Mathematical déjà vu, and Coffee | Jon Butterworth | Life & Physics

Last week I was in a hotel in Edinburgh where the whole bedroom was vibrating for some unexplained reason, at an almost imperceptible level. The Bessel functions in my glass of water were a key part of the evidence that persuaded the manager to move us

Occasionally I get asked what it was that first attracted me to physics. There are many possible answers (If you're keen, you can find a couple of them here). But part of the answer is definitely something I'd call the 'economy of solutions'.

What I mean is that when we try to analyse and understand a wide variety of physical systems, the same pieces of mathematics turn up over and over again. This is very economical in terms of brain power. It also means that putting in the effort to understand one particular, perhaps obscure, physical system, often gives you a head start on understanding many others.