Main Miscellaneous Topics Hub : [ Interesting Miscellaneous Topics (v1.1) ] A curated set of essays outside the scientific core that enrich understanding across Economics, Personal Finance, History, and Technology. Economics Context Essays (INACTIVE): A look at select economics topics. A financial system operates in an economic system background. [ The key differences between Capitalism and Socialism (v1.0) ]  -   Various flavors of both systems. [ Balancing capitalism and social democratic ideas - European case studies (v1.0) ] -   European case studies of mixed economic systems. Personal Finance: A look at personal finance and the stock market. [ Money Management Skills (v1.1) ] - Frameworks for understanding personal financial flows and investment vehicles. [ How the stock market works (v1.1) ] - Stock trading strategies and market mechanics. [ Using Plaid (v1.0) ] - Bank‑transfer payments (hosted on jaykasipersonal.blogspot.com). [ How I use Zelle (v1.1) ] - Zelle, P...

These two essays were written years apart but share a common thread: they reflect my curiosity about meaning, order, and the nature of consciousness — and why I eventually paused these explorations. They are not prescriptive. They simply document where my thinking led me, and why I chose not to pursue these questions further at this stage of life. 1. A Perspective on Spirituality Spirituality is not essential for developing an ethical framework. Ethics answers the question: How should I live? Spirituality addresses a different set of questions: What is the higher purpose and meaning of life? How could the order we see in the universe possibly arise? In Eastern philosophy: How does one find the atman — the true consciousness — and understand its identity with brahman , the ultimate reality? People meet their need for meaning in many ways. Whatever the approach, the end result is a mental orientation — a state of mind. I have been too busy ...

Physics/Astro Physics Hub : [ Physics/Astro Physics Deep Dive (v1.1) ]   Welcome to the definitive guide to the cosmos. This series of essays explores the fundamental rules governing our universe, tracking the journey from the cosmic macro-scale down to the strange quantum world. Cosmic Beginnings & The Fabric of Space: These essays examine the birth of the universe, how it expands, and the invisible scaffolding that shapes everything we see. [ Big Bang and Cosmic Dawn (v1.1) ] -   How the universe transitioned from a hot, dense singularity into the structured cosmos we observe today. [ Space-Time Fabric (v1.0) ] -  Understanding Einstein’s revolutionary idea that gravity is not a pulling force, but the bending of geometry itself. The Expanding Universe :   Cosmic acceleration, dark energy, and the mysterious forces pulling the universe apart. [ Dark Energy (v1.1) ] - what is causing the universe to expand faster [ Dark Matter (v1.1) ] - what are the clumps that ...

Physics can get awfully close to the universe creation event, but it is very unlikely it can say anything about why the Big Bang occurred and what it was before it. It is not even clear causality works in such instances. This is as close as we can get to God's creation. At time zero, there was no space, time, or matter. It is assumed there was a gravitational singularity. Here is an account of the progression of the universe from “Physics of the Universe” and other sources. This is basically the standard model of cosmology. Since the Big Bang, 13.787 billion (± 20 million) years ago, the universe has passed through many different phases or epochs. Due to the extreme conditions and the violence of its exceedingly early stages, it arguably saw more activity and change during the first second than in all the billions of years since. The first second of creation is dominated by particle physics and quantum mechanics and may not make much sense to a layman. To better understand it, you ...

  Much of this essay is a summary of classes of Prof Richard Wolfson of Middlebury College among other sources. The Quantum and Relativistic Revolutions Einstein developed the special theory of relativity in 1905 and further expanded it to the general theory in 1915. Special theory is, in its essence, a great equalizer. It says that your frame of reference does not matter - it could be at rest or moving at close to the speed of light. Physics experiments give the same result. You play the same tennis on a steady cruise ship or on land. You eat peanuts the same way on a steady airplane or on land. This simple thing leads to some interesting effects and fundamentally alters classical physics. The general theory of relativity turns out to be a theory of gravity. After that quantum mechanics was developed. The key concept of quantum mechanics can be illustrated by emptying a jug of water repeatedly in half until you cannot do it anymore. You are left with one molecule of water....