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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by JRSpriggs (talk | contribs) at 07:09, 20 June 2012 (→I hope you check you recent assertions: reality). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Political content on user page

Hi, I think a lot of the content on your user page is interesting, but it sits uneasily with the guidelines at WP:UPNOT. It strikes me that this material would be better posted on your personal blog (if you have one). There's probably no harm in keeping things as they are, but I'm curious about your motivations, I hope you don't mind me asking. Cheers, Jowa fan (talk) 08:01, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

I do not have a blog. In fact, I have only three active accounts on-line: (1) an e-mail account, (2) this account at Misplaced Pages, and (3) an account at youtube (just for watching videos, not posting them). So this is my only outlet for expressing my opinions. I cannot afford to pay for anything, so I only use these free accounts. And as a older person, I prefer not to get involved in the complexity of additional accounts, if I can avoid it.
For a long time, I did not have a user page except as a redirect to this talk page. However, I finally decided to reveal some basic facts about myself without getting into information which could be used to steal my identity or embarrass me. Talking about my interests naturally led to describing my political views which are not mainstream. Especially, when we had the financial crisis, I felt compelled to say what I thought the cause was and possible cure might be. I guess you could say it evolved into a blog, but I do not change it very often and its length is not especially great. I do sometimes remove material which no longer reflects my view or has become irrelevant to current affairs. JRSpriggs (talk) 08:25, 9 July 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for the explanation, this all makes good sense. Nowadays there are plenty of sites where one can start a blog without paying anything—but you're quite right, looking after multiple accounts can get complicated. Jowa fan (talk) 10:26, 9 July 2011 (UTC)
I agree in part with User:Jowa fan. I don't care what you have on your talk page, but I'd be concerned that Misplaced Pages authors could delete my stuff at any time as per WP:UPNOT: user pages are not permitted to contain extensive personal opinion or soapboxing unrelated to the Misplaced Pages itself. You might look into LiveJournal which is free and easy to use (and you can include a lot on your user page there if you prefer having a home-base for opinion rather than a blog), or Google Plus for a more interactive experience. WordPress is another common resource (but I'm less familiar with them personally). I hope it never becomes an issue for you, but I'd keep everything backed up either way, just to be safe. TricksterWolf (talk) 05:40, 1 September 2011 (UTC)
I do keep a local copy of the source of my user page. But it is not clear that that would be very helpful if there was a determined attack on my privilege of choosing the content of my user page. Thanks for suggesting alternative hosts, but I would rather not use them if I do not have to.
By the way, if you want people to refer to you as "she" rather than "he", you should indicate on your user page that you are a woman. For example, although I have not chosen to use userboxes myself, you could put {{User:UBX/female}}, {{User:UBX/female2}} or {{User:UBX/female3}} on your user page. JRSpriggs (talk) 08:24, 1 September 2011 (UTC)
Sure. I'll do that eventually. It's a bit odd for me, because I made this account under my pseudonym rather than my real name so that I can edit articles of a less-scholastic nature without being tracked. So far I haven't really had the need to share much personal information, but you're right that a little would help. Either way, I wasn't remotely offended, and I'm a transsexual woman so I suppose some people wouldn't consider me female anyway (though people who meet me seem to universally assume I am, fortunately).
Good to see your involvement, and thanks for pointing me to the Wikiproject page for the discussion on limit ordinal terminology. I'm still learning, and it helps. TricksterWolf (talk) 19:35, 1 September 2011 (UTC)
For other user boxes see Misplaced Pages:Userboxes/Gallery. JRSpriggs (talk) 03:08, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Apology

I recently had reason to read through my talk archives, and now with the distance of time, I can see that I have sometimes been peevish and short with you during our disagreements. I wanted to apologize for that. In fact, taken as a whole, you have been remarkably patient with me. For that, my thanks.

On another matter, at one point in our discussion, we discussed evidence-based economics. I'd like to note that low inflation continues, just as New Keynesian models predict (acceleration in inflation rate is negatively related to unemployment). As such, I remain staunch in my belief in textbook macroeconomics.

regards, --LK (talk) 09:03, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for being concerned about my feelings and apologizing. Actually, I think that few people who disagree with me so strongly would have been as patient as you have.
Perhaps you are correct that high unemployment will prevent inflation. However, we need to allow businesses to become more profitable to get the economic expansion that will reduce unemployment. This means that government must focus on reducing the burdens it puts on businesses by: (1) reducing taxes, (2) reducing regulations, and (3) reducing spending which removes inputs from the private sector thereby raising the costs of business. JRSpriggs (talk) 21:34, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Let me add another apology / thank you. You are right, of course, to undo my FRW edit. That was a sloppy editing mistake by me; thanks for catching it! Law of Entropy (talk) 19:08, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

United States debt-ceiling crisis article: August 15 in Timeline

Please read and comment on the section "Moving the August 15 timeline entry" in the "United States debt-ceiling crisis" talk page. Thanks. --RoyGoldsmith (talk) 11:08, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Why did you undo my edit on the metric tensor?

