How Scientists See the World

I linked to this on Twitter, where people enjoyed it. Don’t want folks who are still stuck in 2008 and only reading the blog to miss out. Abstruse Goose, click for legible original:

"poor bastards"

Tom Whyntie points out that the rabbit should really be more spherical.

Comments

44 responses to “How Scientists See the World”

  1. Simplicio Avatar
    Simplicio

    Alright, I got most of it, but what’s the matrix pointing towards the plant. Quantum superposition of something?

  2. Sili Avatar
    Sili

    Don’t be silly. If it were, it’d be a cow.

  3. Rhys Avatar

    I think the alt-text is too negative! Those educated in science are lucky enough to be able to appreciate both pictures…

  4. Oded Avatar
    Oded

    Simplicio, fractal I think

  5. BenJ Avatar
    BenJ

    Looks like a matrix version of f=ma (the added terms would simply be additional forces)

  6. Not A Scientest Avatar

    I DONT GET IT o.O

  7. Tom Avatar
    Tom

    I am also confused about the matrix by the fern.

  8. Marcus Avatar
    Marcus

    It’s funny because there’s more than a little truth to it. Personally, I find the world all the more beautiful for it.

  9. Stefan Avatar

    The matrix could be some 2D map which produces a self-similar orbit similar to a fern?

  10. […] This post was mentioned on Twitter by addison , J.S.. J.S. said: How Scientists See the World http://ow.ly/17HqRa […]

  11. Jonathan Avatar
    Jonathan

    Nice, but I can’t help but feel the biologists and geologists are being left out here…

  12. rillian Avatar
    rillian

    The matrices by the fern are an iterated function system, a type of fractal famous for modelling fern-like geometry, among other things. One can find the same coefficients quoted in the wikipedia article.

    I thought spectral synthesis of the hills was funnier. Leaving out the geologists indeed!

  13. erik Avatar
    erik

    I got where most of the stuff is related to, but I’m not quite sure where the schroedinger equation is applied.

  14. Oded Avatar
    Oded

    erik – everywhere of course! šŸ™‚

  15. iayork Avatar

    I’m not quite sure where the schroedinger equation is applied.

    If you did, the cat would have to kill you.

  16. lylebot Avatar
    lylebot

    Scientists see the world as a bunch of simplified (to varying degrees) models of independent components with little to no interactions between them? Hmmmm….

  17. Karthik Avatar

    It looks like the matrix by the fern is a recipe for self-similarity.

  18. Mr. Owl Avatar
    Mr. Owl

    It’s funny ’cause it’s true!

  19. Tevong Avatar

    is the mistake in schrodinger’s equation deliberately designed to bait people that can’t help pointing those kind of things out šŸ˜›

  20. spyder Avatar
    spyder

    Reiterating Jonathan at #10: would it have been too much to include some protein synthesis from DNA/RNA sequencing??

  21. dan Avatar
    dan

    @15: Well, you could have “the way string theorists view the world” and just erase all that stuff and put a loop šŸ˜›

  22. gregorylent Avatar
    gregorylent

    this is a serious topic … seeing parts, and feeling apart from, hugely damaging in the long run

  23. Daniel Avatar

    Abstruse Goose is God.

  24. Nick Tacik Avatar
    Nick Tacik

    False. I only see Maxwell’s equations in covariant form.