User talk:Paul Wormer

Tasks: start a new article • add basic, wanted or requested articles • add definitions • add metadata • edit new pages

Welcome to the Citizendium! We hope you will contribute boldly and well. Here are pointers for a quick start. You'll probably want to know how to get started as an author. Just look at Getting Started for other helpful "startup" links, our help system and CZ:Home for the top menu of community pages. Be sure to stay abreast of events via Twitter. You can test out editing in the sandbox if you'd like. If you need help to get going, the forum is one option. That's also where we discuss policy and proposals. You can ask any administrator for help, too. Just put a note on their "talk" page. Again, welcome and have fun! Aleksander Stos 12:32, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

Paul Wormer

Current talk page

Archive 1, Archive 2

Quantum mechanics

Now set up with an experimental advanced subpage. i migrated information from the previous article to various subpages too. Chris Day 14:00, 1 April 2008 (CDT)

Would you please critique my article on the compressibility factor of gases?

Paul, I have been working (in one of my sandboxes) for over a week on an article to be called Compressibility factor (gases). I am about ready to create it as a CZ article. It can be viewed at User:Milton Beychok/Sandbox2. Would you be so kind as to read and critique it? You may leave your critique comments on the talk page at User talk:Milton Beychok/Sandbox2. Thanks in advance, - Milton Beychok 14:32, 1 April 2008 (CDT)

Compressibility factor (gases)

Paul, if you would still like to nominate Compressibility factor (gases) for approval, please do so. Regards, - Milton Beychok 12:42, 14 April 2008 (CDT)

AD/CE

Probably worth setting up a thread on the forums to discuss this, followed by a formal policy. There was a big go-round on Wikipedia about this point (although I think it was BC versus BCE, there). J. Noel Chiappa 17:33, 14 April 2008 (CDT)

There's been a thread on the forum about this for some time (What about Anno Domini and BC), think the decision is author/workgroup preference, in that there are some areas where CE/BCE is the only acceptable form. It does seem that CE and BCE are rapidly increasing in use. I searched on Google for "5th century CE" (32,000 hits) vs "5th century AD" (172,000 hits) and suspect that the relatively high hit rate for CE use does reflect a significant unease with using AD and BC. See http://www.religioustolerance.org/ce.htm for rationale and background. So personally I'd favour CE and BCE, anticipating that these will become dominant usage. I think the only real objection to them is that they are less well known, but this seems to be changing.Gareth Leng 02:43, 15 April 2008 (CDT)

Hmmm. Well, it would be nice if it was formalized as a policy. Also, I'm not big at all on leaving it up to the authors, that will result in a real mish-mosh, and it will also result in either i) people racing to be the ones to start articles, or ii) people getting into revert wars where they convert back and forth. (One necessarily gets one or the other, if we have 'author decides', no?) Although I suppose anything that caused a 'land rush' on starting articles isn't all bad! :-) J. Noel Chiappa 10:27, 15 April 2008 (CDT)

I would just use both; I typically use: 2008 AD(CE) or some variant of. That way you satisfy everybody. --Robert W King 10:30, 15 April 2008 (CDT)

As long as it was your idea...

...yes ;-) --D. Matt Innis 19:09, 15 April 2008 (CDT)

Compressibility factor (gases)

Approved! Looks like the engineering and chemistry workgroups are off on a great run! --D. Matt Innis 19:19, 21 April 2008 (CDT)

Please read my comment of April 11th on the Talk page of Mole (unit)

Paul, I proposed a re-write of the Examples section of the Mole unit article which is mostly a simplified rewording of most of that section. The only part that I removed was the part that I thought would be more appropriately included in an article on chemical stoichiometry.

I hope that my proposed re-write doesn't endanger our working relationship. Please let me know what you think of it. Milton Beychok 01:08, 23 April 2008 (CDT)

Faraday

Thanks for the nudge; I had gotten confused about whether I was or was not allowed to copyedit while the article was in 'Nominated', so I solved my confusion by doing nothing! I have posted on the Talk:, and once I'm sure I won't be causing a problem, I will give it a go-through. Mind, I will only be able to re-arrange what's there to be clear; I have a basic understanding of E+M, and so can explain basic physics things better, but I know little of Faraday's life or work, and so will be relying on the existing article contents for all the data. J. Noel Chiappa 14:06, 23 April 2008 (CDT)

PS: You might want to archive some of the older stuff off the top of your personal Talk: page; it's getting a bit big. The template {{archive box|auto=long}} on both this and the "/Archive 1" subpage gives a nice look, if that's useful to you. J. Noel Chiappa 14:06, 23 April 2008 (CDT)

van der Waals

Hi Paul, please take another look at the references there, as explained on the talk page. Thanks! Btw, just saw that you already started spherical harmonics - I will probably join in there soon. -- Daniel Mietchen 17:45, 23 April 2008 (CDT)

Physical Properties Templates

Hi Paul,

I posted this on Talk:Cadmium, but wanted to get some feedback from Chem Editors so figured I'd just ask...

I had this kooky idea of trying to store materials physical properties data in templates so we can call it up from multiple locations and keep it current. That way we can do things like this:

Selected Electronegativities:
{{Selected Electronegativities|Hydrogen}}

and... Selected Melting Points:
{{Selected melting points|Hydrogen}}

and also....

{{[[Template:Resizable Periodic Table of Elements |Resizable Periodic Table of Elements ]]}} ...pretty easily.

