Archive for Imbolc

Imbolc – the Quickening of the Year

Posted in Biographical with tags , , on February 1, 2023 by telescoper

It is 1st February 2023, which means that today is Imbolc, a Gaelic festival marking the point halfway between the winter solstice and vernal equinox.  In the old pagan calendar, this day is regarded as the first day of spring, as it is roughly the time when the first spring lambs are born, daffodils etc start to appear, and the days get noticeably longer.  It corresponds to the Welsh Gŵyl Fair y Canhwyllau and is also sometimes called, rather beautifully, The Quickening of the Year.  It’s a time for rebirth and renewal after the darkness of winter. Walking by the canal on my way to work this morning, I passed a place where two swans have nested for many years. I noticed that last year’s cygnets – which I saw on Monday with their parents – now appear to have departed for pastures new. That is the way of things. It won’t be long until this year’s chicks appear.

In Ireland Imbolc is usually often referred to a Lá Fhéile Bríde,  St Brigid’s Day, after St Brigid of Kildare, whose feast day is 1st February.

In the Northern hemisphere, in astronomical terms, the solar year is defined by the two solstices (summer, around June 21st, and winter, around December 21st) and the equinoxes (spring, around March 21st, and Autumn, around September 21st). These four events divide the year into four roughly equal parts of about 13 weeks each.

If you divide each of these intervals in two you divide the year into eight pieces of six and a bit weeks each. The dates midway between the astronomical events mentioned above are the cross-quarter days, of which Imbolc is one. They are:

  • 1st February: Imbolc (Candlemas)
  • 1st May: Beltane (Mayday)
  • 1st August: Lughnasadh (Lammas)
  • 1st November: Samhain (All Saints Day)

The names I’ve added in italics are taken from the Celtic/neo-Pagan and, in parenthesis the Christian terms), for the cross-quarter days. These timings are rough because the dates of the equinoxes and solstices vary from year to year. Imbolc is often taken to be the 2nd of February (Groundhog Day) and Samhain is sometimes taken to be October 31st, Halloween but hopefully you get the point that although the Pagan festivals have been appropriated by the Christian church, they have much older origins.

The last three of these also coincide closely with existing Bank Holidays in Ireland, though these are always on Mondays so may happen a few days away. Until this year, however, there wasn’t a holiday for Imbolc. Last year, however, the Government decided to create a new Bank Holiday that corrects this anomaly. The first such holiday is next Monday, 6th February, the new St Brigid’s Day holiday.  which also happens to be the first national holiday in Ireland to be named after a woman.


Incidentally, the Celts counted each day starting from sunset, so the Imbolc/St Brigid’s Day celebrations in County Kildare started last night, 31st January. Maynooth Castle – or at least the remains thereof – was illuminated last night, though I was not there to witness it.

As it also happens, today is my first Advanced Electromagnetism lecture of Semester 2 and also the 5th anniversary of the very first lecture I gave in Maynooth, on Computational Physics on 1st February 2018…

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The Start of Spring Semester

Posted in Biographical, Education, Maynooth with tags , , , , , , , on February 1, 2021 by telescoper

It’s February 1st 2021, which means that today is Imbolc, a Gaelic festival marking the point halfway between the winter solstice and vernal equinox, i.e. it’s a Cross-Quarter Day. To be pedantic, Imbolc is actually the period between this evening and tomorrow evening as in the Celtic calendar days were counted from sunset to sunset.

The first Day of February is also the Feast day of St Brigid of Kildare (c. 451-525), one of Ireland’s patron saints along with Saints Patrick and Colm Cille. One of her miraculous powers was the ability to change water into ale, which perhaps explains her enduring popularity among the Irish.

In Ireland this day is sometimes regarded as the first day of spring, as it is roughly the time when the first spring lambs are born. It corresponds to the Welsh Gŵyl Fair y Canhwyllau and is also known as the `Cross Quarter Day’ or (my favourite) `The Quickening of the Year’. According to legend it is also the day on which jackdaws mate. Given how many of them there are around Maynooth there should be a lot of action today.