The insert is correct, you can find it in most textbooks (see for example, Rindler) so what qualifies it as "unhelpful"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Czyx (talk • contribs) 04:35, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

User page, again

I see that there have been a few previous complaints about your user page. However it is still a 7,000-political manifesto. A few hundred words would be one thing, but this is out of proportion. Could you edit it down to a brief summary?   Will Beback  talk  01:44, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Why?
Out of proportion to what? The edits I have devoted to it are only a tiny proportion of my total edits.
I could summarize my position by saying that I believe in freedom, but then no one would know what I meant, or rather they would jump to incorrect conclusions about what I believe.
Is it not said that Misplaced Pages is uncensored? And is my user page not intended to represent me to those who want to learn about me? Anyone who is uninterested in my ideas is free to ignore it. JRSpriggs (talk) 07:22, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
It is out of proportion to any reasonable used of a user page. Have you read Misplaced Pages:User pages? Pages like yours are routinely deleted.   Will Beback  talk  07:31, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
I reduced it by more than half. I really do not want to reduce it any further. JRSpriggs (talk) 12:01, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
Thanks, I appreciate the good faith effort. It's still about six times too long, but I won't pursue it further.   Will Beback  talk  20:45, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Western Republican Leadership Conference

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Notice of deletion discussion at Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/User:JRSpriggs

MfD nomination of User:JRSpriggs

User:JRSpriggs, a page you substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/User:JRSpriggs and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of User:JRSpriggs during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you.

Nom Comments: Sorry to have to do this, but it seems to have become a pervasive issue and it needs to be resolved.WaltCip (talk) 17:40, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion was closed as speedy keep: nomination withdrawn. Jowa fan (talk) 00:46, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

You may or may not be interested, but all of the parts of your manifesto that are relevant to me (e.g. not the parts concerning political / economic / social conditions in the US about which I know little) I completely agree with, in particular your miscellaneous bits at the end. Thought I'd mention it because I have found it can be good to feel that one is not alone in one's views. --Matt Westwood 20:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
My thanks to Matt Westwood and to all those who supported me at the MfD. JRSpriggs (talk) 06:05, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Comsumer

Thanks for that. It was simply a type on my part. Will be fixed in the next few minutes. --User:Woohookitty 17:32, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

No problem. Sometimes I forgot to read what I actually type. :) --User:Woohookitty 09:28, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for this, I appreciate it. LK (talk) 14:04, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

It'll be pleasure to buy you a drink if we ever get a chance to meet. LK (talk) 14:06, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
You are welcome. As I said above in a different context, user pages are to represent that particular user, not someone else. JRSpriggs (talk) 04:55, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Bit puzzled

Hi JRSpriggs, I'm a bit puzzled about the purpose of this edit in response to my last reply at User talk:Sugdub. Did you perhaps somehow misplace this? Cheers - DVdm (talk) 11:23, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

I am sorry that I did not make it clear that it was addressed to Sugdub rather than to you. I just occurred to me that perhaps he would benefit from seeing a spacetime diagram of how length is measured for a moving object and that was the only one I could find on the commons. JRSpriggs (talk) 17:23, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
Ah... a piece of the puzzle :-) Ok, Cheers - DVdm (talk) 17:30, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

2 vs 3 digits

Hi JRSpriggs, I did a diff and did not see your comment before I re-inserted my correction to two digits on Methods of computing square roots. I thought it was a vandal edit. I am an engineer, so i'm used to significant digits, but i see you are a mathematician. Can you please explain or send me to a link on the 'ok if last digit off' part? Thanks Arosa (talk) 01:44, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

I can understand your desire to round off to the nearest digit, but that is not possible in general. For example, if x is only known to be between 3.3 and 3.6, then x could be described as "3 to one digit" or "4 to one digit" with equal validity. The best one can do as a consistent practice is to round to one of the two closest digits. And consider 3.48, if it is rounded to two digits, then it becomes 3.5. And then 3.5 is usually rounded to 4 (the even digit of {3, 4}) to one digit. However by your rule, rounding from 3.48 to 4 to one digit would be unacceptable.
And practically, the rule I use allows one to preserve more information than your rule allows in the case which appeared in the article. JRSpriggs (talk) 17:46, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
Indeed there are many problems with any of these approaches (including multiple roundings, the fact that 3 to 1 digit and 4 to 1 digit have zero overlap, etc). I think what you last wrote (decimal expansion starts with...) does preserve the most information. Good job. Arosa (talk) 16:49, 21 December 2011 (UTC)
The compromise you mentioned (re decimal expansion) was not my work. It was put in by Isheden (talk · contribs). I advise you to follow my practice and always read the new entries in the revision history carefully before editing. JRSpriggs (talk) 02:05, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Spelling corrections

JRSpriggs, you made some spelling corrections on Talk:Schrödinger equation. While I share your irritation with bad spelling, it's not generally recommended that you edit comments by others (see WP:TPO). RockMagnetist (talk) 01:38, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Barnstars!

