Tim O’Hare
observations, thoughts and useful stuff…100 greatest films
Over the last couple of weekends The Times newspaper (which I buy on Saturdays only) has run articles on the “100 Greatest Films/Books of the Decade” (the decade in question being 2000-2009). I thought it would be interesting to see which of these films/books I have watched/read – perhaps this is a measure of how “current” or media-savvy I am. So, here goes my list from the 100 Greatest Films:
06: Slumdog Millionaire
09: The Queen
34: Finding Nemo
42: The Incredibles
71: Monsters Inc
89: School of Rock
That’s it – I’ve seen just six of the top hundred and four of these are films for children (says it all really).
Mind you, I have a couple more on DVD ready to watch:
08: Casino Royale
50: Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
and there are a few others in the list that I’ve nearly watched or thought about watching such as:
23: Man on Wire
39: Lost in Translation
94: An Inconvenient Truth
so it’s not impossible I might be able to creep up to 10% of the list eventually.
Fractal forecasting
There’s an interesting piece in New Scientist, No 2733 [07 November 2009] outlining some new published research which has used satellite derived rainfall data to explore how atmospheric processes show the same patterns of variation whatever scale they are examined on. Such behaviour is called multi-fractal and basically means that if you look at something on a large scale you see a certain pattern of variation but then when you look in more detail at a smaller scale the same pattern shows up (an oft-quoted example of this are coastlines which show large-scale undulations/headlands/bays but which, when viewed more closely show similar undulations at smaller scale). Fractal behaviour is starting to show up in all kinds of data and processes.
Anyway, the importance of this finding for meteorology is that currently it is verydifficult to build numerical models which accurate forecast larger scale processes because the resolution of the models prevents accurate description of processes on smaller scales (and so these have to be added into the model as special parameterisations). If atmospheric processes are really fractal (an idea that was first suggested at least 80 years ago by Lewis Fry Richardson) then it will be possible to properly (or at least better) describe the smaller scale processes in numerical weather prediction models.
I’m a believer that much of the complexity that we observe in the real world is governed by relative simple underlying principles and behaviour and this research is an example of this occuring in practice.
A new kind of cloud?
Preparing for my recent lecture on clouds I came across this set of images on the BBC website [01 June 2009] along with a brief explanation of a campaign by the Cloud Appreciation Society (yes, I am a member) for a designation for a new type of cloud – “asperatus” (meaning “roughened up” or “agitated”). Click through the images in turn and read the captions to find out more (or just enjoy the REALLY awesome photos). There’s more on the campaign for asperatus clouds at the Cloud Appreciation Society website.
Peter Shilton’s Nearly Men
As a child I was always really into football but I was brought up in a non-sporting family in the middle of a non-football county (Somerset) and so my football-related activity was limited to reading loads and loads of football magazines, covering the walls of my bedroom with pictures of footballers, obsessively keeping records of results and scorers and playing endless Subbuteo football tournaments against myself. Then, when I moved away from home to go to university I ended up in places where football wasn’t a big deal. It was only when I pitched up in Plymouth in July 1992 that I was finally in a place where there was a proper football team.
I remember that not long after we moved to Plymouth my wife and I were walking in Central Park when a bunch of guys in training kit came running towards us. Out in front of them was the manager and as they passed us my wife looked at me and said with a tone os surprise “That’s Peter Shilton” (who if you don’t know was a very famous England goalkeeper). Shilton had fairly recently taken up his first, and only, appointment as a club manager.
Anyway, after a few months I finally got myself to Home Park to see Plymouth Argyle play (they lost to Huddersfield) and from that point onwards I was hooked (I’ve hardly missed a home game since 1993 which means that I will have been to something like 300-350 games). At one time I actually used to write the match reports for the official club website and even helped out with online commentary (usually my role was to be the side-kick to the main commentator although I did also get the odd stint doing the full commentary). My first full season as an Argyle fan was 1993/94 and this was rather a momentous season for Argyle as Shilton built a team that played attractive passing football and scored absolutely shed-loads of goals. They reached the play-off semi-finals only to fall to a depressing defeat (at Home Park) in the second leg to Burnley. That season Argyle played great football but they also let in too many goals and missed out on what should have been a straightforward promotion.
The following season (1994/95) everything went badly wrong. Players got injured, the squad fractured (thanks Peter Swan) and Shilton was eventually sacked following disagreements and highly-public fallings-out with the Chairman. It was a horrible season and ended in relegation.
“Peter Shilton’s Nearly Men” is a new book written by Argyle fan Paul Roberts that describes this whole period at the club, from just before we moved to Plymouth to the relegation that followed Shilton’s departure. It’s a great read for any Argyle fan who recalls that era, being based on lots of research including extensive interviews with the players and other figures at the club at that time. It took me right back to that era – one that in some ways is still fresh in my mind but in other ways seems like ancient history. It was good to be taken back to that periods, not only to remember the football but also to recall the other memories that I have of my first couple of years in Plymouth.
How Mumbo Jumbo Conquered The World
Last night I finished reading Francis Wheen’s book “How Mumbo Jumbo Conquered The World“. This is a book by Guardian journalist Wheen that sets out to explore how modern thinking has been taken over by irrational and ill-supported ideas and frameworks. I picked it up in my local Oxfam shop and thought it looked like the kind of book I might enjoy; the cover claims that it is “hilarious” and there are other reviews that describe it as “entertaining” and “amusing”. I didnt really find much to laugh at in it and rather plodded through it, not exactly not enjoying it but certainly not lapping it up with gusto. I guess it required a bit more political knowledge than I possess and so I probably didn’t get all of the points it was trying to make. Still, there were some interesting part (I can’t remember any detail about what they were though…) and it certainly stretched my brain into areas that it doesn’t normally go why can’t be a bad thing.