Also, I've started the {{Physical properties}} template to display the info in the articles (please see Lead or Cadmium/MSDS for examples). I have (I believe) left open the option of using the system for any material, not just the chemical elements. Any objections? Reasons it won't work? Things I should change? Feedback is welcome....--David Yamakuchi 10:23, 25 April 2008 (CDT)

I agree that the editing of the property values need to be easy enough that a Non-Technical Person (NTP) can do it without confusion or errors. Thus far, I have been focused on getting the system working and then spent a little time on the "view" of the data, which right now, looks like it might live in the MSDS or Isotopes page. In the future, perhaps we can write different "viewers" for the data, including maybe a "edit the data values viewer".

At this time, if you click on the "xxxxx/Physical Properties" link at the bottom of the table/view, it takes you to the template to add data (stored in the template in the form of a switch statement), which is maybe a simpler syntax (better for NTPs) for the data than the wikitable was with all it's added "centers" and pipes and such. I'm currently looking at a slightly more sophisticated system for the Isotopes (or Isotpes as I guess we are now spelling it).--David Yamakuchi 11:16, 1 May 2008 (CDT)

Mole (unit), yet again

Paul:

I understand your revision of the lead-in section and have no problem with it.

However, I would still like to re-write the Examples section as per my comment of April 11th on the Talk page of the aricle (the next-to-last comment on that Talk page) if you agree to it. I think that my rewrite will be more understandable by non-physicists.

I assume you are at home again and I hope you enjoyed your stay in California. Regards, Milton Beychok 11:26, 28 April 2008 (CDT)

Of course we are not at war

Paul, that was just my way of saying that it wasn't really that important to me and I would rather drop the subject. Best regards, - Milton Beychok 11:42, 29 April 2008 (CDT)

Your attention needed..

..here --Thanks, D. Matt Innis 12:01, 29 April 2008 (CDT)

Please look at Fluid catalytic cracking

Paul, if you have some spare time, look at Fluid catalytic cracking and tell me what you think of it. It is the most difficult article that I have undertaken at Citizendium because it has been over 50 years since I designed an FCC unit and (a) my memory is not what it used to be and (b) the advances made in those 50 years have been numerous. Regards, Milt - Milton Beychok 03:44, 9 May 2008 (CDT)

Since you once served an internship in an ammonia plant

Paul, you might enjoy a stroll down memory lane by reading Ammonia production. - Milton Beychok 00:48, 11 May 2008 (CDT)

Paul, when you have the time, I would appreciate it if you looked at Ammonia production and gave me your comments. Thanks, - Milton Beychok 12:49, 7 August 2008 (CDT)

Paul, thanks very much for your comments about Ammonia production. As you suggested, I have now added a paragraph discussing the two ways in which nitrogen is obtained for use in the last Haber-Bosch step.

As for your comments on the Haber process article, I have just finished some rather extensive edits to that article (see the Talk page of the article) to try and clean it up and decrease the focus on electrolysis of water. In fact, I have stated that if there are no objections forthcoming in the next week, I plan to drastically shorten the discussion of electrolysis and I have more or less suggested that a stand-alone article is needed for electrolysis.

As for merging the Haber process into the Ammonia production article by a redirect, I would rather not do that. The Haber process is merely a discussion of the last step in the synthesis of ammonia discussed in Ammonia production and I see no harm in an article devoted only to that process. Besides that, redirecting the Haber process means deleting its contents and that might ruffle some feathers if it were done with having a consensus to do it. I would rather keep on writing new articles to build up an "infrastructure" of chemical engineering articles and not get involved in what might get to be lengthy process of achieving concensus to merge. Milton Beychok 01:02, 9 August 2008 (CDT)

Formatting of article list on your user page

Hi Paul, just reformatted the list to allow for easy progress monitoring. Hope you like it; if not, feel free to revert. -- Daniel Mietchen 05:12, 13 May 2008 (CDT)

I just noticed this

I just noticed this one of Larry Sanger's archived Talk pages:

Milton added this to WP. Now WP has two articles on the same subject, a good one (by Milton) and a poorly done one, this. Up to the 3 000 000! --Paul Wormer 04:28, 12 May 2008 (CDT)

I take it that you don't like my having posted my "Fluid catalytic cracking" on Wikipedia. Is that correct? Milton Beychok 16:49, 14 May 2008 (CDT)

Definitions

Hi Paul, I too had been using lower case to start the definitions, i think we agree on that style. However, Larry corrected some of mine and it says to use upper case to start the definition at CZ:Definitions ("Begin the definition with a capital letter, and end with a period. "). It kind of make sense since there is a colon between the article name and the definition. I suppose that it also means the definition can be used on its own as a sentence without the prefix of "Article name:" although, I do not thing that is currently the case. Chris Day 10:28, 16 May 2008 (CDT)

Excellent Cauchy

Juste-milieu on Cauchy--I was a math major at Notre Dame back when it was just as Catholic as Cauchy was, and so he was our great hero! The article integrates the man, the math and the milieu very well, so I signed the approvals. Richard Jensen 07:15, 18 May 2008 (CDT)

Energy

Hi Paul, we are currently trying to design a system that handles disambiguations (see here and here for details). This also effects the way terms with multiple uses are to be used in Related article subpages and similar places. The ultimate goal is to have a consistent disambiguation handling system across CZ (another difference to WP), to list all the different uses at Energy (disambiguation) and to link from there to Energy (kinetic), Energy (chemical), Energy (mechanical), Dirichlet energy, Energy (psychology) and so on as articles get created on those topics. Groetjes, Daniel Mietchen 05:37, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

