27th.

Incidentally, one of the submissions of the last assignment came with a note that this was the last assignment the student had done in Maynooth and that the first one he had done, when he was in his first year, was also set by me.

 

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Last Remarks

Posted in Biographical, Education, Euclid, Maynooth, The Universe and Stuff, Uncategorized with tags , , on May 11, 2025 by telescoper

On Friday (9th May), the last day of undergraduate teaching at Maynooth, I gave the last lecture in my module on Particle Physics. I actually finished the syllabus on Tuesday (6th) so the final one was more a revision class than a lecture. I used it to go through some past examination questions and (try to) answer some general points raised by the class.

What surprised me about this lecture was that, as has usually been the case, there was more-or-less a full attendance. Examinations in Maynooth start on Friday (May 16th), but the Particle Physics examination is not until May 27th, near the end of the examination period. I therefore expected that many students would be concentrating on their revision for their other modules, which have exams earlier in the season or finishing their projects (which are due in before the exams start). There were one or two absences, but most came anyway. In fact there was even an extra student, one of our MSc students. When I saw him at the back of the lecture hall I asked, jokingly, why he had come. He replied “I haven’t got anything better to do”. I wasn’t sure how to interpret that!

That lecture was at 11am. Later that day, at 3pm, I gave a Departmental colloquium (which had quite a big audience). The title was Euclid: The Story So Far and the abstract was

The European Space Agency’s Euclid satellite was launched on 1st July 2023 and, after instrument calibration and performance verification, the main cosmological survey is now well under way. In this talk I will explain the main science goals of Euclid, give a brief summary of progress so far, showcase some of the science results already obtained, and set out the time line for future developments, including the main data releases and cosmological analysis.

The audience for these talks is very mixed: experimental and theoretical physics staff, postgraduates and even some undergraduate students (including some who were in my lecture earlier) so it was quite a general talk rather than one I might give to an specialist astrophysics audience. If you’re interested you can find the slides here.

Having a quick cup of tea after the end of the talk and before I headed off to catch the train, I talked briefly with a student who is taking his final examinations at Maynooth this year. He told me that I had actually given the first lecture he attended when he had just started his first year and the colloquium was the last talk he would attend at Maynooth. That would be the case for quite a few students in the audience, I suppose, but it won’t be true for any in future: I am no longer teaching any modules taken by first year students, and I’ll be retired when the current first year students graduate…

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Darkness into Light Maynooth

Posted in Biographical, Maynooth with tags , on May 10, 2025 by telescoper
The start
Dunboyne Road
The end
Carton House Grounds

It’s about 6am and I’m back home after Darkness into Light. Despite having to get up at half past three in the morning, it was a very enjoyable event: a large crowd of at least a thousand, and a lovely morning without a cloud in the sky, not particularly warm, but an acceptable 8°C, and made all the more atmospheric by the mist, especially over the grounds of Carton House (the entrance to which we passed en route) and the birdsong of the dawn chorus.

The walk itself is about 5km, but I had to walk about 2km from home to get to the start at Maynooth GAA and about 2km home from there afterwards, so it was a good bit of exercise. More importantly, I raised €312.28 for Pieta. Thank you to everyone who contributed! The fundraiser will stay open until the end of June if you’d like to donate you still can!

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go back to bed for a couple of hours…

P.S. Darkness into Light is a national event, as you can read here.

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After the Lectures

Posted in Biographical, Education, Maynooth, Music with tags , , on May 9, 2025 by telescoper

Today has been such a busy day that I’ve only got time for a quick post. This morning was spent preparing and delivering a revision lecture, and this afternoon preparing and delivering a Departmental Colloquium.  That done I headed straight for the railway station to get the train into Dublin and thence by foot to the National Concert Hall.

So here I am, sipping a glass of nicely chilled white wine as I wait for tonight’s performance. I’ll post a review tomorrow but, until then, Cheers!

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The Pope, the Atheist, a Black Cat and Dave Allen

Posted in Biographical, Television with tags , , , , , on May 7, 2025 by telescoper

Today is the day that 133 Cardinals gather in the Vatican to enter the autoclave (is this right? Ed) in which they will elect the next Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church. Good luck to them, as it seems like they will be under a lot of pressure for the next few days.

For some reason this news reminded me of the late great Irish comedian Dave Allen. He was hugely popular on British TV in the 70s and 80s. He had his own show in a prime-time slot on Saturday evenings on BBC1 for many years, which was mandatory family viewing in our house. The show included some pre-recorded sketches but I think the best bits involved him just sitting, talking and telling stories. He wasn’t a stand-up comedian. He didn’t often tell jokes either, his humour was mainly observational and satirical, especially about politics and religion. Although an atheist he never really mocked religious belief, but he did make fun of the pomposity and hypocrisy that often goes with it.

I found this quote in which he expresses thoughts about hierarchies very close to mine:

The hierarchy of everything in my life has always bothered me. I’m bothered by power. People, whoever they might be, whether it’s the government, or the policeman in the uniform, or the man on the door—they still irk me a bit.

Anyway, here he is telling a joke that seems relevant.

P.S. He always made out that the glass on the table beside him contained whisky, but it was always just a dash of ginger ale with an ice cube in it.

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