I'm learning about physics from a very large book!

Why oh why does a topologist give a pig's ear about physics? Well, topology is a sort of geometry, and, in the words of Sir Michael Atiyah, "In recent years there has been a remarkable renaissance in the relation between Geometry and Physics." This is what led me a couple of months ago to read The Road To Reality by Roger Penrose. This is a dirty great book about all of phyiscs whose 1000+ pages I mindlessly ploughed through, skipping the big words as I went.


Well now I have to try to understand an actual bit of topology that was inspired by phyiscs, and so in order to get to grips with it I have obtained this enormous book from the library. See how huge it is! The smurf is just for scale. I really don't think I'll get very far with it, but who knows...

Apologies for the shortage of activity here. I have my excuses! The strange reading / not reading business with Middlesex was because I never actually started it! In fact there was probably a solid month where I didn't read anything interesting because I was too busy getting my maths wrong. I'll definitely read it next.

Finally, have any of you seen famous people in the Edinburgh streets yet? I have one underwhelming sighting so far, of funny-ish Frankie Boyle off of Mock the Week.