vttoth

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280 Posts
I am a software developer and author of computer books. I also work on some problems in theoretical physics.
Home pagehttps://vttoth.com/
vttothAug 31, 2025
AI fakeries https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=13658
AI fakeries

The other day, I came across a tragic photograph accompanying a story from the horrifying winter of 1944-45 in Budapest, when the Arrow Cross ruled the streets and their units murdered Jews by the thousands, often lining them up and shooting them into the icy Danube. The victims were first ordered to remove their shoes: leather was valuable! (Today, their fate is memorialized by a row of bronze shoes marking one of the locations where these murders took place.) The story was about a mother, already barefoot in the snow, who managed to convince her son to run. Supposedly, the son survived (I cannot vouch for the authenticity of the story but there were harrowing stories of survival during the Arrow Cross's deranged murder spree.) Accompanying the post was an old black-and-white photograph showing the moment this supposedly happened. Except that it wasn't an old black-and-white photograph. <a href='https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=13658' class='excerpt-more'>[...]</a>

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vttothJul 2, 2025
Canada Day https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=13561
Canada Day

The Sun is still up so it's not too late: Happy Canada Day!

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vttothMar 6, 2025
History’s mistakes https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=13271
History’s mistakes

I could not resist answering a Quora question about Trump and Ukraine: Trump wants a quick end to Russia’s war. How do you feel about his withdrawal of military aid to Ukraine, and what effect that will have on Putin’s willingness to come to the negotiating table? For a brief moment, allow me to give Trump the benefit of the doubt and assume that he had the purest of intentions in his heart, that he was doing everything he was doing out of compassion, out of concern and a sense of responsibility, trying to end the bloodshed, the senseless war. He won’t. There is a meme that has been very popular lately, and with good reason, recalling another instance when a similar choice was made: British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain returned triumphantly on September 30, 1938, from the Munich conference, where he agreed to Herr Hitler’s demands to compel Czechoslovakia to cede critical <a href='https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=13271' class='excerpt-more'>[...]</a>

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vttothOct 22, 2023
Driving on the right https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12207
Driving on the right

It was 82 years ago, back in 1941, that the country of my birth, Hungary, switched to driving on the right [link in Hungarian]. The decision has a sad history. It was prompted by the experience earlier that year when Hungary allowed the transit of Wehrmacht troops on their way to occupy Yugoslavia. This was yet another step towards Hungary fully committing itself to the German effort, giving up any semblance of neutrality. For Hungary's prime minister at the time, Pal Teleki, this was the last drop [link in Hungarian] in the proverbial bucket. Early in the morning on April 3, 1941, he shot himself. His farewell letter to Miklos Horthy, Hungary's leader at the time, simply stated, "I did not hold you back. I am guilty. Pal Teleki, April 3, 1941." Hungary went on to fight with the Germans against the USSR. When it became clear that the Germans cannot win, Horthy made a half-hearted attempt <a href='https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12207' class='excerpt-more'>[...]</a>

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vttothOct 5, 2023
Hungarian Nobels https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12166
Hungarian Nobels

I don't know much about attosecond light pulses but my wife and I did note that one of the recipients of this year's physics prize was a physicist was studied just a year ahead of Ildiko at ELTE (Eötvös University). She doesn't recall if she ever bumped into Ferenc Krausz, though. And of course one of the recipients of the Nobel prize in physiology or medicine was Katalin Kariko, for her groundbreaking work in mRNA vaccines. Well-deserved indeed! I actually know (a little bit) more about mRNA vaccines than about attosecond physics, which might seem odd, considering that physics is my home turf, and organic chemistry is like an alien landscape. But the generation of ultrashort photon pulses is a very specialized field of study, to which I never paid much attention. Anyhow, Kariko and Krausz are now added to that long list of scientists who were born, and studied in, Hungary, but who <a href='https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12166' class='excerpt-more'>[...]</a>

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vttothOct 3, 2023
Heat wave https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12162
Heat wave

Here's my phone screen as of a few minutes ago: That's in Centigrade of course. What can I say? OK, our balcony thermometer only shows 28.3 C. Even so... not exactly typical early October weather for Ottawa.

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vttothSep 30, 2023
Half a million years https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12159
Half a million years

So this has been in the news lately, too: a discovery of remnants of a wooden structure that is almost half a million years old.  It is truly incredible. These tools, these worked pieces of now petrified wood, predate the emergence of homo sapiens by several hundred thousand years. Not for the first time I am left wondering just how much of the past will remain forever hidden from us. The earliest human whose name is known to us lived roughly 5000 years ago. Let that sink in for a moment. Modern human behavior began roughly 100,000 years ago, give or take. Presumably, this behavior involved language, social structures and, well, names. These were our ancestors, millions and millions of them, who inhabited the Earth for countless generations. And we don't even know their names. And now this, some 476,000 year old logs along with simple stone tools that were used to shape them. That <a href='https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12159' class='excerpt-more'>[...]</a>

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vttothSep 29, 2023
From out of this world https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12153
From out of this world

I've been meaning to mention this: A few days ago, the sample capsule of the OSIRIS-REx mission returned safely to the Earth, carrying inside a sample taken from the asteroid Bennu. This is a remarkable achievement, the first successful sample return of its type. I wonder what we will learn from the material that was obtained, but I'm sure it will reveal some intriguing secrets, especially about the history and formation of the solar aystem. Love the way the capsule was sitting on the ground, upright, not even tilted. Could it be more picture perfect than this? I am also mildly (but pleasantly) surprised that I have not heard any panicmongering about a capsule bringing back extraterrestrial microbes or whatever. OK, I wasn't specifically looking but still. It's a relief.

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vttothSep 29, 2023
Falling antimatter https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12150
Falling antimatter

OK, not exactly a surprising result but still, a fantastic experimental achievement: Yes, Virginia, antimatter falls downward. Why is this important? Well, we kind of knew that it was inevitable. I mean, if antimatter were to fall upward, it'd have meant that our entire understanding of gravitation is wrong. That even our understanding of special relativity is probably wrong. So it was a rather safe bet that antimatter follows the same geodesics as normal matter and falls downward. But physics, lest we forget it, is ultimately not about erudite speculation. It is about experiment and observation. And this amazing experiment achieved the almost impossible: it observed antihydrogen atoms in a vertical vacuum chamber at cryogenic temperatures and, as expected, most of those hydrogen atoms ended up at the bottom.

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vttothSep 13, 2023
Left-wing libertarian https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12128
Left-wing libertarian

Yes, that's me. At least according to The Political Compass. It does not surprise me much, mind you. While I am not a wild-eyed, "woke", progressive "social justice warrior" (in fact, I am increasingly a deeply fed up with the "woke" lot), many of my views tend to align broadly with the traditional left. I also reject authoritarianism in all forms, and while I don't endorse unconstrained freedom (e.g., in the economy), I largely view constraints as a necessary evil, not as a universal solution. And, of course, I absolutely, strongly, vehemently reject any and all forms of personality cults. So here, then, is my question: Given the direction our societies are heading, will there be room for left-wing libertarians like me in the future? Authoritarianism seems to be so much in vogue these days, be it the culture of intolerance in the name of tolerance as practiced by the woke left, or the <a href='https://spinor.info/weblog/?p=12128' class='excerpt-more'>[...]</a>

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