"The Condensed Matter Song"

"The Condensed Matter Song"

By Mason A. Porter, Oxford Centre for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Mathematical Institute, University of Oxford

(parody of the "Matter-Patter Trio" by Gilbert and Sullivan)



I'm having lots of trouble with this awful calculation –
So I shall go back to my lab for some Bose-Einstein condensation.
And see if better vortex lattices cannot attract my senses,
And with some extra stirring I shall find the consequences.
Oh but in my complex conjugate I did forget the dagger,
And now that I get vortices I have regained my swagger,
And a word or two of compliment my vanity would flatter,
But I won't get tenure anyway, because it's really condensed matter!

Because atomic physics is really condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter,
Yes it's really condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter,

Yes it's really condensed matter,
It is really condensed matter,

BECs are condensed matter, condensed matter, condensed matter!

matter, condensed matter, condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter, ...


It may be a little tired and perhaps generally silly
And that energy landscape seems to me complex and hilly;
Though with it I want to grapple with a biological question,
But I know not what, so do you have a suggestion?
I shall then submit a paper to Physics Review Letters,
With excellent predictions to be tested when technology is better,
But right now I wish that landscape would be flatter,
And I don't actually know biology, so I study condensed matter!

Yes I study condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter,
Biology is really condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter,

Yes it's really condensed matter,
It is really condensed matter,

Biology is condensed matter, condensed matter, condensed matter!

matter, condensed matter, condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter, ...


If I had been so lucky I would have studied complex systems
But unless I find a power law surely nobody will listen –
I was given good advice when my mentor saw me erring
That to study networks and call it "physics" would be ever so daring,
And then with real data I would truly get to fiddle,
And publish papers in Nature and Science that aren't worth a piddle.
That particularly vapid, unintelligible patter
Is very sexy nowadays, but we all know it's really condensed matter!

Yes it's really condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter,
Complex systems is really condensed matter,
condensed matter, condensed matter,


All this rapid-publication, unintelligible patter
Is presented at the March Meeting, so it must be condensed matter,
Yes this rapid-publication, unintelligible patter
Is all part of the subject that we call condensed matter,
matter, condensed matter, condensed matter,
matter, condensed matter, condensed matter!



(OK, so I'm probably being a little harsh here and I'm definitely biting the hand that feeds me. But I couldn't resist doing this...)