AgentOfAllah's Posts
Nairaland Forum › AgentOfAllah's Profile › AgentOfAllah's Posts
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 (of 46 pages)
AlmiqhteeAllah:If it's about the economics of it, then there are evident long term benefits for Nairaland. For instance, we could acknowledge Nairaland in our scientific publications, which will increase its exposure to the rest of the world. Not by much, but every little counts, right? Also, if we are able to invent something that may become a commercial success, we'll make lots of ads on this very platform... However, I'm convinced Seun is not all Machiavellian. I'm sure that deep down, he's got a deep appreciation for science for the sake of it. |
AlmiqhteeAllah:Yeah I checked Johnnydon's thread and it's apparently closed. I don't understand why it was closed. |
adepeter2027:I have a new password proposition for Lala: Password 5 = Science. What's great about it, it doesn't eliminate the others. What say ye, sir Lala? ![]() |
Hey people, I had a short chat with Exciton yesterday, and this made me quickly realise that Nairaland may have far more active researchers in the shadows than is apparent. I'm particularly interested in knowing scientists in the fields of physics, materials sciences, nanotechnology, electrical engineering and chemistry. I think this community is grossly underrepresented in Nigeria, so to most, we are virtually non-existent. I want to do something about this starting from now. If we have a unified platform with which to interact with each other, we can find people with similar interests as us, we may be able to discuss our subjects of interest, find new solutions and ultimately, prepare formidable research grant proposals to interested agencies to solve problems that are peculiar to Nigeria. I'm sure you'll agree with me that we've had enough of drooling over technologies developed in other countries, to solve the problems of other people. Time to start solving our own problems. Before any of this can be done though, it will be helpful to make each other's acquaintances, and know what we all do. I will start with myself: I am specialised in the growth and characterisation of inorganic semiconductor materials for light harvesting. My specific interest is in the development of highly efficient deep UV LEDs based on III-Nitride material systems, and the commercial applications and benefits of this research spans many fields, including medicine (sterilization, germicidal irradiation, efficient containment of Psoriasis etc), energy harvesting (water splitting), Agriculture (artificial greenhouses for precise climatic management of food crops), Efficient visible lighting (secondary excitation of wavelength dependent devices for dynamic white light control), space equipment management: believe it or not, but in space, the lack of atmosphere exposes space equipment to a constant barrage of ionic charging from high energy photons and other cosmic particles. These can significantly affect the results from highly sensitive measuring devices. For instance, the LIGO project which won the 2017 Nobel Physics prize cannot yet be deployed to space because of this problem. In order to surmount it, we need highly efficient UV sources to rid the space equipment of these charged particles by UV irradiation. The current solutions are bulky, unsustainable and expensive. https://i66.tinypic.com/301qcrp.jpg UV Applications I'll leave the creative minds to come up with many more applications. My primary goal is to solve or contribute to the solution of the efficiency problems with UV LEDs and allow others take advantage of this solution. Anyway, enough about my research. I'd like to know more about yours?? Seun, Lalasticlala, Mynd44 help with your moderators super powers please. I promise, I will formally acknowledge Nairaland if anything tangible comes out of this! |
Exciton:Oh, what an atrocious disgrace. You shattered my last ember of hope Wow. That's a large shift in PL peak and you're right. It strongly suggests that the reconfiguration energy is on the order of thermal energy to induce such huge structural changes probably causing the formation of large density of trap states. Did you guys thermally anneal your sample for a while before doing the measurements? It generally makes films more stable. Anyways, the device operating temp range isn't that wide and such shifts wouldn't be present while moisture and O2 attacks can be prevented with the usual encapsulation methods well developed for its organic cousins.I didn't prepare this sample, so I'm not sure if any post-synthesis enhancement was done. The PL test though, was done in a HV cryostat chamber, so it's highly unlikely that air contamination occurred. Well, you know this material more than I do, but that orange peak didn't look like trap states to me. Its FWHM was narrow, more like free excitons, or even free carriers. It's probably an innate characteristic of the material system. Hehehe. I once took a course on spintronics. Not too horrible. Yes, spin currents... the possibilities. Still a relatively young field though.I imagine it isn't. I'm just a bitter soul, haha! Very true. I am quite sure that the only place in sub-saharan Africa with a good laser physics