A story of blind science-Believers and a Scientist with open mind

This was a question in a physics degree exam at the university of Copenhagen:
"Describe how to determine the height of a sky-scraper with a barometer."
One student replied: "You tie a long piece of string to the neck of the barometer, then lower the barometer from the top of the skyscraper to the ground. The length of the string
plus the length of the barometer gives the height of the building."

This highly original answer so incensed the examiner that the student was failed immediately.

The student appealed on the grounds that his answer was in-disputably correct and the University appointed an independent arbiter to decide the case.

The arbiter judged that the answer was indeed correct but did not display any noticeable knowledge of physics. To resolve the problem, it was decided to call the student in and allow him six minutes to provide a verbal answer that showed at least a minimal familiarity with the basic principles of physics.

For five minutes, the student sat silent, forehead creased in thought.

The arbiter reminded him that time was running out, to which the student replied that he had several extremely relevant answers, but couldn't  make up his mind which to use. On being advised to hurry up the student replied: "Firstly, you could take the barometer up to the roof of the skyscraper, drop it over the edge and measure the time(in t sec) it takes to reach the ground.
The height of the building can then be worked out from the formula H=0.5g*t^2(g is gravity). But bad luck on the barometer."

"Or if the sun is shining, you cound measure the height of the barometer, then set it on end and measure the length of its shadow. Then measure the length of the skyscraper. But if you want highly scientific about it, you can tie a short piece of string to the barometer and swing it like a pendulum(length=l), first at ground level and then on the roof . The height is worked out by the difference in gravitational restoring force T=2*pi*root over(l/g)."

"Or if the skyscraper has an emergency staircase, it would be easier to walk up it and mark off the height of the skyscrapers in barometer lengths, then add up."

"If you merely wanted to be boring and orthodox about it, of course you could use the barometer to measure the airpressure on the roof of the skyscraper and on the ground and convert the difference in millibars into metres to give the height of the building."

"But since we are constantly being exhorted to exercise independence of mind and apply scientific methods, undoubtedly the best way would be to
knock on the janitor's door and say to him,'If you would like a nice new barometer, I will give this one if you tell me the height of this skyscraper'."

(That student was indeed Neils Bohr, the only dane to win the Nobel prize for Physics)

Tathagat Avatar Tulsi

Tathagat Avatar Tulsi (born 9 September 1987) is an Indian physicist, best known as a child prodigy. He completed high school at the age of 9, earned a B.Sc. at the age of 10 and a M.Sc. at the age of 12 from Patna Science College (Patna University). In August 2009, he got his Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore at the age of 21. In 2010, he was offered a position as Assistant Professor on contract (a non-permanent teaching position for fresh PhD graduates) at IIT Bombay.Various Indian newspapers claimed that this made him the youngest faculty member ever at an IIT.

Tulsi was born in Patna, Bihar. He completed high school at the age of nine, earned a B.Sc. at the age of ten and a M.Sc. at the age of twelve from Patna Science College (Patna University).

He received wide public attention in 2001, when he was shortlisted by the Indian Department of Science and Technology (DST) to participate in a Nobel laureates conference in Germany. Later, the DST officials claimed that it was a mistake to shortlist him, and that he was a "fake prodigy".^[6] Tulsi alleges that some students who accompanied him to Germany asked him to prove his brilliance, but he refused to share his research as it was incomplete. This resulted in him being labeled a "fraud", whose father had forced him to mug up physics without any actual understanding. Following the controversy, Tulsi suffered from depression, which he says, cost him a Ph.D. seat at IIT. He decided to "fight back" by earning a Ph.D. and gaining recognition as a scientist.

Tulsi was admitted by the Indian Institute of Science (IISc)., where he wrote a 33-page long Ph.D. thesis on "Generalizations of the Quantum Search Algorithm". He has the special distinction of being one of the world's youngest scientists. At the age of 17, he co-authored a research manuscript ("A New Algorithm for Fixed-point Quantum Search") with Lov Grover, the inventor of a quantum search algorithm that goes by his name.

Tulsi is listed as one of the most gifted Asian youngsters by TIME magazine, mentioned as "Superteen" by SCIENCE, "Physics Prodigy" by The TIMES, "Master Mind" by The WEEK and listed by OUTLOOK as one of the smartest Indian youngsters. Tathagat Avatar Tulsi participated in the Stock Exchange of Visions project of Fabrica, Benetton's research centre in 2007. He was invited by Luciano Benetton for a dinner in honor of Al Gore on Jun. 14, 2007 in Milano, Italy. Tathagat's story was showcased by National Geographic Channel in the program My Brilliant Brain. The episode named "India's Geniuses" was aired on 13 Dec. 07 and was hosted by Bollywood actress Konkona Sen Sharma.

 

Research

Tulsi worked on quantum search algorithms for his Ph.D. Tulsi at 21 is often claimed by news reporters as the youngest person in India to hold a doctorate. Some of his research publications are listed below (in chronological order of dispatch to the scientific magazines).

