
	Where results make sense

Topic: Fermi problem

Related Topics

Drake equation

Fermi paradox

Freelancer (computer game)

Harrisburg, Nebraska

Kardashev scale

Kobayashi Maru

Game theory

American Black Duck

Mission critical (game)

Global warming

Livingston County, Missouri

Trinity test

Dyson sphere

Organian Neutral Zone

Manhattan Project

	Fermi problem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		In physics, particularly in physics education, a Fermi problem, Fermi question, or Fermi estimate is an estimation problem designed to teach dimensional analysis, approximation, and the importance of clearly identifying one's assumptions.
		Fermi was known for his ability to make good approximate calculations with little or no actual data, hence the name.
		Fermi estimates are also useful in approaching problems where the optimal choice of calculation method depends on the expected size of the answer.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Fermi_problem (623 words)

	Enrico Fermi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Fermi took a professorship in Rome (the first for theoretical physics in Italy, created for him by professor Orso Maria Corbino, director of the Institute of Physics).
		In 1938, Fermi won the Nobel Prize in Physics for his "demonstrations of the existence of new radioactive elements produced by neutron irradiation, and for his related discovery of nuclear reactions brought about by slow neutrons".
		On November 28, 1954, Fermi died at the age of 53 of stomach cancer in Chicago, Illinois and was interred there in Oak Woods Cemetery.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Enrico_Fermi (1298 words)

	Fermi paradox - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		However Fermi principle adherents believe that, due to a lack of evidence to the contrary, in all probability, humans (as a technologically advanced species) are effectively alone in at least our part of the Milky Way.
		Some of those who subscribe to the Fermi principle state that given enough time to develop, the radio transmissions of any sufficiently advanced civilization will begin to outshine their parent star in the radio part of the spectrum.
		Some adherents to the Fermi principle state that it is highly unlikely that all advanced civilizations would not eventually take full advantage of the power source of their home star, and in doing so change the electromagnetic signature of their sun.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Fermi_paradox (5903 words)

	Fermi Calculations
		Fermi excelled at this rough-and-ready modus operandi, and, to pass it on to his students, he developed a type of question that has become associated with his name.
		Fermi problems might seem to resemble the brainteasers that appear among the back pages of airline magazines and other popular publications (Given three containers that hold eight, five, and three quarts, respectively, how do you measure out a single quart?), but the two genres differ significantly.
		Fermi's intent was to show that although, at the outset, even the answer's order of magnitude is unknown, one can proceed on the basis of different assumptions and still arrive at estimates that fall within range of the answer.
	sci.mercer.edu /handouts/fermi_calculations.htm (2313 words)

	Old Hippie Brand Computers (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		Problem: Galaxy has been around for billions of years, even if one ET civilization formed a few million years before us, the Galaxy would be filled with Bracewell-von Neumann probes.
		Problem: they may use methods we have not learned yet, but if there are many civilizations someone would use EM methods.
		Problem: Sun is average star, if other stars formed a million years ahead of us, then They would be a million years ahead of us in technology.
	www.oldhippiebrand.com /fermi.php (2379 words)

	Physics Today June 2002
		Fermi was born in Rome on 29 September 1901 and died in Chicago on 28 November 1954.
		Fermi was not particularly critical of Mussolini's fascist regime prior to the dictator's promulgation of anti-Jewish laws in 1938.
		The next theoretical problem that Fermi attacked was estimating the probability that a given number of pions would be produced in the collision of a proton with a nucleus.
	www.physicstoday.org /vol-55/iss-6/p38.html (4563 words)

	Enrico Fermi - Biography
		Enrico Fermi was born in Rome on 29th September, 1901, the son of Alberto Fermi, a Chief Inspector of the Ministry of Communications, and Ida de Gattis.
		In 1944, Fermi became American citizen, and at the end of the war (1946) he accepted a professorship at the Institute for Nuclear Studies of the University of Chicago, a position which he held until his untimely death in 1954.
		Fermi was member of several academies and learned societies in Italy and abroad (he was early in his career, in 1929, chosen among the first 30 members of the Royal Academy of Italy).
	nobelprize.org /physics/laureates/1938/fermi-bio.html (990 words)

