/sci/ - Science & Math

The limit of short term memory is 7 chunks (+/- 2 chunks) of information. A "chunk" is essentially one unit of information as your brain sees it. So "871" would be three chunks of information (one chunk for each digit), whereas "911" would be 1 chunk (since if you're american you'll intrepret that as a name with either the emergency service or the terrorist attack).

That little fact has two consequences:

1) When studying disconnected information in large volumes (great example is foreign language vocabulary) you should avoid trying to memorize more than 7 words at a time. Get 7 words down, then move to another 7 words. On your second pass through all the words start sorting them into piles. One pile for words you've apparently gotten down already, one pile for words you barely missed, and one pile for words you can get right. Focus on that last pile, then move up to the "sort of got it" pile. You can apply this technique to subjects other than foreign language obviously.

2) Whenever possible try to link information to other information, ideally information you already know well. The less information your brain has to store in non-consolidated memory, the better. One way of doing this is to know the material very, very well such that you can naturally link all the concepts together. Another way (that doesn't require you to have already mastered the material) is to link the new information to totally unrelated information that is tangentially relevant in some way. One common way of doing that is using mnemonics, and the more emotionally salient they are the better (so make them funny or offensive). For example, the way medical and neuroscience students remember the order of the facial nerves is with the mnemonic
>Oh, Oh, Oh, To Touch And Feel Virgin Girl's Vagina And Hymen
With the first letter of each word above corresponding to the first letter in each facial nerve's name (olfactory, optic, oculomotor, trochlear, etc.)

>>4020190

WHAT IF MARS WATER HAS SPACE GERMS????
OR LIKE, WHAT IF IT TASTES LIKE TANG?
(I hear that if you become an astronaut, you become addicted to tang so it probably wouldn't be all bad)

I'm not sure dude, and I'm sorry that I can't answer your question.

But to keep this thread bumped, will you expand on the concept of "postdoc stipends"?

This concept excites me.

My roommate and I can't agree on this. I have 99 socks in a drawer an equal number of each of 3 colors black, brown, and white. Without looking in the drawer how many must I take out to guarantee I have a matching pair of socks?

Is it 34 or 67? Lives are at stake man!

bump

captcha: dshard levels

This is a very important question for a paper I am trying to write, and I am having difficulty googling the answer.

I have read Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle and I understand that by more accurately measuring the position of objects on a quantum scale adversely changes the value of that objects momentum (or visa-versa) and the reason for this is basically that the mere act of observing causes a disturbance in either that objects speed or position.

That being said, I do not understand why quantum occurrences are described as "random". Are they truly random, or do they only appear so because of the uncertainty principle? If they are random, then how can we know this? How can we be sure that there isn't actually something calculable driving this apparent randomness?

Hypothetical situation /sci/:

Let's assume for a minute that it's the year 2030. You got picked to go on the first manned landing on Mars (anything that would have normally prevented you from going was taken care of). There's a small chance the rocket carrying you out of Earth's gravitational pull will explode, killing you and your crewmates instantly. Assuming you live, you'll be stuck with little to do for a year as that's how long it will take your ship to reach Mars after it has launched. That's just a one-way time estimate too. If you count the thing as a round trip, it'd be two years. Two years of your life spent on the longest "car ride" of your life (and the scenary outside the window never changes) and all just for several hours of getting to walk on another planet.

Would you go along with this? Or you decline the offer to go on a historic first Mars landing?

Also: Let's say you say yes. You get to Mars, freak out because holy fuck you're on mars, and have a good time collectan' rocks and prothean ruins and all that good stuff. Then as you prepare to take off you make a horrific discover: The lander capsule has mechanical defect that will make it impossible for you to return to your ship. You're now stuck on Mars forever. Well, not forever seeing as how you're obviously going to once your oxygen runs out. What do you do? Pull off your helmet to end it quick, find the nearest tall gorge/crater and toss yourself in and hope that the planet's lower gravity will still be enough to kill you on impact? Do you resign yourself to your fate and wander the rusty wastes until you collapse? Olympis Mons is nearby your landing site, will you be the first human to climb the tallest mountain in the solar system?

>>1494879
NO WAY. JENK IS REREREREAAAAAALLLLL!!!!!

Besides, you should tell that to the Jenk Dealer who makes his rent and feeds his kids from collecting shit and fermenting it.