Ambiguous articles like this one are going to be moved to disambiguated versions thereof, and the 'blöd' message you see is just a reminder to fix that. I did that right now such that your user page looks normal again. Further splits of the article into subtopics of the sort listed above may become necessary with time. -- Daniel Mietchen 07:26, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

You probably saw a temporary state after I had created Faraday's law/Definition, but before I had gotten to Faraday's law (disambiguation). J. Noel Chiappa 10:27, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

OK --Paul Wormer 10:35, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

The definition seems OK, just the talk page was not properly set up, and I fixed that. I also saw the discussion on the name there and added my comment. -- Daniel Mietchen 05:20, 28 May 2008 (CDT)

Pipe

Yes the pipe works, we have been redesigning the {{R}} and {{Rpl}} templates to be as user friendly as possible. Also note that the green A pops up when it is up for approval, as is one on your list right now. Also note that you can indent now too, something that was not possible before. Here are a few example:

{{rpl|Electron}}
{{rpl|Electron configuration||**}}
{{rpl|Electron orbital||**}}
{{rpl|Electron shell||**}}

•  Electron: Elementary particle that carries a negative elementary charge −e and has mass 9.109 382 91 × 10⁻³¹ kg. ^[e]
  •  Electron configuration: The arrangement of electrons of an atom, a molecule, or other physical structure, distributed in the orbitals of the given system. ^[e]
  •  Electron orbital: Quantum mechanical quadratically integrable one-electron function (function of the coordinates of one electron) ^[e]
  •  Electron shell: A group of electron orbitals that share the same principal quantum number (n). ^[e]

{{rpl|Electron}}
{{rpl|Electron configuration|Configuration|**}}
{{rpl|Electron orbital|Orbital|**}}
{{rpl|Electron shell|Shell|**}}

•  Electron: Elementary particle that carries a negative elementary charge −e and has mass 9.109 382 91 × 10⁻³¹ kg. ^[e]
  •  Configuration: The arrangement of electrons of an atom, a molecule, or other physical structure, distributed in the orbitals of the given system. ^[e]
  •  Orbital: Quantum mechanical quadratically integrable one-electron function (function of the coordinates of one electron) ^[e]
  •  Shell: A group of electron orbitals that share the same principal quantum number (n). ^[e]

{{rpl|Electron||}}
{{rpl|Electron configuration|Configuration|:}}
{{rpl|Electron orbital|Orbital|:}}
{{rpl|Electron shell|Shell|:}}

 Electron: Elementary particle that carries a negative elementary charge −e and has mass 9.109 382 91 × 10⁻³¹ kg. ^[e]

 Configuration: The arrangement of electrons of an atom, a molecule, or other physical structure, distributed in the orbitals of the given system. ^[e]

 Orbital: Quantum mechanical quadratically integrable one-electron function (function of the coordinates of one electron) ^[e]

 Shell: A group of electron orbitals that share the same principal quantum number (n). ^[e]

For more information and examples see Template:Rpl/Doc. Chris Day 10:54, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

Energy Conversion Analysis

Sir: You are missing a point. This is Unites States of America and there are are some laws that need to be obeyed. I do feel that I have been abused as an author and that my initial input has been viloated. Thanks, Gordan

Need help with editing the Density article

Paul, I got interested in the Density article which got transferred from Wikipedia to CZ in 2006 without any revision to make it suitable for CZ. It contained a number of terminology errors and was very disorganized. I spent quite some time in the past 24 hours to correct the obvious errors and to reformat/reorganize it. As a result, I then upgraded it from status 4 to status 2.

However, it contains an equation for calculating the density of crystalline mmaterials given certain crystallographic data and the molecular mass ... which I think needs quite a bit of discussion and explanation. In all candor, I don't understand the equation.

I noticed that in the Kilogram article, you contributed a discussion of the silicon project and it seems to me that your discussion is about that subject of calculating density from crystallography data and molecular mass. When and if you have the time, would you look at the Density article and see if you could contribute an understandable discussion of the equation given there in the "Measurement of density" section?? Thanks, - Milton Beychok 18:26, 10 June 2008 (CDT)

Milton, I had a quick look, but it seems to me that the crystal density formula is only correct for orthogonal a, b, and c axes (cubic lattices). For skew axes the volume of the unit cell must be extended to a formula containing the angles between the basis vectors. (Volume of a general parallelepiped). --Paul Wormer 03:27, 11 June 2008 (CDT)

Paul, could you perhaps extend the formula for skewed axes and also add some explanatory text? Or do you think that perhaps that method of obtaining a theorertical density is too esoteric for inclusion in the density article? Would it be better to move the formula into the article about crystals or a new one about crystallography? I would appreciate your doing whatever you can and explaining it on the Talk page of the density article. I just don't feel qualified to do any of that. Thanks, - Milton Beychok 12:01, 11 June 2008 (CDT)

The equation is simple if you know vector algebra, it is

$V=\mathbf {a} \cdot (\mathbf {b} \times \mathbf {c} )$

where a, b, and c span the unit cell and we have an inner and a cross product, respectively. Do you think presenting this would be useful (given the amount of opposition against mathematical formulas)? --Paul Wormer 09:56, 13 June 2008 (CDT)

I haven't noticed any great opposition to formulas other than in some discussion on the forums. When CZ finally attracts many more active physicists and engineers (other than the very few that are now active), that opposition will disappear. As for your formula, I don't know vector algebra and don't understand your equation but I accept it because I trust you. Would you please revise that section of the Density article and include some explanation so that even I would understand it? Or, if you feel that section should just be deleted, than remove it entirely .. with an explanation on the Talk page. - Milton Beychok 10:47, 13 June 2008 (CDT)

Milton, where did you get that formula for the crystal density? To me it seems to hold only for molecular crystals consisting of one type of molecule, like crystalline naphtalene (there is one molecular mass in it). In atomic crystals, like NaCl (table salt), one usually has different types of atoms with different masses in the unit cell.