	FERMI PROBLEMS
		Fermi was uncontestably one of the most important research physicists of this century, and a great many of the working tools of the modern physicist were invented by him.
		The problem with guessing is that one does not know how much confidence to place in the answer, because the constraints from which it follows have not been clearly identified, and so even if estimations have been made at an intuitive level, the degree of imprecision in the estimations has no way to be identified.
		This lookup problem in fact rapidly becomes more difficult than the generation of the information itself, and as we generate more and more useful numbers, we get progressively less use from the simplest of them, which are buried and obscured by a bigger bulk of other data.
	www.ph.utexas.edu /%7Egleeson/httb/section1_3_3_5.html (2260 words)

	Fermi problem -- Facts, Info, and Encyclopedia article (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		The classic Fermi problem, generally attributed to Fermi, is How many piano tuners are there in (Largest city in Illinois; a bustling Great Lakes port that extends 26 miles along the southwestern shoreline of Lake Michigan) Chicago?
		A famous example of a Fermi-problem-like estimate is the (Click link for more info and facts about Drake equation) Drake equation, which seeks to estimate the number of intelligent civilizations in the galaxy.
		For instance, a Fermi estimate might indicate whether the internal stresses of a structure are low enough that it can be accurately described by (Click link for more info and facts about linear elasticity) linear elasticity.
	www.absoluteastronomy.com /encyclopedia/F/Fe/Fermi_problem.htm (559 words)

	Nobelist Maria Goeppert Mayer, 1906-1972
		When Fermi left Columbia to direct the Met Lab project, Goeppert Mayer took over his courses and worked with Harold Urey on separating uranium isotopes as part of the Manhattan Project.
		During a discussion of the problem with Fermi, he casually asked: "Incidentally, is there any evidence of spin-orbit coupling?" Goeppert Mayer was stunned.
		Fermi taught it to his class the next week." Goeppert Mayer's 1948 theory explained why some nuclei were more stable than others and why some elements were rich in isotopes.
	www.anl.gov /Science_and_Technology/History/mgm.html (471 words)

	ID 287 - Gifted Education Services/Fermi Math League - Rules and Scoring (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		Fermi problems are designed to foster growth in the areas of problem solving, analytical thinking, and creative thought and technology skills.
		Fermi problems offer students an opportunity to develop skills in the standards outlined by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) including numbers and operations, mathematical reasoning, data analysis, problem solving, measurement skills, geometry, communications, and representation (modeling).
		One problem is for grades 1-2, grades 3-4, and one is for 5-7.
	www.int287.k12.mn.us /gifted/fermirules.html (1196 words)

	Fermi problem estimation dimensional analysis approximation Enrico Fermi Trinity test piano tuner Drake equation Fermi ... (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		Fermi problem estimation dimensional analysis approximation Enrico Fermi Trinity test piano tuner Drake equation Fermi paradox University of Maryland collection of Fermi problems
		Fermi Math is named after him - to commemorate his ability to estimate and "play around" with problem solving.
		I propose a model for the problem based on the assumption that long-term colonization of the...
	en.powerwissen.com /IY6D46nO7YvRx2NiiVGqtw%3D%3D_Fermi_problem.html (690 words)

	BU Physics Graduate Showcase
		The Y-junction was previously found to have a chiral fixed point in the spinless case, corresponding to an asymmetrical current flow in the presence of an external magnetic field.
		When applied to the problem of interacting fermions it describes the Fermi liquid fixed point and also the instability of the Fermi liquid towards other ordered phases such as charge and spin density waves, and BCS superconductors.
		When fermions interact with bosons, such as phonons, the physics of the problem is profoundly affected by retardation effects which are not present in the Fermi liquid problem and have to take into account.
	physics.bu.edu /~gradreg/talks.html (811 words)

