Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah Live at Sin-é

I cannot even describe the absolute pure beauty of this man's voice:



The entire Live at Sin-é album is great, and in my opinion, the live versions of the songs are so much more incredibly soulful compared to the studio versions (the studio album is great too, but I love the live versions more).

I think I might do an entire long post about Jeff Buckley someday, because his voice is nothing like I have ever come across. It has this unique intricate beauty to it which is impossible to find anywhere else.

I wish I was there when he sang these songs on stage.
Or I wish he was alive, so that I could at least have the hope of going to one of his concerts.

Last Post, by Carol Ann Duffy

I absolutely adore Carol Ann Duffy. I have loved her since we studied her poems in our AQA GCSE classes, and I think she influences me quite a bit.

There is something so simplistic yet intense about her poems - it's like these small events in life which become the pivots of the poem, and show how meaningful even the most 'meaningless' moments can be. It is like each moment spans a lifetime, and becomes a lifetime's worth of memories.

Here is one of her poems, Last Post, written in 2009 at the passing away of the last two British survivors of WWI (Henry Allingham and Harry Patch):

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If poetry could tell it backwards, true, begin
that moment shrapnel scythed you to the stinking mud…
but you get up, amazed, watch bled bad blood
run upwards from the slime into its wounds;
see lines and lines of British boys rewind
back to their trenches, kiss the photographs from home-
mothers, sweethearts, sisters, younger brothers
not entering the story now
to die and die and die.
Dulce- No- Decorum- No- Pro patria mori.
You walk away. 

You walk away; drop your gun (fixed bayonet)
like all your mates do too-
Harry, Tommy, Wilfred, Edward, Bert-
and light a cigarette.
There's coffee in the square,
warm French bread
and all those thousands dead
are shaking dried mud from their hair
and queuing up for home. Freshly alive,
a lad plays Tipperary to the crowd, released
from History; the glistening, healthy horses fit for heroes, kings. 

You lean against a wall,
your several million lives still possible
and crammed with love, work, children, talent, English beer, good 

food.
You see the poet tuck away his pocket-book and smile.
If poetry could truly tell it backwards,
then it would. 

via BBC Today

The Towers of Hanoi

In the great temple at Benares... beneath the dome which marks the center of the world, rests a brass plate in which are fixed three diamond needles, each a cubit high and as thick as the body of a bee. On one of these needles, at the creation, God placed 64 disks of pure gold, the largest disk resting on the brass plate, and the others getting smaller and smaller up to the top one. This is the tower of Bramah. Day and night unceasingly the priests transfer the disks from one diamond needle to the other... When the 64 disks shall have been this transferred from the needle on which at the creation God placed them to one of the other needles, the tower, temple, and Brahmins alike will crumble into dust, and with a thunderclap the world will vanish.

- The New Turing Omnibus, A.K. Dewdney, pg. 364

Found this gorgeous description of the Towers of Hanoi in this book called The New Turing Omnibus. I really recommend anyone to read it. It's an interesting and absorbing look at some major points in Computer Science. Even if you are totally unrelated to Computer Science, it's still full of really fascinating puzzles and ideas which will intrigue you.

How Not to Proof

Just found these hilarious ways of writing bad proofs from the MIT website. It's so funny, because a lot of this is done on our lecture slides (just to spit on our graves).

Here are some of my favourites out of the entire list; and I have sorted these into two piles: done by professors, and done by students (just to cheer you up):



Done by students:

Proof by throwing in the kitchen sink:

The author writes down every theorem or result known to mankind and then adds a few more just for good measure. Known to result in extra credit with sufficient whining.

Proof by cumbersome notation:

Best done with access to at least four alphabets and special symbols. Helps to speak several foreign languages.

I write my proofs in ancient Mongolian

Proof by reference to eminent authority:

"I saw Fermat in the elevator and he said he had a proof . . ."

Proof by wishful citation:

The author cites the negation, converse, or generalization of a theorem from the literature to support his claims.

Proof by personal communication: 

"xn + yn 6= zn for n > 2" (Fermat, doing some personal communication)

Why did you fuck with us for long, Fermat?

Was getting up for a piece of paper too much work for you?

Done by professors:

Proof by vigorous handwaving:

A faculty favorite. Works well in any classroom or seminar setting.

Also used in other fields of work. 

Proof by vehement assertion:

It is useful to have some kind of authority in relation to the audience.

Proof by intimidation: 

Can involve phrases such as: "Any moron knows that..."
or "You know the Zorac Theorem of Hyperbolic Manifold Theory, right?"

Proof by intimidation (alternate form): 

Consists of a single word: "Trivial."
Often used by faculty who don't know the proof.

Proof by mutual reference: 

"In reference A, Theorem 5 is said to follow from Theorem 3 in reference B, which is shown from Corollary 6.2 in reference C, which is an easy consequence of Theorem 5 in reference A."


link [pdf file]

What is next? 

     Next is nothing.

BBC Emma Screenshots