Its only fair that I give you these in return:

The Barnstar of Diplomacy
Thanks for sticking up for me against that IP, ending the complaints, and trying to turn the heat down in this section. =) F = q(E + v × B) 18:37, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

You did that twice (there was another case stopped by RockMagnetist). Also thanks for your many spelling and grammatical corrections on the Schrödinger equation article itself. More generally:

The E=mc² Barnstar
Trillions of cheers for your many contributions to physics and maths articles. =) F = q(E + v × B) 18:37, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


Hope you don't mind me peeking in your contribution history! Its a shame you haven’t the awards you deserve - so here they are! -- F = q(E + v × B) 18:37, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. As you say, this is the first time I have received such an award here at Misplaced Pages. JRSpriggs (talk) 08:55, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification

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Thanks for pointing that out. I have disambiguated the link. JRSpriggs (talk) 09:18, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Addison not Addision of course

I was responsible for the misspelling (which you will not be surprised by), and have now corrected its origin

"Quantum Mechanics, E. Abers, Pearson Ed., Addision Wesley, Prentice Hall Inc, 2004, ISBN 9780131461000

to

"Quantum Mechanics, E. Abers, Pearson Ed., Addison Wesley, Prentice Hall Inc, 2004, ISBN 9780131461000

on my own user page in the references section. I haven’t been using WP much recently so didn't notice your post at wikiproject physics here a few days ago.

Sorry to waste so much of yours (and whoever made the corrections) time... =( F = q(E+v×B) ⇄ ∑ici 16:06, 25 March 2012 (UTC)

Main page appearance: General relativity

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Albert Einstein in 1921

General relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics. General relativity generalises special relativity and Newton's law of universal gravitation, providing a unified description of gravity as a geometric property of space and time. In particular, the curvature of spacetime is directly related to the four-momentum of whatever matter and radiation are present. The relation is specified by the Einstein field equations. Some predictions of general relativity differ significantly from those of classical physics. Examples of such differences include gravitational time dilation, gravitational lensing, the gravitational redshift of light, and the gravitational time delay. General relativity's predictions have been confirmed in all observations and experiments to date. Although general relativity is not the only relativistic theory of gravity, it is the simplest theory that is consistent with experimental data. However, unanswered questions remain, the most fundamental being how general relativity can be reconciled with the laws of quantum physics to produce a complete and self-consistent theory of quantum gravity. (more...)

UcuchaBot (talk) 23:01, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

RE: Failure of protection

Hi. I only enabled move proection. Hope this answers your question. Rjd0060 (talk) 20:03, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying that. I had been under the impression that the featured article of the day was normally given at least protection against IP-users and new users, i.e. semi-protection. I have now been informed that that is not the policy. Still, I feel that it should be the policy. JRSpriggs (talk) 21:11, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Conjugate Variables: Derivation from Action

Hi JR, thank you for your edits. Can you expand your edit for conjugate variables, you've edited that "the derivatives of action are conjugate variables to the quantity with respect to which one is differentiating", but there's no reference for this or elaboration of how it's down.

Also, your units don't make sense, they way you have presented indicates that all conjugated variables in physics are governed by Planck's constant, however, plugging the units in for potential and charge density I get which is close to = but not. Could you explain in more detail your reasoning? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Larsobrien (talk • contribs) 02:10, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

your's sincerely - Lars — Preceding unsigned comment added by Larsobrien (talk • contribs) 00:06, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