	Fermi Questions: “Back of the Envelope Calculations” (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		Enrico Fermi was an Italian physicist well-known for his work in nuclear and atomic physics.
		There is a story that during one of the bomb tests at Los Alamos, Fermi estimated the size of the blast using shreds paper.
		Such questions became known as Fermi Questions or back-of-the-envelope-calculations (The idea being that a physicist could make a rough estimate using the space on the back of an envelope or a cocktail napkin.).
	chesterfield.k12.va.us /~tcouilla/Student/FermiQs.htm (450 words)

	[No title]
		Later, if your primary goal is to encourage students to struggle with solving the problems on their own (and learn that they can "do estimation"), you may choose to provide very little assistance.
		In the bathtub problem, for example, you could explore the effect on the final estimate of smaller and larger tubs, and smaller and larger liquid intake.
		He 'did a Fermi' on the number of cases (wildly overestimated) and the resource implications (impossible in the circumstances).
	www.flaguide.org /extra/download/cat/math/estimation/estimation.txt (3116 words)

	Fermi Problems
		A Fermi Problem, named for Italian physicist Enrico Fermi, is a problem in which realistic estimation and order-of-magnitude calculation are essential.
		The idea of a Fermi Problem is to think about what assumptions we make, how to make them as realistic as possible, how to estimate well, and how to put all of these in the service of a straightforward mathematical calculation to arrive at the answer.
		Note: This problem was devised a few meters from the pool tables at the Reynolds Club at the University of Chicago, which is not far from the old squash courts.
	www.jlab.org /%7Ececire/garden/fermiprob.html (748 words)

	activity_insert.html
		Fermi problems are questions which help students learn to think for themselves.
		Fermi problems are named for Enrico Fermi, Nobel Prize winning physicist, who had the reputation for asking his students unusual and seemingly impossible questions.
		Fermi's advice to his students was (1) break the problem into smaller, more manageable questions, and (2) have the courage to make some estimates and assumptions.
	www-ed.fnal.gov /trc/sciencelines_online/fall99/activity_insert.html (663 words)

	connect-ME - Weblinks
		Throughout his work, Fermi was legendary for being able to figure out things in his head, using information that initially seems too meager for a quantitative result.
		He used a process of "zeroing in" on problems by saying that the value in question was certainly larger than one number and less than some other amount.
		In a Fermi question, the goal is to get an answer to an order of magnitude (typically a power of ten) by making reasonable assumptions about the situation, not necessarily relying upon definite knowledge for an "exact" answer.
	educ.queensu.ca /SurvivorMathland/weblinks/fermi.htm (266 words)

	University of Maryland Fermi Problems Site
		Ignoring other problems (such as structural strain on the tower), estimate the weight of such a tower if its base were the size of Washington DC and it were made of steel.
		For each of these problems be sure to state you assumptions clearly and show your reasoning.
		General problems 16-31 were contributed by subscribers to the PhysLrnr listserve.
	www.physics.umd.edu /perg/fermi/fermi.htm (4212 words)

	Back-of-the-Envelope Estimates \| High School Mathematics at Work: Essays and Examples for the Education of All Students ...
		Some 50 years ago, physicist Enrico Fermi asked his students at the University of Chicago, "How many piano tuners are there in Chicago?" By asking such questions, Fermi wanted his students to make estimates that involved rough approximations so that their goal would be not precision but the order of magnitude of their result.
		Almost any numerical claim may be treated as a Fermi question when the problem solver does not have access to all necessary background information.
		After gaining some experience with these types of problems, students can be encouraged to pay close attention to the units and to be ready to make and support claims about the accuracy of their estimates.
	www.nap.edu /html/hs_math/be.html (1547 words)

	[No title]
		Fermi problems Enrico Fermi (1901-1954), Nobel prize 1938, often preferred direct, rather provisionally seeming solving methods instead of the "more elegant", fine-intimate and complex methods.
		Easy problems in mathematics education are characterised by having a rule, an algorithm or a formula for computing syntactically.
		Expect problems to be solved in a variety of ways and give students a chance to explain their reasoning to each other.
	wwwmath.uni-muenster.de /users/meissne/WWW/part1.doc (6276 words)

