David Fitzgerald

Teacher, statistician, father

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

@sonukg4india Draw a line down the middle. Radius is 4. Area is twice the sector minus the triangle. Thanks SKG.

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

@MichaelFieldNZ And Xanana Gusmao too, I believe.

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

@simongerman600 I agree, Simon. That bio is wonderful and a wonderful subject.

[Cliff Pickover @pickover]

All of Philosophy Made Simple.

By John Atkinson, https://t.co/gE0jEyUBJX, cc nc-nd-3.0

[Prof. Frank McDonough @FXMC1957]

Have historians neglected the role of David Bowie in the outbreak of WW1 😊

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

@robertkaplinsky @openmiddle 84 and 10 ? Is there a higher one?

[Simon Kuestenmacher @simongerman600]

Map shows only countries where over 20 per cent of the population are migrants (were born outside of that country). The combined population of these countries is only 179 million. Living in a migration-nation is pretty rare.

[Colin Gorrie @colingorrie]

This is why we can still read Shakespeare — even if it takes some effort.

Yes, “thou” and “thy” make him sound ancient. But they're just the last traces of an older system.

The real Old English — the one that's truly foreign — came centuries before.

[Michael Shermer @michaelshermer]

My next book is called Truth. Here is @RichardDawkins from Unweaving the Rainbow on truth. If ever a scientist were to win a Nobel Prize for literature it should be Richard.

"Purveyors of cultural relativism and the ‘higher superstition’ are apt to pour scorn on the search for truth. This partly stems from the conviction that truths are different in different cultures and partly from the inability of philosophers of science to agree about truth anyway. There are, of course, genuine philosophical difficulties. Is a truth just a so-far-unfalsified hypothesis? What status does truth have in the strange, uncertain world of quantum theory? Is anything ultimately true?

On the other hand, no philosopher has any trouble using the language of truth when falsely accused of a crime, or when suspecting his wife of adultery. ‘Is it true?’ feels like a fair question, and few who ask it in their private lives would be satisfied with logic-chopping sophistry in response.

Quantum thought experimenters may not know in what sense it is ‘true’ that Schrodinger’s cat is dead. But everybody knows what is true about the statement that my childhood cat Jane is dead. And there are lots of scientific truths where what we claim is only that they are true in the same everyday sense.

If I tell you that humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor, you may doubt the truth of my statement and search (in vain) for evidence that it is false. But we both know what it would mean for it to be true, and what it would mean for it to be false. It is in the same category as ‘Is it true that you were in Oxford on the night of the crime?’, not in the same difficult category as ‘Is it true that a quantum has position?’

Yes, there are philosophical difficulties about truth, but we can get a long way before we have to worry about them. Premature erection of alleged philosophical problems is sometimes a smokescreen for mischief."

[Massimo @Rainmaker1973]

A vertical wind tunnel moves air up in a vertical column, enabling gravity to be countered by drag instead of lift, as experienced by a skydiver at terminal velocity.

And allowing spectacular air dance shows.

[📹 dream_scene_in_the_world]

[Dr. Catharine Young @DrCatharineY]

Just stopping by your timeline in case you didn’t know that the Chief Science Advisors for Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States - are all women 🔥

[Simon Kuestenmacher @simongerman600]

A cool way of visualizing how powerful different passports are in enabling you to travel freely.
Source: https://t.co/1gZn4nifHs

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

Lonely New Zealand

[Nature is Amazing ☘️ @AMAZlNGNATURE]

The side of planet Earth we aren't used to seeing.

[Dylan O'Sullivan @DylanoA4]

C. S. Lewis, the world to a reader

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

Vale Duckworth famous for the Duckworth-Lewis system in cricket

[Rob Eastaway @robeastaway]

I'm sad to report that Frank Duckworth MBE, co-creator of the Duckworth-Lewis method for adjusting targets in rain-affected cricket matches, passed away last Friday. His method was used just yesterday in the rain-affected World Cup match between Afghanistan and Bangladesh. RIP.

[Steven Pinker @sapinker]

Syntactic ambiguity of the month (thanks, Sam Mehr!)

[David Fitzgerald @fitzsawa]

Not for the squeamish

[Massimo @Rainmaker1973]

A dead whale passes gas for the very last time, ejecting all of its rotting internal organs into the sea.

These events are rare, but happen when the methane, produced by the decomposition is trapped by the thickness of the muscle tissue and blubbery skin.