The last equation in the section Covariant formulation of classical electromagnetism#Lagrangian for classical electrodynamics says that the Lagrangian density of the electromagnetic field is
L = 1 2 ( ϵ 0 E 2 − 1 μ 0 B 2 ) − ϕ ρ free + A ⋅ J free + E ⋅ P + B ⋅ M {\displaystyle {\mathcal {L}}\,=\,{\frac {1}{2}}(\epsilon _{0}E^{2}-{\frac {1}{\mu _{0}}}B^{2})-\phi \,\rho _{\text{free}}+{\boldsymbol {A}}\cdot {\boldsymbol {J}}_{\text{free}}+{\boldsymbol {E}}\cdot {\boldsymbol {P}}+{\boldsymbol {B}}\cdot {\boldsymbol {M}}\,}
while the action is
S = ∫ L d x d y d z d t . {\displaystyle S=\int {\mathcal {L}}\,dxdydzdt\,.}
Strictly speaking, varying a variable at one point will not affect the integral. To change the integral, one must make the variation over a hyper-volume of space-time
Δ x Δ y Δ z Δ t {\displaystyle \Delta x\Delta y\Delta z\Delta t\,}
which has units . So we need to differentiate the action with respect to the charge density within a unit hyper-volume in order to get the electric potential. Thus take and multiply it by which gives the desired . A similar thing must be done with the other conjugate pairs in field theory. JRSpriggs (talk) 07:34, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
On second thought, what I was saying was nonsense. Instead of relying on my error-prone memory, I need to look this up in a text book and get back to you. JRSpriggs (talk) 04:57, 24 April 2012 (UTC)
I have not been able to find it in my textbooks. But on further thought, I believe that there is no conjugate variable for the electric scalar potential, φ; and the conjugate variable for the electromagnetic vector potential, A, is the negative of the electric displacement, −D. Similarly, there is no conjugate variable for the Newtonian gravitational scalar potential. In this case, the units of the product −A·D should be the same as action divided by a unit (3-)volume.
When you apply the calculus of variations to derive the Euler-Lagrange equations from the principle of least action, there usually are terms which come from integration by parts and take form of integrals over the 3-dimensional boundary of the 4-dimensional hyper-volume over which you are integrating the variation in the Lagrangian density. The conjugate variables are found from those boundary terms. For example in this case, the boundary integral's integrand is −D·δA. JRSpriggs (talk) 19:05, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Dear JR,

Is it possible you are confusing intensive and extensive variables in Thermodynamics with the symplectic vector spaces of the Heisenberg group?
The conjugate variables in the Heisenberg uncertainty relation are related through their Fourier transform duals, whereas the conjugate variables in thermodynamic properties are related through Maxwell relations which are taken as derivatives of thermodynamic potentials.

After some thought I see where you're coming from, and how taking derivatives of the Lagrangian gives conjugate pairs, c.f. Canonical commutation relation, and your approach makes a lot of sense.

It's a pity V and φ aren't conjugate, I really could have done something useful with that.
Despite all that, I think you should continue with your edit, hopefully you can show V and φ are Fourier transform duals.
your's sincerely - Lars — Preceding unsigned comment added by Larsobrien (talk • contribs) 00:14, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
As you indicate, there is a notion of conjugate variables in thermodynamics, but that is distinct from the notion of conjugate variables in mechanics which is what I was addressing. There is a separate article on conjugate variables in thermodynamics.
Could you clarify what you mean by V and φ? If you mean voltage and the electric scalar potential, they are the same thing (only the name is changed). JRSpriggs (talk) 12:03, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Ricci calculus

Hi, this article is awesome, the first time I have seen such a complete and transparent summary for this concept.

The Teamwork Barnstar
This is to be shared between:

Well done and thanks to you all, and sorry this is so late (I would have awarded this earlier but don't get on WP much anymore). Best, Maschen (talk) 16:32, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

You are welcome. JRSpriggs (talk) 21:11, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Was that all?

You could have disagreed with my summary of the source without accusing me of editing under false pretenses, you know. I pared down that bullet point a bit, see if you still like it: https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=United_States_debt-ceiling_crisis&diff=495617632&oldid=495606587. We can move to the article's talk page if you think there is anything else we need to take care of. FiveColourMap (talk) 13:43, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

I did not mean to imply that you were intentionally doing anything wrong. I merely meant that your edit was one-sided.
This is a difficult issue to address since how one describes the situation has implications for who (Republicans or Democrats) gets the blame. And it may be hard for a reader to separate what S&P is saying (which is deliberately vague to avoid offending one party or the other) from what Misplaced Pages is saying. JRSpriggs (talk) 03:31, 3 June 2012 (UTC)
I did not mean to imply that you were intentionally doing anything wrong. - thank you. Happy Sunday! FiveColourMap (talk) 19:17, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

I hope you check you recent assertions

A tensor basis of a given type can be expressed as the tensor product of possibly different sets of vector bases. This is mathematically sensible; if your thinking becomes too component-centric rather than being in terms of the actual (abstract) tensors, you can lose sight of this. Your recent edit comment about the Kronecker delta and Lorentz transform shows up the difference in our perspectives. I do not intend to argue this with you. — Quondum 11:20, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Some things may be tensors in a mathematical sense which are not tensors in the sense of general relativity physics. Just as one might say that any space of tensors is a vector space in a mathematical sense, but not in a physical sense. In physics, we are focusing on particular mathematical objects which are useful in modeling reality, not just on anything that someone can imagine. JRSpriggs (talk) 07:09, 20 June 2012 (UTC)