- Geosciences, along with many other disciplines in science and engineering,
faces an exponential increase in the amount of data generated from observation,
experiment and large-scale, high-resolution 3-D numerical simulations.
- "If the object of science, whether analytical or abstract, is
to find, prove and finally communicate theories, then teh basic end of science
implies the need for accurate analysis and accurate communication"
- Dave Yuen, U Minn.
- Typically, science uses the language of mathematics - equations
- Can you visualize the equations?
- Computer simulations have become very important in analyzing a problem
- drawback is communicating this large amount of data
- for a 2D 512 x 512 grid,
- outputing 5 fields (T, P, fluid velocity, fluid production,
T_max)
- each 512^2 have 4 bytes of data in each position = 5 MB
per frame,
- for 200 frames = 1 GB of data!
- How can you pull patterns and phenomena out of a gigabyte of numbers?
- When properly utilized, images convey complex phenomena and patterns,
more so than mathematics.
- Working with data, visualizing, allows exploration of phenomena
on scales too large or too small to be experienced directly, helps develop
useful knowledge that will be retrieved and applied when relevant in the
future.
- Graphics and Visualization convey very large amounts of data
very efficiently
Quantitative Communication
- Our lives are filled with assessments of quantity
- an approximate or exact sense of:
- number (time)
- amount (your lunch drink)
- size (clothes, the room)
- scale
2. Science works with:
- order of magnitude reasoning (magnetic flipping)
- precise measurements (ppb, ppm, wt%)
- very large datasets
- need techniques for all
We will explore how to represent these quantities visually and quantitatively.
- Graphical communication comes in a variety of forms, check out the
web!
- good: www.geol.lsu.edu
- bad: corporatecup.net/2003CC/rules.html