lab is in South Africa. I think they do stuff on ultra cold atom spectroscopy and other AMO kinda stuff. You should check their university websites. They even have an expensive nanoscience centre or so according to news. Not to speak of their large array of telescopes for astronomy. I simply don't get why we are so far behind compared to SA in STEM.Oh lawd! So much for the Giant of Africa...more like the giant armpit of Africa! I want to do those cool light trapping and maybe nonlaser BEC experiments. Not for any particular reason..just for funzies. I really want to be able to do research somewhere in Africa, I really won't mind if it's not in Naija, but Nigeria would be preferable. Unfortunately, our useless illiterate leaders, with a primitive and childish impulse to agglomerate wealth like it's candy, would rather use the nation's wealth to buy houses in Dubai et al. Well, most of our "Profs" aren't that different from the politicians too.You just channeled my feeling. Anyways, you can do your research abroad till you get famous enough to attract big grants to set up a lab in Nigeria. Or you can go the way of Agabi Oshiorenoya. But it's really nice to know a fellow Nigerian with whom you could have this sorta chats with!Agabi Oshiorenoya! Omg, how come I never heard of this bloke? What Another Nigerian physicist that is interested in neuroscience? Is this heaven?? Omg! I'm mulling neuroscience as my next fancy. Specifically, I want to answer consciousness! I think I'm going crazy so keep me in your thoughts, haha!Listen, let's stay in touch and keep the door for collaboration open. Now I'm interested in knowing all the active physicists on this forum. I think I'll start a thread to find out. |
Oh, the prejudice! This author has given happiness a grotesque definition to justify the snarky title of their article. Happiness is not a finely defined set of wants, but any aspiration that brings about contentment. For instance, I may invest my happiness in the success of my child, in which case, I would do anything, even if that thing hurts, to make sure my child succeeds. My happiness could also be invested in sexual gratification. Should this be the case, why shouldn't I seek it, even if it means spending my own money to travel across Europe to fulfill this dream? The only thing this author has done to drive home their vacuous points is resort to silly red herrings, like equating sexual gratification with multiple partners to STD cultivation. What about people who get STDs from single partners? In this nauseating excuse of an article, the author mentions a few examples of "higher" pursuits which should supersede one's desire for happiness. For instance, they mentioned the "deeper fulfillment of parenthood", as if to suggest that every parent gets a sense of fulfillment. Such a claim is just bunkum! The truth is that there are many parents in the world today, living in extreme misery because they had children when they shouldn't have. Those parents enjoy no deeper fulfillment! This is not to say having children cannot in fact give one fulfillment. Only that if you are certain that it wouldn't, or even unsure that it would, you had better held back before plunging yourself into an insufferable abyss. "Will this make me happy?" What is wrong about this line of enquiry? Yes, it may however be useful to enumerate the sort of things that make you happy in order of priority, for some pursuits might require you to forego others, but make no mistake, your net happiness is always the goal. Anybody that says otherwise is either pretentious or doesn't know the meaning of happiness. An equally important question to ask is the cost of your happiness. I suppose this is the most difficult bit, as it is very complicated to estimate. And I'm not just talking of financial cost, this also includes health, time, effect on those you care about (if you care about anybody), and so on. If your happiness pursuit isn't sustainable, then you may want to think twice before indulging. This author recommends a list of questions to ask before embarking on their so-called "higher" aims. These include: "Is this right? Is it my duty? Is it productive? Is it healthy? Is it worthwhile? Will it bear good fruit? Will it make me a better person? Is this what God wants?" When you ask if something is right, what is the yardstick by which you measure its rightness? For most things we do in life, there is usually never a ready answer for whether they are right or not. Also, while the outcome of certain actions are certainly predictable, these are very few compared to most of life's pursuits. The eventual outcome of our pursuits are so unpredictable that one can never be certain of the answers to questions about how productive or profitable their actions may be. For all we know, one of those people Elise met along the way might have turned out to be the source of her "higher" aim; and yes, her definition of "higher aim" is as irrelevant to us as ours might justifiably be to her. In short, while the answers to all these questions could very well be the justifications for one's life's pursuits, they are subjective. Even still, whatever lies at the end of that pursuit, whether you acknowledge it or not, is still about your