• A new algorithm for fixed-point quantum search
• Quantum computers can search rapidly by using almost any selective transformation, Avatar Tulsi, Physical Review A, 78, 022332.
• Faster quantum walk algorithm for the two dimensional spatial search, Avatar Tulsi, Physical Review A, 78, 012310.
• Adiabatic quantum computation with a one-dimensional projector Hamiltonian
• General framework for quantum search algorithms

:::::::BLACK HOLE::::::::::

star is a huge, amazing fusion reactor. Because stars are so massive and made out of gas, there is an intense gravitational field that is always trying to collapse the star. The fusion reactions happening in the core are like a giant fusion bomb that is trying to explode the star. The balance between the gravitational forces and the explosive forces is what defines the size of the star.
As the star dies, the nuclear fusion reactions stop because the fuel for these reactions gets burned up. At the same time, the star's gravity pulls material inward and compresses the core. As the core compresses, it heats up and eventually creates a supernova explosion in which the material and radiation blasts out into space. What remains is the highly compressed, and extremely massive,
core. The core's gravity is so strong that even light cannot escape.

Photo courtesy NASA
Artist concept of a black hole: The arrows show the paths of objects in and around the opening of the black hole.

This object is now a black hole and literally disappears from view. Because the core's gravity is so strong, the core sinks through the fabric of space-time, creating a hole in space-time -- this is why the object is called a black hole.
The core becomes the central part of the black hole called the singularity. The opening of the hole is called the event horizon.
You can think of the event horizon as the mouth of the black hole. Once something passes the event horizon, it is gone for good. Once inside the event horizon, all "events" (points in space-time) stop, and nothing (even light) can escape. The radius of the event horizon is called the Schwarzschild radius, named after astronomer Karl Schwarzschild, whose work led to the theory of black holes. 

 Supermassive black holes in some giant galaxies create such a hostile environment, they shut down the formation of new stars. Strangely, black holes lie at the center of most galaxies, as shown in the next image.

 Dark matter composition is up for debate, with subatomic particles and black holes considered as candidates.

 This is a new composite image of a galaxy cluster located about 2.6 billion light-years away. The three views of the region were taken with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope in February 2006. See a massive radio telescope in the next photo.

 Like most galaxies, NGC 1097, a barred spiral galaxy, has a supermassive black hole at its center.

 In this artist's rendition, the yellow region at the center represents a supermassive black hole. Around are dust grains mixed with heated, outflowing gas. But just how big is "supermassive?" Find out in the next photo!

This is a depiction of a wormhole, or an Einstein-Rosen bridge, bursting open in the vacuum of space. Many believe these curves in spacetime could enable time travel. 

......I really need your time.....!!!!!!!!

A man came home from work late, tired and irritated, to find his 5-year old son waiting for him at the door.

SON: "Daddy, may I ask you a question?"
DAD: "Yeah sure, what is it?" replied the man.

SON: "Daddy, how much do you make an hour?"
DAD: "That's none of your business. Why do you ask such a thing?" the man said angrily.

SON: "I just want to know. Please tell me, how much do you make an hour?"
DAD: "If you must know, I make Rs.100 an hour."

"Oh," the little boy replied, with his head down.Looking up, he said, "Daddy, may I please borrow Rs.50?"


The father was furious, "If the only reason you asked that is so you can borrow some money to buy a silly toy or some other nonsense, then you march yourself straight to your room and go to bed. Think about why you are being so selfish. I work hard everyday for such this childish behavior."


The little boy quietly went to his room and shut the door. The man sat down and started to get even angrier about the little boy's questions. How dare he ask such questions only to get some money?

After about an hour or so, the man had calmed down, and started to think: Maybe there was something he really needed to buy with that Rs.50 and he really didn't ask for money very often. The man went to the door of the little boy's room and opened the door.

"Are you asleep, son?" He asked.

No daddy, I'm awake," replied the boy.

"I've been thinking, maybe I was too hard on you earlier," said the man.

"It's been a long day and I took out my aggravation on you. Here's the Rs.50 you asked for." The little boy sat straight up, smiling. "Oh, thank you daddy!" He yelled.

Then, reaching under his pillow he pulled out some crumpled up bills. The man, seeing that the boy already had money, started to get angry again. The little boy slowly counted out his money, and then looked up at his father.

"Why do you want more money if you already have some?" the father grumbled.

"Because I didn't have enough, but now I do," the little boy replied.

"Daddy, I have Rs.100 now. Can I buy an hour of your time? Please come home early tomorrow. I would like to have dinner with you."

Share this story with someone you like....

But even better, share Rs.100 worth of time with someone you love. It's just a short reminder to all of you working so hard in life. We should not let time slip through our fingers without having spent some time with those who really matter to us, those close ! To our hearts.