The formula for volume is easy. Remember, the volume of a parallelepiped is the area of its base surface times its height. Now, b×c is a vector of length equal to twice the area of the triangle that has b and c as sides. The direction of this vector is orthogonal to the plane of this triangle. Hence a⋅(b×c) is the height of the parallelepiped times the area of the base surface.--Paul Wormer 11:21, 13 June 2008 (CDT)

Paul, I don't know where that formula for crystal density came from. It was already in the article when I stumbled upon the article a few days ago and began to edit and improve it. Presumably, it was either added earlier by someone in CZ or it was already in the Wikipedia article when someone transferred it to CZ about 2 years ago. I checked the current Wikipedia article and it is not in the current WP version. I have also searched the Internet and found that there is such a method ... but could not find that same equation anywhere. - Milton Beychok 12:25, 13 June 2008 (CDT)

Milton, I found in a very old physical chemistry book (A. Findlay, 2nd ed. 1941) an example of a density calculation of what Findlay calls "rock salt" (above I called the same compound "table salt"). First Findlay shows that there are four NaCl molecules per unit cell (which in this case is a cube with one lattice parameter: a = 0.56 nm). He does this by counting, for instance, the atoms on the 8 corners are shared by 8 unit cells and have therefore weight 1/8. The face-centered atoms are shared by two cells and have weight 1/2, and so on). The molecular mass M of NaCl is 58.454, N = 4, a = b = c = 0.56 nm and this is all you need to compute the density of rock salt [in g/(nm)³]. To explain that N = 4 one really needs a picture of the unit cell, which is easily drawn since it is a cube. What do you think, should we go all the way and add this example?

--Paul Wormer 02:58, 14 June 2008 (CDT)

Paul, you have made my day! When I use that formula in the Density article with Findlay's example data, I get 217.9×10^-23 g/(nm)³ which is equivalent to 2.179 g/(cm)³. My copy of Handbook of Chemistry and Physics has the density of sodium chloride as 2.165 g/(cm)³. The difference is less than one percent.

Yes, I will add Findlay's example. Is this his book: Alexander Findlay (1941). Practical Physical Chemistry, Seventh Edition. Longmans, Green and Company.  ?

If you would be so kind as to email me a simple sketch of the cube and explaining how to count N, I will produce a drawing and upload it into the article as well. By letting me add the example and the sketch, you will be free to nominate the article for approval some day if you want to do so. You can email me at mbeychok@cox.net or you can fax me a copy of the page from Findlay's book at: 949-706-9634 (preceded by the country code for the USA). Thanks again, - Milton Beychok 12:01, 14 June 2008 (CDT)

I scanned the relevant pages and sent them as pdf to mbeychok@cox.net--Paul Wormer 05:02, 15 June 2008 (CDT)

PS I extended the article on the vector product with the formula for the volume of a general unit cell that I mentioned earlier, see: Vector_product#Application:_the_volume_of_a_parallelepiped--Paul Wormer 07:55, 15 June 2008 (CDT)

cross product

I had forgotten about that lame image. We should try to do better, but I just now back from vacation so I likely won't touch it for a few days. I'll try to come up with a better one. Making it ourself keeps the copyright's consistent, so I would rather do that. David E. Volk 08:19, 17 June 2008 (CDT)

Thanks for corrections to Density

Paul, thanks for your corrections to the section on xray diffraction crystallography. I don't know how in the world I messed up the reference to Findlay's book. I guess I better start going to bed earlier.

The HTML for a center dot renders like this ⋅ in my Internet Explorer browser, so I changed it to × instead.

Thanks again, Milton Beychok 11:33, 18 June 2008 (CDT)

Party!

Hi Paul! So, you've been working but not partying? Come add your name to the cast of characters at July party! Aleta Curry 20:28, 2 July 2008 (CDT)

Scary guide

Don't worry about it too much, the elem_infobox, that is. It is not that YOU personally need to do it, but that someone should before we approve the article. The easiest way to fill in the chem_infox or elem_infobox is to simply copy one from another article (via edit button to see the code), like ketoconazole or Hydrogen, and then change the relevent parameters. David has been busy changing the element box, so I need to go brush up on that one also, but I think he is going to do that for every element so we don't need to worry so much about that. Cheers. David E. Volk 10:40, 7 July 2008 (CDT)

Stokes Theorem

Hi Paul

Thank you! I'm not really done with the divergence theorem yet, I was thinking of inserting some pictures to explain the proof I'm gonna give.

But when I'm done, I'll do Stokes aswell. And after that, maybe Green's Identities :)

Emil Gustafsson 05:47, 10 July 2008 (CDT)

Your request that I look at Energy (science)

Paul: First, let me say that I think your lead-in paragraph is very good. I have taken the liberty to slightly reword/rewrite it so as to:

• Use a little more colloquial English. For example, I used "forms" instead of "manifestations".
• Add internal links to existing and non-existing articles.
• Make a very few revisions for better clarity. For example, pumps do not run on gasoline ... instead, they may be driven by gasoline-fueled engines.