happiness. So, by all means, ask yourself: "will this make me happy?" without being shamed into accepting that there can be such a fulfillment that is deeper than your happiness. The most atrocious liberty this author took was their attempt to desynonymise happiness and joy! That's just an egregious contrivance not even fit for pedantic deliberations. A joyful person is a happy person, and when someone is unhappy, they cannot be a joyful person. Obviously, joyfulness and happiness are equally transient states. There's nobody that is perpetually joyful; so, to end an article eschewing the pursuit of happiness with a statement like: "You can never go wrong by doing what brings joy" rings excruciatingly hollow, and dumb...like really? You don't say!! In the end, I've only read a disappointingly uninspiring article by someone who is eternally bitter that other people may find joy in different ways than them. The author attempts to paint these people as "joyless, miserable, lonely, smiling, empty people". However, it seems to me that the only person who is joyless, miserable, lonely, empty, and, might I add, shallow, is someone who, rather than embrace all the many expressions of happiness and its pursuit, chooses to limit its definition as an excuse to condemn others for not being just like them. |
Exciton:My feeling exactly when I saw your moniker! BTW, I also work on MOCVD, but I'm primarily an ultrafast spectroscopy guy. Do you think there's anywhere in Nigeria where we have MBE/MOCVD reactors? You can also use perovskites in water splitting... basically as a photo activating catalyst, due to it's tunable bandgap and long charge carrier correlation length, to provide the much needed electrons (well, as radicals) to kickstart the water splitting process.Yeah, I've noticed it does get a lot of Nature papers! Let's hope the stability issue is fixed. I once did temperature dependent PL studies on one, and its luminescence changed from refulgent green at low temperature (13K) to dull orange at 290K. That didn't make sense to me because the redshift was more than Varshni's model could account for within that temperature range. It turns out that the atomic arrangements are prone to significant thermally induced reconfiguration. For someone that works with mechanically robust inorganics, that was befuddling. Never mind applications, there's so much Physics that can be done within your field! Can't wait to read about your works! In the PV industry, of course they'll serve to augment other upcoming third and fourth gen solar cells. There's serious competition though, even apart from the traditional Si or III-V based cells. Dye sensitized solar cells is one, organic based (now with electron spin as an added degree of freedom to improve device efficiency is a growing research topic) etc.I call my Spintronics colleagues spin doctors, mostly because most of their theories completely fly over my head! But yes, that too is a potentially revolutionary field. I mean, to generate current flux with negligible thermal loss...Oh, the humanity! By the way, I'm just a struggling PhD student trying to achieve my dreams! You guys need to come back to Naija and teach the next generation. Almost no one knows these things in Naija.I'd gladly accept that offer if it comes with a well-funded Photonics and Spectroscopy lab. I really want to teach in Nigeria at some point, even if it's pro bono, but Nigerian professors are mostly inactive researchers for lack of funding, and that puts me off! I'll just become obsolete in less than 3 years, then we're back to square 1. I hate square 1s!! I too am completing my PhD pretty pretty soon! |
Exciton:Hi Exciton! I started reading your posts when I saw your moniker (it's a dead giveaway!). This post confirms my suspicion that you're an LED bloke! It's refreshing to find someone working on LEDs. Although, I've had collaborations with some core Perovskite guys, My focus is on inorganic III-Nitrides for Deep UV applications. I once did Optical and and carrier dynamics studies on a group of Perovskite materials (lead-iodide based), and they were extremely frustrating to pin down because they were very susceptible to thermal degradation. I know the study of Perovskite is an exciting, reinvigorated field, and they are especially notable for their energetic tunability, which, in principle, makes them great for solar cell applications. However, I fear they are not very stable in the long term, compared to their established inorganic counterparts. I'm not a Perovskite expert, so indulge my ignorant question: Do you think they can replace traditional solutions, or they'll just augment them? BTW, is your intended application for water splitting or PV? Sorry if my question is broad...like I said, I'm not really an expert. |
shaybebaby:Okay, will do! |
