Magritte Memes

Posts tagged with Magritte

The Treachery Of Linear Algebra
Math Science
1 month ago 24.1K views 0 shares
The Treachery Of Linear Algebra
A brilliant mashup of René Magritte's famous painting "The Treachery of Images" and linear algebra. The matrix shown is actually a rotation matrix, which transforms coordinates in a very non-linear way despite being part of "linear" algebra. The French caption translates to "This is not a linear application," which is mathematically incorrect and therefore hilarious. It's the mathematical equivalent of showing a pipe and saying "this is not a pipe." Mathematicians have been quietly chuckling at this for centuries. Well, decades. Fine, since I made this joke 4 minutes ago.

Quantum Surrealism: Schrödinger Meets Magritte
Physics Science
9 months ago 14.2K views 0 shares
Quantum Surrealism: Schrödinger Meets Magritte
The infamous Schrödinger's cat experiment meets surrealist art! The meme brilliantly mashes up quantum physics with René Magritte's famous painting "The Treachery of Images" (you know, the pipe with "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" underneath). In quantum mechanics, Schrödinger proposed his famous thought experiment where a cat in a box with a radioactive trigger is simultaneously alive and dead until observed. Here we see the cat both transparent (dead) and solid (alive) with the radioactive material and trigger mechanism nearby. The French phrase "Ceci n'est pas une dead or alive" (This is not a dead or alive) is the perfect punchline - because quantum superposition means it's literally both states at once until measured. It's quantum physics making fun of itself!