In my personal opinion, as you probably already know, keeping things as simple as possible is the best course ... and I think you did a good job of that. I think that saying energy is a "measurable" quantity is simpler and more commonly understood than is the word "scalar".

My reworded or rewritten version is available at User:Milton Beychok/Sandbox2. You can read it there and decide whether or not you wish to use it or use parts of it.

I will look at the rest of the article in the next few days, but I suspect that I won't be too much help there. However, I will try to be helpful. Regards, Milton Beychok 17:28, 23 July 2008 (CDT)

Paul, I just added another section in my Sandbox2 about your table of "combustion enthalpies" for your consideration. I hope it is useful. Milton Beychok 13:00, 24 July 2008 (CDT)

Pictures

Steve definitely knows the details better than I do. However, one rule I know is that all pictures published (note: not created but published) before 1923 are in the public domain; this is confirmed by the table in CZ:Images#Copyrights, to the right. So any image with publication info from before that date should be okay. This means that images #3, #4, #5 and #8 on http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:James_Clerk_Maxwell should be okay. Let me know if you need to know more details. -- Jitse Niesen 17:44, 4 August 2008 (CDT)

Finger crossing

Thanks Paul, your finger crossing sent the tropical storm more northly and thus it hit east of Galveston around Port Author. Of course, the folks over there might not like you so much now! David E. Volk 15:57, 5 August 2008 (CDT)

Haber process

Paul, a week ago I posted a message on the talk page of the Haber process article explaining my intention to shorten the electrolysis section down to no more than about two paragraphs. Since no one objected during the week, I went ahead today and shortened that section as I said I would. I also corrected numerous errors in the chemical reactions in the other sections. Milton Beychok 22:39, 15 August 2008 (CDT)

Ether

Thanks for the warning Paul. As soon as I saw "ether" was the subject of the change, and you being a physicist, I instantly knew what you were up to. Luckily Gustav missed us completely in Galveston, but we all prepared our houses and chemistry labs on Friday just in case. David E. Volk 08:42, 2 September 2008 (CDT)

Have you seen my photo?

Paul, have you seen my photo that I added to my user page? I thought you might be interested in seeing the old man you've been working with. Regards, Milton Beychok 16:12, 17 September 2008 (CDT)

Your sandbox or scratch box

Paul, unless you want to keep it completely private, would you tell me how to find your sandbox or scratchbox? Milton Beychok 23:12, 21 September 2008 (CDT)

Rubbish

Paul, I am very interested to know why this article did not fit your criteria (both scientifically and regarding the relevance to our topic). Although it is in complete contradiction with the definition of the topic to treat structure of water separately (see my response to Matt, minutes before yours), my scientific curiosity urges me to discuss these matters on a separate page, say structure of water. Would you join? Pierre-Alain Gouanvic 03:08, 27 September 2008 (CDT)

Roy paper

Moderately positive? Sorry I've given that impression, no it's utter garbage. I tried to hunt down the journal as Springer stopped publishing it in 2003, seems to have been picked up by a house I hadn't heard of, and Roy is the editor. I certain;y haven't inserted any comment even vaguely supportive anywhere (unless by accident), my edits to tone down commentary on it may have been too gentle. Gareth Leng 11:24, 27 September 2008 (CDT)

error message: texvc executable not found

Thanks for informing me regarding problem with latex. It appears, the problem started today only, because yesterday everything seemed fine. Anyway I did manage to kludge along with HTML, though it is not very elegant.

Also, I created an advanced page for Nuclear overhauser effect which I am unable to delete now. (Sender: Sekhar Talluri)

Paul, look at your scratchbook now. Regards, Milton Beychok 20:08, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

WP content in "Hydrogen bond" article?

Hi Paul,

I noticed that you have worked extensively on the Hydrogen bond article. I expect soon to move that to the featured article (draft) on the Welcome page of CZ, but I have a question about the possible WP content of the artilce. If it contains such WP content, then it should indicate so on the article. In any case, I believe it should be so indicated, but could you confirm this for me, and if it should be so indicated, could you do that?

James F. Perry 18:32, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the HTML idea!

Much easier. I still have some computer science things where I need to have things like summations in fractions, and I am rapidly thinking of drawing them with the Microsoft Equation Editor and saving them as .png.

Howard C. Berkowitz 15:07, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Quantum Mechanics

Hi, I'd like to try and finish off the Quantum Mechanics article (at least, the introductory part of the article - that's all I have the ability to work on), and (gasp!) get it approved. Do you have time to work on it with me? Thanks! J. Noel Chiappa 13:50, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

U.S. customary units

Hi, Paul: When you have a few minutes to spare, take a look at U.S. customary units and let me have any comments you may have. Thanks, Milton Beychok 23:58, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Your testimony

Please let us have it! --Larry Sanger 21:06, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I sympathize with your concerns and would like to come to a resolution about them, but your comment on CZ:Why I contribute to CZ does not seem appropriate, since it does not really answer the question, and actually undermines the community-boosting (PR) purpose of the page.