KreativGenius:Why do you think I'm shying away from ideologies? I'm not, I'm just saying the party shouldn't be defined by any such ideologies. The party's policies will in fact, intersect with many ideologies (call it ideological pluralism) without being confined to any one in particular. The party will prioritise statistics and pragmatism over ideology. A party needs aclearly defined purpose, objective,belief system,principles. These contribute to the binding factor within the factor, and ultimately helps it become marketable. You seem like an idealist, this needs reining and clear goals and objectives.The party's principle/belief system is pragmatism. I'm a pragmatist. If you think that's idealism, I couldn't argue otherwise because of semantic circularity, just like being intolerant towards the intolerant. Practically however, it's in stark contrast with, and diametrically opposed to idealism. The spirit of my modern party will be multifaceted. Based mainly on modern challenges such as human rights, poverty alleviation, environmental protection and so on. Whenever these clash, as the always do, the national interest will take precedence over ideology. These aren't new ideas, as many modern governments already practice this, but usually in violation of the spirit of their manifestos. |
shaybebaby:We'll be neither liberal nor conservative nor libertarian. My vision of a modern party is one driven by pragmatists, not ideologues or highfalutin demagogues. Maybe we call it Congress for Pragmatic Nigerians. I'm tired of silly, hypocritical idealisms. I'm sure people may be tempted to call it a centrist party, but there will be an important distinction: Our policies will be supported as much as possible, by science and statistics, not by a need to satiate moderate ideologues. Of course, our pragmatic policies will have to depend on certain core principles which aren't up for debate, like freedom, fairness, justice, etc. I guess a ratified version of the universal declaration of human rights would do. Our Manifesto should address immediate problems like corruption. To this end, three processes should immediately be strengthened; oversight, statistical records and institutional independence. All such agencies that carry out such roles will constitutionally be guaranteed a certain amount of base fund that doesn't require government approval, but subject to regular government audits. The people make the system, so appointment is extremely important. Most federal appointments would probably come from within the political party, which means that members must be subjected to extreme vetting, complete with background checks and what not. Anybody with a criminal history cannot be admitted into the party. We also need to think a lot about sources of government income. Hopefully, tax regimes will be strengthened too. Taxes aren't important just because the government gets its funds from them, but also because the government would feel more beholden to the people, therefore, more responsible. These are my raw thoughts. With great minds such as yours, we can have a more refined manifesto ![]() |
PastorAIO:That's a good thing, isn't it? To run out of urges is to run out of reasons to stay alive. |
shaybebaby:Let's start a political party! I'm totally up for it. |
shaybebaby:I feel this kind of inflexibility might be counterproductive for two reasons: 1) It's remarkably easy for criminals to prey on the sentiments of people by politicising your harsh actions as an attack on tribe/religion/ethnicity and so on. This ends up ennobling the criminal in the eyes of the people you serve. The harsher the punishment, the easier it is to villify you, since people automatically empathise with the apparent underdog, even to their own detriment. I still come about a lot of threads on this very forum where people believe Jonathan (and fedora adorning goatherd with lots of half-eaten rotten yams in his closet) and Diezani (Nigeria's strategic national eyes reserve) aren't criminals, but victims of a vindictive ethnic bigot, Buhari (and 14th century grandad who still thinks women belong in the other room). I believe his harsh words and iron fist reputation may have played well into the hands of his detractors, or, at least, introduced a lot of resistance in his failing and flailing anticorruption drive. 2) Most petty thieves are usually protégés of bigger ones, so if you're as harsh with the small timers as you are with the big fish, you may find the big fish unpleasantly difficult to indict since they'll always cover their tracks by using small guys as their front persons. Dead men don't talk...they don't help either. Agencies like the FBI are successful because they make good deals with small thieves in order to catch big ones. So maybe don't execute a ₦30 thief. (S)he may prove useful in helping you recover ₦30 billion ![]() |
shaybebaby:Holy father uncle cousin king, you ain't messing around!!! |
shaybebaby:Nah, never seen it, but I hear a lot about it. I'll look it up ![]() |
Hati13:Your response gave me the opportunity to self-reflect. You know, my most cherished education are things I've learned from and about people with entirely different perspective than me. It's admirable that you ventured out of your small universe to interact with people that must no doubt seem culturally exotic to you. Above all, I'm really glad this forum has been able to make positive contributions to your life. I wish more Nigerians were like you. |
shaybebaby:Aw hell yeah! Shiiiiiiiiiet! ![]() If you liked the wire, you might like Narcos. |
shaybebaby:House of cards? Did you hear that there'll be no new seasons? Spacey was accused raping/sexually assaulting some boys, so Netflix ended the series. |