Today is, appropriately enough in the light of all this, the start of the Spring Semester of teaching at Maynooth University, the fourth Spring Semester I will have experienced here although this is obviously not like the others in that we’ll be teaching online at least for the first half and probably for the entirety. I was planning to stay at home today but I realised I’d left some things I need in the office on campus so will have to go to collect them. That’s why I’m up early. That and the need to shake myself out of the lockdown torpor that has afflicted me since New Year. It’s time to get my act together, pull my finger out, put my best foot forward, etc.

This Semester I am teaching Engineering Mathematics II, Computational Physics I and Advanced Electromagnetism. The former, what you would probably call a `service course’, covers a mixture of things, mainly Linear Algebra but with some other bits thrown in for fun, such as Laplace transforms. Interestingly I find the Mathematical Physics students do not encounter Laplace Transforms in the first year, but perhaps engineers use them more often than physicists do? I think I’ve written only one paper that made use of a Laplace transform. Anyway, I have to start with this topic as the students need some knowledge of it for some other module they’re taking this semester. I reckon six lectures will be enough to give them what they need. That’s two weeks of lectures, there being three lectures a week for this module.

Once again my teaching timetable for this module is quite nice. I have lectures on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and then the students have a choice of tutorial (on either Thursday or Friday). That means I can get through a decent amount of material each week before each tutorial. I don’t do the tutorials, by the way: that’s left to one of our PhD students, who gets paid for doing that and correcting the weekly coursework. There are about 50 students on this module, divided into two courses: Electronic Engineering and Robotics and Intelligent Devices. We don’t have Civil or Mechanical or Chemical Engineering, etc, at Maynooth, in case you were wondering. Lectures will be done as webcasts using Panopto but also recorded for later viewing.

My first Computational Physics lecture, which I will do from home, is on Thursday, after which there is a lab session which we will do via Microsoft Teams. That’s the way we did it after lockdown last year and it worked OK. Students attend one two-hour lab session in addition to the lecture, on either Thursday or Tuesday. The first lecture being on Thursday the first lab session will be Thursday afternoon, with the same material being covered the following Tuesday. Fortunately, Python is free to download and easy to install so it’s quite straightforward to run the labs remotely. Teams has a screen sharing facility so it’s quite easy for myself or my demonstrator to see what is wrong in the same way we would do in a laboratory class.

The Advanced Electromagnetism module is a new one for me but I’m quite looking forward to it. Being a final-year module its content is less prescriptive than others and I’ll be adding a few things that I find interesting. Both lectures for that one are on Wednesdays and again will be given as webcasts with recordings available later.

Today is a particularly busy day because in addition to my first lecture (at 2pm) I have a meeting of Academic Council (3pm via Teams), a Euclid telecon (via Zoom) and a meeting with my PhD student via Teams. I have also been trying to sort out tutors and tutorials for the forthcoming Semester: these don’t start until next week so there’s time, but it has been quite a challenge to get everyone sorted. Fortunately I think that’s now done.

Oh, and another thing. I signed up for Irish language lessons (Beginners Level) and will be having classes once a week from now on.

It’s going to be a very busy term but I reckon being busy is probably going to be a good way to get through the next few months.

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Spring Semester Starts

Posted in Biographical, Education, Maynooth with tags , , , , , , on February 3, 2020 by telescoper

It’s February 3rd 2020, which means that today is two days after Imbolc, a Gaelic festival marking the point halfway between the winter solstice and vernal equinox. The 1st Day of February is also the Feast day of St Brigid of Kildare (c. 451-525), one of Ireland’s patron saints along with Saints Patrick and Colm Cille. One of her miraculous powers was the ability to change water into ale, which perhaps explains her enduring popularity among the Irish.

In Ireland this day is sometimes regarded as the first day of spring, as it is roughly the time when the first spring lambs are born. It corresponds to the Welsh Gŵyl Fair y Canhwyllau and is also known as the `Cross Quarter Day’ or (my favourite) `The Quickening of the Year’.

