Technology invades the modern world

Chapter 1 Welcome to 1960
If he could choose his life over again, Lin Ran would definitely not choose to spend the last day of 2019 stargazing at Cherry Springs National Park.

I was just trying to find a place around the tent to relieve my urgent need to pee, but I came across a strange light gate. Out of curiosity, I moved closer to see what it was.

Then?

Then there is no more.

When I regained consciousness, all I could see was pitch black.

Lin Ran did not doubt whether he was blind or not, because he had not only lost his vision.

Hearing, touch, taste and smell also disappeared.

The loss of the five senses is chilling.

No matter how hard I tried to open my eyes, I couldn't feel any sight.

There was only empty darkness all around, and silence and emptiness gradually emerged in my heart.

No! There was something. Lin Ran could sense something indescribable in the distance, constantly devouring the darkness.

Although he didn't know what it was, his intuition told him that once the darkness was completely swallowed up, his consciousness would be swallowed up as well.

Countless thoughts flashed through his mind, "Is it possible that when I look at the stars, the stars are also looking at me? Have I been abducted by aliens?"

Lin Ran already regretted it. If he had known this would happen, even if he had spent the last day of 2019 boringly staying at home in the rental house or reading literature in the library, it would have been much better than his current situation.

Loss of consciousness may result in a vegetative state at the mildest and death at the worst.

From the beginning, his mind was full of distracting thoughts, but as time passed, the distracting thoughts in his mind quickly disappeared, leaving only endless pain and suffering. Lin Ran could completely understand why being locked up in a small dark room was considered the ultimate torture.

Whether it was the environment he was in or the crisis of losing consciousness, it was enough to make Lin Ran linger on the brink of collapse.

"No! I can't die like this. If I die, I feel like my mother won't be able to live either." As the only child in a single-parent family, Lin Ran knows very well what he means to his mother.

"No, consciousness can't stop it from spreading!"

"Even thinking is not allowed!"

“How can we stop it from spreading?”

Lin Ran was terrified. He didn't even have to wait until it devoured his consciousness. His own negative emotions were enough to overwhelm him.

"No, I have to find something to do, otherwise I will become a fool even if I don't go crazy." Lin Ran thought to himself.

As an outstanding graduate of the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics of Jiaotong University and currently a doctoral student in computer science at Stony Brook University, what Lin Ran means by finding something to do is to review the knowledge in his mind.

"Use Graph AI to solve various problems, including partial differential equations, bioinformatics, quantum physics, materials science, and so on." Computer PhD is an extremely huge field, and Graph AI is the next new branch of this behemoth.

Lin Ran actually has a strong interest in aerospace. As for why he did not choose aerospace, it is because it is impossible for Chinese people to apply for American aerospace projects, let alone a doctorate with a scholarship.

So in the end, I gave up my ideals and distant goals for the sake of life. Whether a computer PhD stays in the United States or returns to China, the prospects and expectations are far better than staying in China to work in the aerospace field.

It’s just that the Graph AI direction is a big pit, which he didn’t expect.

"Design and Manufacturing, Principles of Automatic Control, Aerodynamics, Engineering Thermodynamics, Comprehensive Russian, and Aircraft Design" are all required courses for Lin Ran's major.

That’s right, Russian too. Even English is only taught in the freshman year, while Russian is taught throughout the three years from freshman to junior year.

From the textbooks to the content of the professor's lectures to the exercises he had done, each one emerged in his mind. Compared with the current subject he was working on, the aerospace-related content could calm his heart more and offset some of the panic brought by the darkness.

"Functions, Limits, Derivatives, Integrals, Calculus of Multivariable Functions"

"Mechanics, thermodynamics, electromagnetism, optics, and modern physics."

“History of aerospace development, types of aircraft, and principles of aerospace technology.”

One course after another appeared in Lin Ran's mind, and the content that was almost forgotten was awakened again. Lin Ran felt that if he had been so serious in the past, his GPA would not only be in the top five in the grade, but would definitely be the first in the grade.

The Russian courses that used to be difficult and boring became extremely interesting at this moment. Lin Ran was willing to sit in the first row of the classroom and have his face washed by the professor's saliva.