Hati13:Hi Hati, it seems you're Ethiopian, so indulge my curiosity, if you please; how did you come to know about Nairaland, and why did it initially interest you? |
shaybebaby:Yeah, makes sense! ![]() @great pleasures, only if you binge.Like a wise man (name withheld) once said: "if you don't binge you're hinged". ![]() Makes sense, right? You can surely tell it came from a very deep place. Oh oh speaking about binge, here's one thing you may not yet know about me: I'm into TV series...as in a lot of them. The Walking dead, handmaid's tale, GoT, rick and morty, let me remember the others.. Do you watch any? |
shaybebaby:What!? how did you know? Tell me about procrastination, I can definitely relate but unlike you, it fills me with guilt.As should all great pleasures ![]() |
shaybebaby:It is exactly how you've done, you just have to open the exact http of the picture. The link should be an active one that ends with ".jpg" or ".png". Not sure what other extensions work, but if it doesn't have a common extension of a digital image, it probably won't work. Like so: https://i.imgflip.com/1mfpln.jpg I bet you "drop mic" after every typing seshI drop it's equivalent: My keyboard...but not intentionally...which is why I've had to replace my keyboard like three times. |
shaybebaby:This is exactly how I think of the subject. Asides quantum tinting, what else do you get up to that you shouldn't.I'm in a theatre troupe, I sing, play the drum set and participate in improv theatre. But my biggest sin, the one I'd say I shouldn't really be doing is procrastination...but doing it makes me feel damn good, I won't lie! ![]() |
Jupxter:You're always welcome to discuss subjects of your choosing! |
vaxx:Nor have I, or will I ever argue that they are the same. As for their common descent, we are in agreement. |
Jupxter:On the contrary, I read all you wrote. I just don't think you understand the absurdity of your position. You're trying to use the fact that humans share common traits with other animals to prove that humans aren't animals. Your argument makes no sense to me comrade. |
Proudgorgeousga:Thanks! My classification includes ALL humans. Jupxter:White men, yellow men, brown men, tall men and short men weren't excluded in my definition of humans. Although, I admit that I haven't quite decided if women are apes or not; but I'm leaning towards not, seeing how sophisticated their comprehension is compared to us. Given my clarification, I hope my brother in transaction refines his understanding of my meaning. |
Jupxter:Lol...I don't know my IQ levels because I've never taken an IQ test. I despise the notion that the definition of intelligence can be standardised. As a physicist, one versed in quantum theories, i felt it wouldn't be a problem for you placing this thesis side by side with relativity as it relates to mechanics, i'm sure you can relate with diverse relativities in our physical universe, from physics to the whole world, and can agree that if such level of proximities exists in human-animals genomes, then it being existential in humans doesn't imply humans are animals and animals are humans.Aside from the facts that we eat, s.hit, p.iss, reproduce, sweat, sleep, bleed, and die like other animals, it is precisely our genetic proximity to them that is the scientific basis for our classification as animals. "Animal" isn't a species, it's a taxonomic kingdom to which we and many other creatures belong. As a geneticist, I hope you don't dispute this. Perhaps, the scientific community didn't buttress the entire objectives of genome sequencing appropriately, which begs the question, why do we share similarities in genome sequencing in animals? How does it affect humans, what are the overall benefits, if this questions can be carefully evaluated, you will find your answers, and the right path, for now, i hate to be your opposition bro. You're close, very close to the truth.Biology answered these questions about a century before DNA was discovered. The answer is called evolution. |
Jupxter: ![]() I'm not sure why you believe I'm deluded, but I'm very interested to know, when you have some time to explain. That said, you're correct that biology is not my forte, however, I know a thing or two about taxonomy to understand whence your misunderstanding emanates. You asked many questions such as why is a man not a cock or a roach and so on. Well, all those questions can simply be answered if you read a little on biological taxonomy. Hopefully, you'll also come to appreciate that while a Chimp, a gorilla and an orang-utan are apes, they aren't all the same. Likewise, man can be an ape without being a chimp. Perhaps it would aid both of our understanding if you supplied the scientific definition of ape. |
shaybebaby:Thug life, innit!? ![]() |
Jupxter:I can Google granite formation, but that's not where my confusion lies. I just don't know what link you're making between that and our conversation on evolution. |

Another Nigerian physicist that is interested in neuroscience? Is this heaven?? Omg! I'm mulling neuroscience as my next fancy. Specifically, I want to answer consciousness! I think I'm going crazy so keep me in your thoughts, haha!