Today is, appropriately enough in the light of all this, the start of the Spring Semester of teaching at Maynooth University, the third Spring Semester I will have experienced here. The weather has even played along; it has definitely been spring-like. The Campus, whicgh has beenhas been very quiet for the last week or so since the examinations finished, is full of students again.

This Semester, as was the case last year, I am teaching Engineering Mathematics II and Computational Physics I. The former, what you would probably call a `service course’, covers a mixture of things, mainly Linear Algebra but with some other bits thrown in for fun, such as Laplace transforms. Interestingly I find the Mathematical Physics students do not encounter Laplace Transforms in the first year, but perhaps engineers use them more often than physicists do? I think I’ve written only one paper that made use of a Laplace transform. Anyway, I have to start with this topic as the students need some knowledge of it for some other module they’re taking this semester. I reckon six lectures will be enough to give them what they need. That’s two weeks of lectures, there being three lectures a week for this module.

Once again my teaching timetable for this module is quite nice. I have lectures on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and then the students have a choice of tutorial (on either Thursday or Friday). That means I can get through a decent amount of material each week before each tutorial. I don’t do the tutorials, by the way: that’s left to one of our PhD students, who gets paid for doing that and correcting the weekly coursework. There are about 50 students on this module, divided into two courses: Electronic Engineering and Robotics and Intelligent Devices. We don’t have Civil or Mechanical or Chemical Engineering, etc at Maynooth, in case you were wondering.

Anyway, my first lecture was this afternoon at 2pm and had a good turnout. It was so sunny outside that we had to close all the blinds. That’s quite an unusual event for a February lecture!

My first Computational Physics lecture is on Thursday, after which it will be back to the Department for some frantic behind-the-scenes activity ahead of the afternoon lab session, which is in a computer room near my office. Students attend one two-hour lab session in addition to the lecture, on either Thursday or Tuesday. The first lecture being on Thursday the first lab session will be Thursday afternoon, with the same material being covered the following Tuesday.

While my teaching duties are the same this year as they were in the corresponding semester last year, there is a significant difference this year in that I am now also Head of Department. Either side of my first lecture I had to attend a meeting of the Faculty Executive for Science & Engineering, a meeting on `Project LEGO’ (which, sadly, did not involve any actual Lego but was instead about the proposed redesign of the University’s website) and a meeting of Academic Council. I have also been trying to sort out tutors and tutorials for the forthcoming Semester: these don’t start until next week so there’s time, but it’s quite a challenge to get everyone sorted out. A few timetable clashes have also come to light. So, in summary, I’m a bit worn out after today and will shortly go home to vegetate.

At least I didn’t have to find time for the regular Monday afternoon Euclid telecon in which I usually participate. There wasn’t one today because the working group of which I am part is actually meeting in person for a few days… in Paris! I couldn’t go because of all the above!

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Ahead of Teaching

Posted in Biographical, Education, mathematics, Maynooth, Music with tags , , , , on February 3, 2019 by telescoper

It’s 3rd February 2019, which means that today is two days after Imbolc, a Gaelic festival marking the point halfway between the winter solstice and vernal equinox. This either happens 1st or 2nd February, and this year it was former, i.e. last Friday In Ireland this day is sometimes regarded as the first day of spring, as it is roughly the time when the first spring lambs are born. It corresponds to the Welsh Gŵyl Fair y Canhwyllau and is also known as the `Cross Quarter Day’ or (my favourite) `The Quickening of the Year’.

I wrote a post about this time last year, on the day I gave my first ever lecture in Maynooth University, on Computational Physics, in a theatre called Physics Hall. That was on Thursday February 1st 2018. It’s hard to believe that was a full year ago. Time certainly has gone quickly this year.