We should talk about the sentiments you've expressed about editor roles. I do support editors removing text and whole articles, but this is rule-governed. I have removed articles myself on many occasions, when editor decisions have been made. But if there is some objection to the deletion, there has to be some mechanism to avoid total lawlessness, as it were. And there is a separate problem about deletions when a topic is clearly an ideological or otherwise highly controversial one, and also when both disputants are editors. I hope you would agree that rather too many editors would simply delete everything they happen to disagree with, if they were left unchecked. That, moreover, would cause the authors to exit en masse. If we wish to remain an open community, we must walk a fine line. The root problem here does not have to do so much with editors-versus-authors so much as with dispute resolution in an open, bottom-up community. On this problem we have a decided advantage over Wikipedia: our editors can and do make important content decisions from time to time, and these decisions are respected by authors and other less-expert editors. --Larry Sanger 16:17, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Cf. a recent discussion on cz-editcouncil and especially my most recent post. --Larry Sanger 16:30, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Euclid

When I did the outline in his article I hadn't noticed there was a separate one. I just noticed that shortly before getting your message, & decided to pause for thought about what should go where. Have we got any relevant policy/guideline? Peter Jackson 11:07, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

As it happens I'm rereading Euclid, so I'll add things as I go along. Peter Jackson 11:55, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Aether

You've already put in more than I knew. This is a pretty minor character in Greek mythology & I don't know whether there's much more worth saying. Peter Jackson 10:40, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

credit

That makes sense. Maybe we need a way to indicate that choice on the images credit template, so others do not come and change it after the fact? Chris Day 15:55, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree, if only that if I am uploading a number of images, each additional operation slows the process. If I'm putting something into public domain, it's not all that necessary to have credit.

In fact, there are times where one may not want to have one's name on an image. A friend of mine is a U.S. Army soldier and photographer. When she takes a picture in her official role, it is public domain, but the archives do show her name. She accepts that any group may use her public domain images, but has strenuously objected when her name is attached to the image, and placed on an partisan web page with which she totally disagrees. She believes it's fair (although not required) for them to say it was U.S. Army, but her name is not to be used as an implied endorsement. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:20, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I'll try and adjust the templates to reflect the ideas here. Chris Day 18:53, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Aristotle

Looks good! Maybe someone could go into his 'physics' in detail...?

Martin Cohen 13:44, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it was Lucien Conein...

I found the error most easily in links, but you appear to have found it in text that was much harder to see. Thanks!

Howard C. Berkowitz 16:03, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Mesmerism, complementary and alternative medicine, alternative medicine, etc.

Your input at http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:Complementary_and_alternative_medicine would be very welcome. We are still feeling our way as to how a structure should evolve.

Having noticed you removed a section about mesmerism, would that be a potential sub-theory of alternative medicine? Should there be an intermediate-level article about magnetic field therapy, which does include some mainstream research?

Howard C. Berkowitz 19:25, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Related articles subpage

Paul, I made some edits to the Electromagnetism/Related_Articles subpage to give you an idea of the type of thing I have been doing on biology pages. I don't think what I have done on the electromagnetism page is necessarily correct (I'm sure the hierarchy and placement of some topics are redundant or incorrect), but I have tried to give you a flavour of what can be done. Chris Day 07:06, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I threw that together quickly so it needs work. I was just trying to give you an idea of the structure and how there should be more breadth.

Other related topics should cover other areas in physics that are equivalent to electromagnetism with respect to the level in an imagined hierarchy. It does not need to be exhautive though, I'm sure some of the topics I added could be axed. Those links do give a reader an option to jump to a different area within physics.

Within the subtopics a link to electricity might be enough. A reader interested in that topic would then click the [ r ] link to get further subtopics in that area. Likewise for magnetism a reader might click on that relevant [ r ] link. I have set up content at those two hyperlinks representing the Electricity/Related Articles and Magnetism/Related Articles pages to help you see the big picture. In effect the related articles subpages becomes a browseable network where you can explore higher level topics as well as lower level topics. Chris Day 14:34, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Magnetic healing email

I didn't see it. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:00, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I would appreciate your comments on Conventional coal-fired power plant

Paul, if you have the time, I would very much appreciate any comments you may offer on Conventional coal-fired power plant.

Also, let me wish you and your family Happy Holdidays!! Milton Beychok 04:23, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Copyediting

Pleasure - & I haven't finished yet. Prepositions are monsters in all languages. I grew up saying 'bored with', and now here's a younger generation saying 'bored of'...! Ro Thorpe 15:48, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

I would leave bodies strewed across the grounds if I ever heard that! Say it ain't so! Hayford Peirce 15:53, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

So, I opened a can of worms? --Paul Wormer 15:54, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Illiterates abound. Especially if they're Republican presidents.... Hayford Peirce 16:21, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Just a confirmation I received your email.

I'll confirm by email as well. We are in substantial agreement, and there are some other issues as well. I'd like to hope they can be solved. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:17, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

CZ Policy

Hi Paul, You wrote in your bio page

" I hate it, however, when content that I contributed is removed without good explanation (in the associated talk page or my personal talk page). So, please, if you feel it necessary to delete some of my work (and possibly replace it with something else), explain to me why you think so."

Technically, you are correct. Deletions must be discussed here. If you feel your work has been deleted without good reason, revert the change and then place your concerns on the discussion page. If the deleter persists--even if they are an editor--restate your concerns and contact the CZ Constabulary if you would like the work to remain until deletions are justified. At the very least, changes that are challenged must be debated in a professional manner. CZ Constable Thomas Simmons 20:35, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Good information

Goodness, Paul, a lot of that was good information. Though, some might have gone over the top ;-). Next time, if I see something that looks like a problem, I'll email you. Thanks for cleaning those up. D. Matt Innis 21:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Ideal gas law nominated for approval

Hi, Paul. I have just nominated Ideal gas law for approval. Since I worked on that article to some extent, 2 more editors are required to join in the nomination. I am inviting you and David Volk to join me in the nomination. Regards and welcome back, Milton Beychok 17:57, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

"Chemical bonding" section of Phosphorus/Draft

Paul, just as a suggestion, if you want to get rid of all the white space in that section, why not caption all four of the images as Image 1, Image 2, Image 3 and Image 4 and locate all of them on the right hand side of the page. Then the text could run down the left hand side and you could change the wording where needed to refer to them as : "as in Image X" or "see Image X" or "as shown in Image X".

