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Good news everyone, scientists can (theoretically) recreate the insects from The Mist! The Mist is a Stephen King novel turned into a movie and a TV Mini Series. I enjoyed the movie version, so I’ll reference that plot from now on. It’s about a military experiment that goes wrong, and a portal to another dimension lets in a horde of large creatures to a small town in Maine. The portal also brings in a wave of “mist,” but actually it’s fog and let me explain why. ...

Could you hack it as a hacker? There’s one scene in the movie “Disclosure Day” where the paramilitary group is trying to get into a warehouse with a locked door, and I swear the “hacking device” used 2 alligator clips attached to the housing of the lock. You can correct me if I misremembered, but for some reason that image stuck with me because I cannot think of one scenario that would make this device plausible. ...

Time Dilation Time dilation stems from Einstein’s theory of special relativity, which says that moving clocks tick more slowly by a factor (called the Lorentz factor). At everyday speeds, the Lorentz factor is approximately one, so the effect is negligible. Near light speed, it becomes dramatic. Here’s the Lorentz factor formula showing how the factor increases with speed: $$ \begin{aligned} &\gamma = 1/\sqrt{1 - v^2/c^2}\\ &\text{where}\\ &\hspace{1em}\gamma = \text{Lorentz factor}\\ &\hspace{1em}v = \text{relative velocity between two objects}\\ &\hspace{1em}c = \text{speed of light} \end{aligned} $$Project Hail Mary The ship in Project Hail Mary (the Book and Movie) travels at about 92% of light speed, so the Lorentz factor is approximately 2.55. In reality, the ship would most likely accelerate for half the trip and decelerate for the rest, but let’s keep it simple using constant velocity. One year on the ship corresponds to about 2.55 years outside it. That’s why a journey that feels like a few years to Grace can become more than a decade for Earth. ...

Life is not a game, but there sure are a lot of games in it. Game Theory Game theory is a branch of mathematics that studies the behavior of individuals in situations where their decisions impact one another. It has applications in parlor games as well as broader contexts. Nash Equilibrium Do you remember the movie “A Beautiful Mind”? It’s based on a true story about John Nash, a mathematician who developed the concept of Nash equilibrium. In game theory, Nash equilibrium is a situation where no player can benefit by changing their strategy, assuming the other players’ strategies remain unchanged. It’s a fundamental concept in understanding strategic interactions between individuals or entities. ...

The fastest path between two points is a straight line, unless everyone follows the same line. Latency vs. Bandwidth vs. Throughput In computer networks, two metrics are critical to determining performance: Bandwidth: the maximum things you can get done at once. Latency: how long each thing takes. It feels obvious to optimize bandwidth. Theoretically, you can get everything done at one time and not worry about how long it takes, but the impact of latency multiplies. ...