Owing to the vagaries of the academic calendar we’re a week later getting back to teaching this year than last year so my first Computational Physics lecture won’t be until this Thursday (7th February) at 9am, but sadly it won’t be in Physics Hall, which I rather liked, but in Hall C – a much less atmospheric venue, but one rather closer to my office, which will be handy if I forget anything (which I am prone to do). There are about 25 students taking this module, a few down on last year, which means they should fit comfortably into our computer lab. I’m not surprised they moved the lecture, really. The capacity of Physics Hall is 90, and even last year I only had about 30 students. Still, it did have a piano (which Hall C does not):

Computational Physics doesn’t start until Thursday. Before that I have to start my other module: Engineering Mathematics II. This (what you would probably call a `service course’) covers a mixture of things, mainly Linear Algebra but with some other bits thrown in for fun, such as Laplace transforms. Interestingly I find the Mathematical Physics students do not encounter Laplace Transforms in the first year, but perhaps engineers use them more often than physicists do? I think I’ve written only one paper that made use of a Laplace transform. Anyway, I have to start with this topic as the students need some knowledge of it for some other module they’re taking this semester. I reckon six lectures will be enough to give them what they need. That’s two weeks of lectures, there being three lectures a week for this module.

By coincidence rather than good planning, the timetable for this module is quite nice. I have lectures on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and then the students have a choice of tutorial (on either Thursday or Friday). That means I can get through a decent amount of material each week before each tutorial. I don’t do the tutorials, by the way: that’s left to one of our PhD students, who gets paid for doing that and correcting the weekly coursework. There are about 50 students on this module, divided into two courses: Electronic Engineering and Robotics and Intelligent Devices. We don’t have Civil or Mechanical or Chemical Engineering, etc at Maynooth.

Campus has been very quiet for the last week or so. The exam period finished in late January but lectures don’t start until tomorrow morning (Monday 4th February) so there have been few students around. No doubt it will be a different story tomorrow. I’ve done my first week’s notes and compiled my first problem set so I’m more-or-less ready to go. First lecture at 2pm tomorrow in Hall H, which is one of the rooms I taught in last term so at least I know where it is!

 

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The Quickening of the Year

Posted in Education, Maynooth, Music, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , on February 1, 2018 by telescoper

It’s 1st February 2018, which means that today is Imbolc, a Gaelic festival marking the point halfway between the winter solstice and vernal equinox. This either happens 1st or 2nd February, and this year it is the former. In this part of the world – I’m in Ireland as I write- this day is sometimes regarded as the first day of spring, as it is roughly the time when the first spring lambs are born. It corresponds to the Welsh Gŵyl Fair y Canhwyllau and is also known as the `Cross Quarter Day’ or (my favourite) `The Quickening of the Year’.

So, talking of quickening, the pace of things is increasing for me now too. This morning at 9am I gave my first ever lecture in Maynooth University in a lecture theatre called Physics Hall, which is in the old (South) part of campus as opposed to the newer North Campus where the Science Building that contains my office is situated.

After that it was back to the Department for some frantic behind-the-scenes activity setting up accounts for the students for the afternoon lab session, which is in a computer room near to my office. Students attend one two-hour lab session in addition to the lecture, on either Thursday or Tuesday. The first lecture being this morning (Thursday) the first lab session was this afternoon, with the same material being covered next Tuesday.

I was far more nervous about this afternoon’s lab session than I was about this morning’s lecture as there seemed to be many things that could go wrong in getting the students up and running on our Linux cluster and getting them started on Python. Quite a few things did go wrong, in fact, but they were fewer in number and less drastic in outcome that I had feared.

So there we are, my first full day teaching in Maynooth. I think it went reasonably well and it was certainly nice to meet my first group of Maynooth students who, being physics students, are definitely la crème de la crème. I’ve got another 6 weeks like this (teaching on Tuesday in Cardiff and on Thursday in Maynooth) before the Easter break so it’s going to be a hectic period. Just for tonight, however, I’ve got time to relax with a glass or several of wine.

Incidentally, I was impressed that Physics Hall (where I did this morning’s lecture) is equipped with an electric piano:

I wonder if anyone can suggest appropriate musical numbers to perform for a class of computational physicists? Suggestions are hereby invited via the Comments Box!

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