	Merriam-Webster Online
		The fermi names a tiny unit of length; fermium names a radioactive metallic element artificially produced, as by bombardment of plutonium with neutrons; and fermion names a particle whose spin quantum number is an odd multiple of one half.
		Enrico Fermi was famed for his ability to make close calculations based on little or no data; for instance, he once estimated the strength of an atomic bomb by measuring the distance traveled by bits of paper dropped from his hand during the detonation.
		One of the joys of a Fermi problem—the name given to an estimation problem that educates students about dimensional analysis, approximation, and the importance of clearly identifying one’s assumptions—is that there is no one correct answer.
	www.m-w.com /cgi-bin/wftwarch.pl?092905 (252 words)

	Fermi Problems (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		A Fermi Problem is a problem in calculation where not enough information appears to have been given.
		The story is that Enrico Fermi dropped some bits of paper just as the first atomic bomb went off.
		Fermi estimated the force of the blast from the distance behind him that the paper landed.
	smard.cqu.edu.au /Database/Senior/Maths_C/Dynamics/mc_dy001.html (1269 words)

	Fermi problem - Encyclopedia, History, Geography and Biography
		Fermi problem - Encyclopedia, History, Geography and Biography
		More Fermi problems and two worked examples (http://iws.ccccd.edu/mbrooks/demos/fermi_questions.htm)
		This page was last modified 08:54, 18 Jun 2005.
	www.arikah.net /encyclopedia/Fermi_problem (652 words)

	Fermi Questions - Classic Fermi Questions and Annotated Solutions
		Two "typical" Fermi questions are posed and solved in this section.
		WARNING: Fermi questions are not really typical and Fermi questions do not have single solutions.
		As with any Fermi question, there are multiple directions from which the problem can be approached.
	iws.ccccd.edu /mbrooks/demos/fermi_questions.htm (845 words)

	What is the force does a 20 mile per hour wind exert on the side of a typical house [Newtons] (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		F1 - (Fermi Problem) What is the force does a 20 mile per hour wind exert on the side of a typical house [Newtons]?
		F6 - (Fermi Problem) At what rate must energy be removed from the chambers of the House of Representatives (when all the members are present) to keep the temperature from rising [Watts]?
		F9 - (Fermi Problem) What is the mass equivalent of the sunlight that is incident on the earth in a single day [kilograms]?
	www.hope.edu /academic/physics/physicsday/Pd2001/questions_01.htm (1495 words)

	Mason Porter: An Introduction to Solitons and the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam Problem (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-17)
		Mason Porter: An Introduction to Solitons and the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam Problem
		The Fermi-Pasta-Ulam (FPU) model, which was proposed 50 years ago to examine thermalization in non-metallic solids and develop "experimental" techniques for studying nonlinear problems, continues to yield a walth of results in the theory and application of nonlinear waves and (many degree-of-freedom) Hamiltonian dynamics.
		For example, it led to the mathematical "discovery" of solitons and was the model problem employed in the first application of Chirikov's overlap criterion (to estimate critical values of a perturbation required for a system to transition from local to global chaos).
	www.cns.gatech.edu /colloquia-seminars/CNSmeetings/abstract/041129.html (176 words)

	The Fermi Paradox: An Approach Based on Percolation Theory
		Proposed solutions to the Fermi paradox either deny the possibility of extraterrestrial civilizations [1, 5], an assumption as yet unwarranted, or accept the possibility of extraterrestrial technological civilizations and propose explanations for why such civilizations may nevertheless not have colonized the galaxy.
		I propose a model for the problem based on the assumption that long-term colonization of the galaxy proceeds via a "percolation" process similar to the percolation problem which is well studied in condensed-matter physics.
		Before making estimates for values of the critical parameters N and P, it should be first emphasized that the main features of the model as a percolation problem do not depend on the values of the parameters or the details of the assumptions.
	www.sff.net /people/Geoffrey.Landis/percolation.htp (2469 words)

Try your search on: Qwika (all wikis)