I think that the formatting would look as good if not better than as the section looks now ... because white space would be minimized. To repeat, just a suggestion. Milton Beychok 19:57, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Your attention to a minor detail

Take a look here. D. Matt Innis 00:27, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

deletion on angular momentum

I got your message re deletion on angular momentum. It was a total mistake on my part and I am still not sure how it happened. I can assure you, I also dislike it if someone makes any change without any discussion and I did not intend to make those changes. Sorry for the trouble and Best wishes. BTW I plan to submit the NMR article for approval by you, hopefully soon. Sekhar Talluri 18:02, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

More about Ideal gas law

Paul, Daniel Mietchen has finished his editing of the article and has signed the Metadata page as an Approval nominator. Chris Day and I also made some very minor edits this morning. The version to be approved has been updated to today's version of the article and the final approval date has been moved from Jan. 26th to Jan. 21st. Would you now please add your signature to the Metadata page as the third nominator, since we need three nominators. Thanks and regards, Milton Beychok 18:35, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

request for approval

I submitted (or tried to) submit the NMR spectroscopy article for approval by yourself, david e. volk and Daniel Mietchen. However, it says you have already nominated it - so I guess I edited the wrong page/place. Can you fix this and review it anyway.Sekhar Talluri 00:01, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, your attention is needed here D. Matt Innis 02:16, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I request you to review the NMR spectroscopy article for approval. I have also requested D.E.Volk to review it. Can you suggest the name of a third editor (if a third editor is required)?Sekhar Talluri 05:06, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Ideal gas law comments by User:Jitse Niesen

Paul, in case you have not already seen his comments, User:Jitse Niesen has raised some questions about the statistical mechanics derivation in the Ideal gas law article. They are at the bottom of the article's Talk page. Would you please address his comments? Thanks, Milton Beychok 18:05, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Arrows with text above them

Paul, I think I have come across text over arrows previously somewhere. Do you know how one does this? I need something like that for Product operator (NMR), in which I would like to use arrows with the appropriate operator over it, for example (90)_x above an arrow, instead of starting equation --> (90)x --> resulting equation. Thanks David E. Volk 19:32, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps you are looking for \overset ? Example:

<math>I_x \overset{\theta_y}\longrightarrow I_x \cos\theta + I_y \sin\theta</math>

yields

$I_{x}{\overset {\theta _{y}}{\longrightarrow }}I_{x}\cos \theta +I_{y}\sin \theta$

However, if you want to do it in text, then I wouldn't know how to achieve this. -- Jitse Niesen 11:35, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I advised \stackrel, is there any difference?

$I_{x}{\stackrel {\theta _{y}}{\longrightarrow }}I_{x}\cos \theta +I_{y}\sin \theta$.

I don't see it. --Paul Wormer 12:39, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I had not seen your reply on David's talk page. I'm not sure about the difference; I definitely don't see any. Perhaps \stackrel is meant for relational symbols (like =, <, ≈) while \overset can be used more generally. There is also \xrightarrow which extends if necessary: $a\xrightarrow {\theta _{x}\circ \theta _{y}\circ \theta _{z}} b$. -- Jitse Niesen 11:49, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

˚C

I tracked it down to the {{Unit}} template. It was set to be in bold italics. I edited it to be in plain text. It is also set to be small, is that desirable, or should I set it to a regular size too? Chris Day 17:16, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Nomination/appointment

Sorry, Paul, I realized that I misunderstood your question, which wasn't about senators at all. I'll post the answer (the correct one, I hope) on the Steven Chu talk page. Bruce M.Tindall 17:18, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

∇ does not render in IE browser

Hi, Paul:

I thought you might want to know that in the Green's function article, the section header for "Proof of Green function of ..." uses ∇ and it renders as a small square on my IE6 browser. Regards, Milton Beychok 22:39, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Spherical harmonics

Paul, that drawing you made for the Spherical harmonics article is absolutely marvelous! I wish the drawings I make to illustrate articles that I write were half as good.

Since you've used the words eigenfunctions/eigenvalues/eigenstates in quite a few articles that I am aware of, why not create the definition subpage for the Eigenvalue article and define those three words?? What do you think? Regards, Milton Beychok 02:46, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Paul, take a look at User:Milton Beychok/Sandbox2

By making the drawing smaller, moving it up a bit and not indenting the first equation, the white space has been much reduced. What do you think? Or is the drawing too small to be useful? Milton Beychok 04:15, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

On the whole I agree, the only thing I don't like is that a sentence starts on the same line as a displayed equation; that I didn't copy.--Paul Wormer 08:00, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I leave it up to you. It was only a suggestion. Milton Beychok 16:50, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Paul, I finally figured it out. I had my 19-inch monitor at a resolution of 1152x864 and the large white space was still there after you made the two changes. Then I changed my resolution to 1152x864 and the white space is completely gone. In other words, the appearance of articles that include drawings and photos can be very different depending on monitor size and display resolution.

