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Merck's Blog

  • 6 min read

Questions of Chinese Grammar

For some time I have fretted over which Asian language to learn. Japanese appeals to me for its sweet sound, and because I take interest in Japanese artwork (particularly the video games and animated films) that they have produced. However, I have rarely met Japanese-speaking people. Chinese is much more utilitarian. Just the sheer number of Chinese speakers and China's recent economic success ensures that any student of Chinese will have ample opportunity to practice. For this reason, I have chosen to study Chinese.

  • 2 min read

iPhone 4, Mathematical Finance, and Basketball

I've been playing around with the iPhone 4 since I took the plunge about two weeks ago. Amazing device. I really love the iTunes U feature. Access to countless hours of educational material. I've been falling asleep to The Tolkien Professor and the 99% Invisible podcast. The other day I took a long walk while listening to a lecture on the history of probability theory and found myself playing basketball (more vigorously than I'd expect). Why sit in a class, half-asleep, when you can listen to the same lecture while getting some cardio? As Steve Jobs would say, This is HUGE.

  • 1 min read

Genes, Games, and Poker

I've been reading Dawkins' The Selfish Gene. What I love most about the book is how my mind is just overflowing with genetic systems, simulatable quantitative machines; I'm just dying to code up some simulations of the systems he exposes so eloquently in the book. Every few pages, a new system comes into view. I have to pause, just stare into the void as my mind runs fast, imagining the mathematics needed to construct from the theory a working computer model.