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Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025

6:40pm EST

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Complex Numbers

by Robert Waltz

Rated: 18+ · Book · Personal · #1196512

Not for the faint of art.

Complex Numbers

A complex number is expressed in the standard form a + bi, where a and b are real numbers and i is defined by i^2 = -1 (that is, i is the square root of -1). For example, 3 + 2i is a complex number.

The bi term is often referred to as an imaginary number (though this may be misleading, as it is no more "imaginary" than the symbolic abstractions we know as the "real" numbers). Thus, every complex number has a real part, a, and an imaginary part, bi.

Complex numbers are often represented on a graph known as the "complex plane," where the horizontal axis represents the infinity of real numbers, and the vertical axis represents the infinity of imaginary numbers. Thus, each complex number has a unique representation on the complex plane: some closer to real; others, more imaginary. If a = b, the number is equal parts real and imaginary.

Very simple transformations applied to numbers in the complex plane can lead to fractal structures of enormous intricacy and astonishing beauty.

http://www.ddewey.net/mandelbrot/

Signature for Honorable Mentions in 2018 Quill Awards

A signature for exclusive use of winners at the 2019 Quill Awards

Signature for those who have won a Quill Award at the 2020 Quill Awards

Show Recent Comments

10 Most Recent Blog Comments:

Robert Waltz

about 7 hours ago
In response to "Samurai Wine"

Annette

, if my understanding of the article is correct, it was one stop on his journey, and the one where he met the cult leader.

1 Like

Annette

about 7 hours ago
In response to "Samurai Wine"

How does Scotland figure in this?

2 Like

Elisa: Snowman Stik

about 8 hours ago
In response to "Samurai Wine"

"And that's why Hollywood won't touch it: there's no happy ending."

I don't know. Hollywood has given Guillermo del Toro money over the years, and happy endings aren't his strong suit. Also, Amazon Studios has toed the waters of unhappy endings (hello, Manchester by the Sea). Nothing's impossible, really.

2 Like

tj in a winter wonderland

a day ago
In response to "No Parking"

This reminds me of a past visit to The Badlands National Park. There are walkways (boardwalks) to prevent walking in the grass where rattlesnakes may be slithering about as well as signs everywhere warning of rattlesnakes. On this particular visit, a woman told her preteen children (three of them) to step off the walk and go over and stand by the sign for a picture. Luckily no one was snake bit; that time.

1 Like

🐕GeminiGem🎁

a day ago
In response to "No Parking"

Flash flooding is a problem even when you aren't at a National Park. Around here, it is typically caused by "burn scars" on the mountains, where the land cannot handle rainfall after having a wild fire. It is super scary.

2 Like

Annette

a day ago
In response to "No Parking"

Yellowstone super volcano with a 1000 miles radius of lava spewing.

I hope the government will set up a perimeter of warning signs soon. After all, we are all too stupid to live far enough from the super volcano without proper notice.

2 Like

Cubby~Packing

a day ago
In response to "No Parking"

I love reading your blogs!

2 Like

tj in a winter wonderland

Jan 7, 2025 at 4:41pm
In response to "Getting Cocker's"

I never bought into the "early to bed, early to rise" thing; it was a well documented fact that Ben liked to stay up until almost dawn recording YouTube videos.

1 Like

Wordsmitty ✍️

Jan 7, 2025 at 12:37pm
In response to "Getting Cocker's"

I wonder why they never used or mentioned the book's full title ▼ ?

2 Like

tj in a winter wonderland

Jan 6, 2025 at 4:32pm
In response to "Business or Pleasure?"

What instantly pops into my mind when I read "bleisure" and "frolleagues":

Frolleagues, an untreatable diseases that results in a severe rash, blisters, and bleisures.

2 Like

January 9, 2025 at 10:09am

#1082161

Samurai Wine

Yes, it's a BBC article about a Japanese immigrant to California.

Kanaye Nagasawa: The samurai who forever changed California

And no, he didn't change it with his katana.

An hour's drive north of San Francisco, rows of gnarled and twisted vines terrace up the slopes of gently rolling hills in Sonoma County, California – which, alongside its neighbour, Napa, has been one of the world's premier wine-growing regions for more than a century.

Much to the annoyance of the French.

But California might never have earned such viticultural acclaim if it weren't for the little-known story of a Japanese immigrant named Kanaye Nagasawa.

So, you're telling me that immigrants can be a benefit?

Born into a samurai family and smuggled out of Shogunate Japan, only to become a founding member of a utopian cult and eventually known as the "Wine King of California", Nagasawa led a life that was stranger than fiction.

Okay, you had me at "utopian cult."

Nagasawa's extraordinary story goes back to 1864, when 19 young samurai from the Satsuma peninsula of Kagoshima were smuggled out of fiercely isolationist Edo-era Japan on a secret mission to study science and technology in the West.

While the BBC seems to have these archaic principles called "journalistic standards," I do not, and therefore I can write that this sounds like the coolest thing ever and why isn't it a movie already?

The youngest of the group, 13-year-old Hikosuke Isonaga went to Scotland, changing his name to Kanaye Nagasawa to protect his family, since at the time it was illegal to travel outside Japan. There, he came into the orbit of a charismatic religious leader named Thomas Lake Harris, who was recruiting followers to his version of ecstatic transcendentalism called The Brotherhood of the New Life.

Ah, yes, the utopian cult in question.

Naming the estate Fountaingrove after a year-round spring on the property, Harris set out to grow grapes, putting Nagasawa in charge of the operation. The winery soon prospered, but the "Eden of the West", as the commune described itself, became ever more wild, making headlines in San Francisco for its bacchanalian parties that eventually led to Harris' ignominious departure.

Hey, Hollywood: I know you're kind of busy right now what with the wildfires and all, but when shit stops being on fire, make this fucking movie.

All this came to an end during one of the darkest chapters of California's history, when Fountaingrove was seized by the government as part of the state's discriminatory Alien Land Laws, which were instituted in 1913, expanded in the 1920s and forbade Asian nationals from owning land or businesses.

Ah, there it is: the America I know. That plus the internment camps a couple decades later, which also feature in the article.

And that's why Hollywood won't touch it: there's no happy ending. It would have to be a Japanese movie. They're not focused on happy endings; what's important is that the protagonists maintain their honor.

1 Like • Comment • View 3 comments

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