I guess the only way to be sure that everyone sees an article the same way is to always locate drawings and photos in the center of a page rather than the left or right side. I would also guess that very long LaTeX equations should also be on a line of their own and centered ... or else the equation may be displayed on two lines, because the LaTeX equations are .png images. That may also explain why the nabla is lost in the TOC ... because the TOC cannot accept images. Milton Beychok 18:58, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

James Clerk Maxwell

Paul, I think I'm done with James Clerk Maxwell. If you're happy with it, I'm willing to back its nomination for approval. Russell D. Jones 03:09, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm done, too. Thanks and cheers, --Daniel Mietchen 10:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Physics editorship

Hi Paul, Milt pointed out to me that you are not a physics editor, and so I would like to encourage you to apply to become one. Cheers, --Daniel Mietchen 11:10, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

New editorship

Dear Dr. Wormer--on the recommendation of your fellow editors, I've made you an editor in the Physics Workgroup. Thanks for your work! --Larry Sanger 14:23, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm late to the party. This new editor will be a valuable addition to the physics group and the history of science subgroup (if and when!). Congrats! Russell D. Jones 15:09, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Is Ernest Rutherford ready for approval?

I don't know enough about him to know, but the article looks pretty well developed. What do you think? --Joe Quick 00:34, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

To give a short answer: no, not ready. The article is not complete enough. The years 1911 (model of atom), 1919 (splitting of the nucleus), and 1930 (promotion to "Baron Rutherford of Nelson") are lacking. Chairmanship of the Royal Society must be mentioned. Further, IMHO, the chronological order of the article is somewhat inconsistent. So let's wait until somebody extends the article. --Paul Wormer 11:11, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Kinematics article

Hello Paul,

In the "Why I contribute ..." page you mention, "... tried to remove something from an article ...".

If that is the issue about kinetics in the Kinematics article, please go ahead and change it as you wish. No objections from me. Regards, Peter Lyall Easthope 17:57, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

No Peter, I didn't think of kinematics at all when I wrote that. I had to check what I wrote, because my memory is not as good as that of water.--Paul Wormer 14:40, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Franklin and electricty

Hi Paul. When you get a chance can you head over to Benjamin Franklin and have a look at the section on his experiments with electricity? I know you've already seen it once, but I'd like to get a second opinion from you on the accuracy and clarity of it. I'm not sure I've written it in a manner that is easy to understand and adequately conveys all the main points. Thanks. --Todd Coles 03:11, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments, I'm going to move them over to the article talk page for reference. --Todd Coles 21:27, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Review of Energy lead-in in your User talk:Paul Wormer/scratchbook

Paul, the first 3½ paragraphs look very good to me and I only made two very minor changes. I changed "let our planes fly" to "lets our planes fly" ... and "carbondioxide" to "carbon dioxide".

However, as you will note, I strongly suggest striking out all of the discussion about using the warm cooling water to melt ice. It is a complete distraction from the main subject of the lead-in. Milton Beychok 23:38, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Milton, with regard to the part you striked out. Larry asked:

First, what kinds of energy can't be converted into work? Second, I have a philosophical question for you: in virtue of what do you call "energy" whatever it is that can't be converted into work? If it can't be converted into work, there must be something else that makes you call this thing/process/state "energy." What is it? (And why aren't we just using whatever your answer is to that question as the definition of "energy"?)

I tried to answer the question why the thermal energy (the 60% "loss" of a fossil power plant) can be seen as a form of energy, although it is not converted into work or electrical energy. It occurred to me that the thermal energy contained in the cooling water can be converted into work if we have a temperature bath of 0 K; using that fact I tried to answer Larry. Maybe you have a less convoluted answer to Larry's question? --Paul Wormer 00:34, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

More about the lead-in section of Energy (science) in your Scratchbook

Paul, this is in response to your last posting on my user Talk page. In the words of Professor Higgins in the "My Fair Lady" musical: "By Jove, I think you've got it!" or something to that effect. In other words, I very much like what you have now ... and I suggest that you put on your new Physics Editor hat and move on to revise the lead-in of the actual Energy (science) article. As an Engineering Editor, I agree completely with what you have now in your Scratchbook. Milton Beychok 20:57, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Webmail

Yes, I received it. I had had a similar problem a few months ago, when I had to use webmail until I rebuilt my computer software, and lost your address in the process. I have it now. Howard C. Berkowitz 22:24, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Hydrodesulfurization Approval

Paul, can you also approve this article? I made one figure for it, so we will need you and Milton for approval. David E. Volk 17:44, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

articles for approval

Hi Paul, Milton Beychok has recently listed the articles on Vapor pressure, Relative volatility, and Specific heat ratio at CZ:Ready for approval. Could you have a look and see whether you'd be willing to put them up for approval? Thanks, Joe Quick 15:07, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I haven't seen replies from any of the other editors I asked about these articles. I don't mean to pester you, but getting approval rolling on even one of them would be a definite positive. --Joe Quick 03:32, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

I have been away from the internet for over a week and I'm back now. I contacted David Volk some time ago about dividing the approval between us. Since he didn't answer I'll read all three and see whether they are approvable. --Paul Wormer 15:59, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Great, thanks! --Joe Quick 16:03, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

About the Energy (science) article

Hi, Paul: I hope you are enjoying your vacation in California. If you could persuade Daniel Mietchen to review, comment upon, or revise the math portions of the Energy (science), I think that the article would then be ready for approval nomination ... what do you think?

The math is beyond my ability and that is why I suggest a review by Mietchen. Milton Beychok 17:40, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Vector rotation and uncertainly principle

Paul, would you be interested in adding to either Vector rotation which I started or Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle which I stumbled on? David E. Volk 17:05, 5 April 2009 (UTC)