You can call me old-fashioned, if you like (actually, you can call me anything you like, so long as you manage to squeeze "outrageously handsome" in there somewhere), but I do enjoy learning about people -- what they like and what they don’t like -- what they do for fun in their spare time, and so forth.
For example, I really enjoyed our recent slideshow in which we saw pictures of how we all used to look in our first jobs or while at college. (See: Slideshow: The Way We Was.)
I know, I know... now you are going to ask me "What happened to that promised blog showing pictures of different people's offices?" (See: Who Among Us Has the Strangest Office?.) I hang my head in shame. I have the pictures that folks sent me of their offices, and I did take a bunch of pictures of the pleasure dome (my own office), but then I moved from one bay to another and I decided that I'd rather show the pictures of my new abode (once I've unpacked all of the boxes).
But I digress... I don’t know about you, but I usually have a few hobby projects on the go. The project that's at the forefront of my attention at the moment (also the one that's occupying the table in the breakfast area of our house) is a giant mosaic of Van Gogh's "Starry Night." A photo of the original picture (not my mosaic) is shown below:
Actually, simply saying "mosaic" does not really convey a good impression of what I've been doing, which is to give my piece a three-dimensional look-and-feel. I'm doing this by creating the mountains on separate layers using 1/8"-thick sheets of pressed board. In addition to the four mountain layers, the big tree in the foreground is also composed of multiple layers. I'm just now at the stage where I'm starting to consider what to use for my mosaic tiles (glass, ceramic, something else).
I will be delighted to show you some pictures of this in a future column, if you are interested (you know me... all you have to do is ask), but this set me to wondering about what other members of All Programmable Planet are doing. For example, I know that Duane is working on his Robot Avatar project, and Ed is creating an electronic computer using only technology that was available in 1900 or earlier. But what about everyone else?
So what I would like would be for you to send me pictures and descriptions of any hobby projects you are currently working on or that you've created in the past (you can email me at max.maxfield@ubm.com). These projects can be electronic-based, or they can be nothing to do with electronics at all... whatever it is you do to relax and take your mind off work. Then I will create another slideshow showing what we all get up to in our spare time.
I was hoping to find a group theoretic solution to the SOMA puzzle as part of aa cahllenge presented to Leonardo's Basement in 2006 by the Minnesota State Fair Commitee. The challenge "Prove That Math Is Fun"
That brings back memories! I was a math nerd in high school, and as part of a state math competition, I competed in the "Oral Presentation" section. The topic that year was "Group Theory". So I had to learn the subject such that I could teach it to others, answer questions, etc.
Unfortunately, the only thing I really remember is that Group Theory lets you manipulate whole sets (groups) of numbers or symbols at a time, instead of individual values. And a main advantage is that you can then work at a more abstract level.
The Rubik's cube is a great sample application: No matter the state of the cube, there are only 12 possible operations (twists of the cube) that can be performed, and each of those operations will result in a different state. If you group all equivalent/symmetric 'states' of the cube into Groups, you can then solve all possible states of the cube with a relatively small set of 'operation sequences'. You can also graph the states and operations (i.e. create a state machine) to prove that all states are reachable within 20 operations.
I also I am trying to get my head around a branch of mathematics called Group Theory which is often described as the mathematics of symmetry. When ever I use the word "group" it kind of gets me pondering about what is the context of "group" here.
Max Maxfield 8/21/2012 10:02:22 AM User Rank Blogger
Re: Any photos?
@EdV: I just received the pics -- they are FANTASTIC -- I can't wait to create a slide show so everyone can see them -- but first we need some more submissions from the others... (hint hint)
Oddly enough one of my current "hobbies" (ongoing since 1998) is teaching piano to groups (people generally). One approach I am working on involves pairing "Starry Night by van Gogh" with the opening bars of "Moonlight Sonata" by Beethoven. Participants do a "note spelling exercise" on a piece of sheet music with specific crayon colors assigne to specific notes; red = C, orange = D, for instance. Next to the music sheet is a panel of a painting. The colors they use on the music sheet are the only colors used on their assciated pice of the painting. The result is a color coded mosaic of sorts that one can play music from. Provided they know the code.
The latest work involves pairing Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker with painting by Paul Klee for an elementary schooll classical music program in Minneapolis.
Yes, I saw that coming! FPGAs are definitely part of the plan, but my workflow is more suited to software-only for now. The design will eventually partially serialize the massively-parallel neurofunction network through a less-massively-parallel FPGA network, much as a modern graphics card serializes billions of vertices through a few hundred parallel processing units.
@Max, I'm not currently using Fuzzy Logic, though I have used it in the past for a few small AI projects. For artificial general intelligence (AGI), I have my own model of neurofunctional networking, which takes cues from neurophysiology to implement intelligence using building blocks at a level a bit above the neuron.
For comparison: If you wanted to emulate an ARM processor on an x86, you wouldn't emulate the ARM's transistors. You would emulate at the instruction-set level. Likewise with the brain, where a neuron roughly equates to a transistor.
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