Cloud cakes
Anyone who has ever been a student on one of my courses will know that I do like to introduce the occasional gimmick or two – whether it be my use of a light sabre as a pointer in my “forces” lecture, sounding a bugle to highlight particularly important physical principles or … (further examples not disclosed so as not spoil the surprise for current students over the coming weeks!). Last week I think I surpassed myself though. At my first meteorology lecture of the year a few weeks ago one of the students came in with a plate of cakes that he was selling to raise money for a student group he is involved with. That put an idea in my head and with these particular lectures taking place late on a Friday afternoon I thought that a nice surprise for the students wouldn’t go amiss. So I spent last Thursday evening in the kitchen baking, but not just baking any old kind of cake. With last week’s lecture being all about clouds, it seemed appropriate to bake some cloud cakes. These were then taken into work and given out to the students towards the end of the lecture when I got to the section on exotic clouds.
You’re thinking I’m bluffing here don’t you? You want to see evidence don’t you?
So here you go… proof that I really am mad!
My cloud cakes, each one with a pale blue sky background and a little piece of fluffy Cumulus!
Fighter Boys
Last night I finished reading “Fighter Boys” by Patrick Bishop, the very well written and thoroughly research account of how RAF Fighter Command won the battle for the skies over Britain in the summer of 1940 (the period commonly referred to as the Battle of Britain). The book is based on diaries, letters and records kept by various fighter pilots at the time and with interviews with surviving family members. It’s a fascinating read that left me wondering whether it would be beneficial for every young person in the country to read this book and to discover more about the fortitude and resilience shown by everyone involved in the efforts to defend British shores from German attack. I’m a bit of a sucker for old planes going back to childhood days building Airfix models but I didn’t properly know the history and when it is written down like this, with real people and real memories it hits home quite hard. So often you find yourself reading about the exploits of such-and-such a pilot only to end the paragraph with a short sharp sentence noting when and how they were killed. Sad, uplifting, interesting and challenging in equal measure this is a great read – perhaps a little on the long side, but then those who fought off the enemy forces day after day would also have enjoyed a little more brevity and they didn’t have any choice…
Freak waves explained?
Years ago when I was a lowly postgraduate student in North Wales there was a mysterious case of a small fishing vessel that sank in relatively calm conditions in Cardigan Bay. Concerns were expressed by some that the boat had been sunk by a navy submarine and after the relevant court cases etc. the local BBC station decided to make a short documentary about the sinking and came up to the lab I worked in to interview an expert and do some filming. I was setting up some waves in a laboratory wave channel for them to film so I got to listen in on the whole process from start to finish (I also had my index finger filmed as I used it to press the ‘on’ button for the wave tank – if ever there was an impressive claim to fame surely that has to be it!).
At the start of the filming process the interviewer briefed the expert (I’ll not name them) about the line of questioning the interview would take and absolutely promised that they would not ask the expert whether the wave that swamped the boat had been caused by a submarine. You can probably guess what happened – the interviewer proceeded to ask about each possible natural cause of sinking and each was ruled out in turn. With no natural causes left the interview then dropped in the killer question – so could the sinking have been caused by a submarine? To which the expert was left with no answer other than an open mouth and an uncomfortable pauase before a hesitant “I suppose that is possible” type of answer.
Since then I’ve come across several reports about freak waves, sinking and damaging ships and there was a BBC science documentary about freak waves a few years ago. Now, there has been some new theoretical research which suggests that certain configurations of sand banks can cause freak waves, up to three times the typical wave size, to occur much more frequently than would otherwise be expected. The authors of the work, which was reported on the BBC Website [09 August 2009] are at pains to point out that their work is theoretical, but should be possible to test their work with measurements made in particular locations. If their work turns out to be correct and to have wide applicability then the world’s shipping companies will be beating a path to their door in no time at all.
Flashman and the Redskins
I recently finished reading the seventh novel in the Flashman series by George MacDonald Fraser – Flashman and the Redskins. MacDonald Fraser’s takes the character of Flashman from Thomas Brown’s “Tom Brown’s Schooldays” in which Flashman is the bully who torments Tom Brown at Rugby School. In the Flashman novels, Flashie has grown up to be a high ranking soldier, knight of the realm, womaniser, cad, scoundrel and coward who works his way around the globe in a series of sdventures that bring him into contact with many famous characters and situations from real history. The novels are very cleverly done, being lightly edited versions of Flashman’s memoirs, backed up by footnotes to various types of corroborating historical evidence.
In Flashman and the Redskins, Flashie returns to the United States of America, first escaping from a tight spot by joining the wagon trains to the Californian goldrush and then, later in life, fetching up by a fairly convoluted route as a witness to General Custer’s last stand with the 7th Cavalry at the Little Bighorn. The two sections of Flashman’s life are cleverly tied together and the level of historical detail is so great that it almost spoils the flow of the story. Of course there is never any doubt that Flashman will come through unscathed with a few more female conquests along the way but the story gives another very readable dose of Flashman magic in another unusual setting.
Here comes the cold
The world is getting warmer right? Wrong – at least wrong if you are looking at global temperatures over the next 10 or 20 years. New research reported at the UN’s World Climate Conference has suggested that the world is entering a natural cooling trend associated with cyclic changes in the atmosphere and ocean currents in the North Atlantic (known as the North Atlantic Oscillation and the Atlantic Meridional Oscillation). The danger is that people might see this cooling as an excuse to take their eyes off the longer term global temperature trend which remains upwards. Early evidence of cooling may have come in the form of increased sea ice cover in the Arctic this summer in comparison to the extreme lows of the last couple of years. The research is described in New Scientist, Issue 2725 [12 September 2009].