“One can only hope that it will be Всякаябеда–клучшемуприводит.”

This Russian saying means "Misfortune may turn out to be a blessing in disguise."

After breaking down all the university courses from beginning to end and going through them again, Lin Ran found that he was undergoing some strange changes.

More and more details that were forgotten in the past and fragments that were not noticed in class are being awakened, and the brain's computing power is becoming stronger and stronger.

As the darkness swallowed him, it seemed to temper his thoughts as well.

However, the trend of the indescribable substance spreading continued unchanged. He could even feel a chill, which was enough to indicate that the other party was approaching.

"If life really ends like this, then it seems not bad to disappear in the ocean of knowledge."

If my brain was just a vacuum tube computer in the past, it has now reached the level of a semiconductor supercomputer. I can quickly get the results of high-order determinants, large-scale linear equations, linear equations with parameters, and other problems in linear mathematics that require massive calculations just by mental arithmetic.

Time goes on and on in a cycle of pain, thinking and memories.

Lin Ran discovered that not only had his brain power made great progress, but his concentration, which had been weakened by smartphones, had also made a qualitative leap. He could think about problems for longer and longer periods of time, and could enter a flow state for longer and longer periods of time.

"If I could return to the real world, I would definitely be a top genius!" Lin Ran thought, but the prerequisite was that he could go back.

After reorganizing the past content, Lin Ran finally turned his attention back to his current project: "Using artificial intelligence to solve the NS equations."

I mentioned earlier that Graph AI is a big pitfall because this direction is very new, and being able to do everything also means being able to do nothing.

After Professor Samuel's team at the University of Washington published a paper in 2017 titled "Data-driven discovery of partial differential equations," AI-powered equation solving began to gain widespread attention. Lin Ran quickly jumped into the fray.

Professor Samuel previously worked on using artificial intelligence to solve partial differential equations, and he also worked on using artificial intelligence to solve partial differential equations, but the NS equation was the most advanced one.

The NS equation, one of the top problems in mathematics, is a mathematical problem that is as famous as the Riemann hypothesis and the Goldbach conjecture.

If a universal analytical solution to the NS equations could be found, aircraft designs could find the optimal shape under various conditions. Wind power generation would no longer be considered waste electricity, becoming comparable to photovoltaic and nuclear power. Car designs could also find the optimal aerodynamics.
Simply put, the universal analytical solution of the NS equations has been found, and all real-world application problems involving the flow of air, liquid, and solids have an optimal solution.

Even if you are not awarded the Nobel Prize or the Fields Medal, scientists around the world will collectively protest.

This is also one of the few top mathematical problems that, once solved, can have the most significant impact on the real world.

However, what Lin Ran wants to do sounds impressive. Using artificial intelligence to solve the NS equations is actually not about finding a universal solution at all. It is just about doing some tiny work to find solutions under some specific conditions. The difficulty is probably equivalent to reducing the difficulty from finding a needle in a haystack to finding a needle in a bowl.

"It's just that I only have my brain now, not my computer?"

Lin Ran used his limited knowledge of advanced mathematics to deduce the formulas in computational fluid dynamics.

From the numerical method finite difference method in the textbook, we deduce the high-order finite difference method, compact finite difference method, and adaptive finite difference method.

The mixed finite element method, discontinuous finite element method, and geometric analysis finite element method are derived from the finite element method.

At the moment of deducing the result, Lin Ran felt that the spread of the indescribable thing was slowing down. "Could it be that we are trying to stop its spread by expanding the boundaries of knowledge?

So what conditions need to be met to completely eliminate it?
Could it be that he has completely solved the NS equations?"

The high-order finite volume method, unstructured finite volume method and dual-time-step finite volume method are derived from the finite volume method.

When we lose our five senses, mathematics becomes the only source of beauty.

Step by step, we move towards the NS equations:

"If I assume an ideal flow on a two-dimensional plane, then I can obtain accurate velocity and pressure fields by adding certain boundary conditions."

"For laminar viscous flow in circular pipes or between parallel plates, the exact solution for the parabolic velocity distribution can be solved."

The swallowing speed continued to slow down, even regressing, and the cold feeling was easing.

From plane Kutta flow to Poiseuille flow, from circular pipe Hagen–Poiseuille flow to Taylor flow between rotating concentric cylinders.
Sudden start of a plate or tube, flow near an oscillating plate or rotating disk, two-dimensional or axisymmetric stagnation point flow towards a plate
When the inertial force of the fluid is much greater than the viscous force, the NS equations can be divided into two regions to solve. In the outer region, there is uniform flow, and in the inner region, the horizontal derivative of the viscous term of the NS equation is ignored, so that a similar solution can be obtained.
The predecessors built an extremely sophisticated mathematical building. In the past, Lin Ran could only glimpse a corner of it, but now he can not only see the whole picture, but also see what other mathematicians cannot see. He realized that he might really be able to add a layer called NS equation to the entire mathematical building.

Lin Ran is moving towards the universal solution of the NS equation step by step.

"How long has it been? I think I've found the exact analytical solution to the universal NS equations!"

After verifying the universal solution with various NS equations, Lin Ran felt that he seemed to have really done it. Just relying on a book on the basics of fluid mechanics, he was able to solve the NS equations. This was much more exaggerated than using martial arts techniques to become an immortal, Lin Ran thought.

Although there was no verification by big names, no witnesses by the public, no cheers from the human world, and no Nobel honor to crown him, he still knew that he had persisted through endless years by thinking about unprecedented ultimate questions, without becoming an idiot or losing his mind. His soul was cheering for him, and his spirit was applauding him.

"If Lao Wang, who taught me advanced mathematics, knew this, he would definitely feel that he had no regrets in his life, because he could teach students to solve the NS equation."

Before he could be happy, the darkness finally collapsed bit by bit, and a colorful world slowly emerged before his eyes.

"Where did this come from for me?"

Whether it is the vehicles whizzing past on the road, the outfits of the pedestrians around, or the big words 1960 on the most eye-catching crystal ball in front of you.

They are all telling Lin Ran an extremely accurate message: Welcome to 1960.

"The neon ball with the words 1960 on it was 46.2 meters away from me. The air temperature at that moment was about 15% higher than that of Cherry Springs National Park, where I was previously. Considering the angle of direct sunlight, the time of day, and the surrounding environment, I'm probably still within New York State."

The classic red shape and the English letters "TELEPHONE" on the back tell him that this is a telephone booth.

The vehicles passing by seemed to be in slow motion, and every license plate number was engraved in his mind.

Lin Ran felt that if a bullet was coming towards him right now, he would be able to see through its trajectory and dodge it.

Countless pieces of information exploded in his mind like fireworks. The evolution of his brain and body was secondary. Lin Ran realized that his biggest gain at this moment was: "Door".

"To be precise, I can travel between all the doors I pass through. All the doors are my anchor points, and the white light circle helps me create a door in a parallel time and space in 1960, which is the telephone booth behind me.

I now have only one door in 1960 and an infinite number of doors in 2020?"

The doors he had walked through in the past appeared one by one in Lin Ran's mind.

In the cold wind of New York, Lin Ran gritted his teeth and stood at the newsstand to buy the New York Times for free, trying to figure out the situation.

"In 1957, the Soviet Union successfully launched the world's first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, marking the beginning of the space age for mankind."

On January 1958, 1, the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community were formally established.

"In 1958, Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments invented the integrated circuit"

"Sir, a copy of the New Year's special edition of the New York Times is 10 cents."

I put down the newspaper and continued to stand in front of the newsstand on the remaining snow. The billboard next to me showed a blonde girl puffing out a cigarette, and the slogan below it, "Camel cigarettes, even doctors love them!" was half covered by snowflakes.

In the public telephone booth behind me, a young man in a tweed suit was yelling into the microphone: "Those rednecks in Houston don't know anything about track alignment!"

Lin Ran turned around and saw a silver NASA badge on the man's chest, and the glass was covered with fog.

When Lin Ran came to his senses, he had already arrived at the lobby of a coffee shop next to the telephone booth. There was a cup of hot water on the table. The blonde waitress at the bar saw Lin Ran looking up and gave him a friendly smile. Sitting opposite was the young man who had just been in the telephone booth.

"Sir, you just mentioned orbital calibration. I think I can provide you with some assistance."

(End of this chapter)