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A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

quantamagazine.org

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Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#11

Post by auntienomen »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #5
Pamar wrote: post #2

I think that the author is trying too hard to create sensationalism by stressing how the person in the article had decided that "math was not for him", by saying stuff like: After that bad math test in elementary school, Huh says he adopted a defensive attitude toward the subject: He didn’t think he was good at math, so he decided to regard it as a barren pursuit of one logically necessary statement piled atop anothe…

Can someone explain how someone who has decided to distance himself from math can major in PHYSICS?! Exactly that. At my university first-year physics students would effectively take the same courses as mathematics students and Mathematical Methods in Physics on top of that.

This is true, but becomes a lot less relevant when you're playing in Huh's league. It's not that easy to make a move even from theoretical high-energy physics to pure mathematics. You can read about some interesting success stories in Quanta, but I think most people who try this end up leaving academia. There's a large cultural gap they have to cross, and most will never integrate enough to survive the job market.

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#12

Post by [deleted] »

Pamar wrote: post #2

I think that the author is trying too hard to create sensationalism by stressing how the person in the article had decided that "math was not for him", by saying stuff like: After that bad math test in elementary school, Huh says he adopted a defensive attitude toward the subject: He didn’t think he was good at math, so he decided to regard it as a barren pursuit of one logically necessary statement piled atop anothe…

[deleted]

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#13

Post by novia »

lumberjack wrote: post #4

I have noticed this in many mathematicians: they will start explaining you something that you are completely unable to grasp, being completely ignorant of the specifics of the field. However they will insist in their pursuit and the polite thing to do is to try to understand some general idea as best as you can, and they don't really expect you to understand everything that they are telling you. This has happened to…

I'm a mathematician. I can confirm that I do this.

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#14

Post by coliveira »

Pamar wrote: post #2

I think that the author is trying too hard to create sensationalism by stressing how the person in the article had decided that "math was not for him", by saying stuff like: After that bad math test in elementary school, Huh says he adopted a defensive attitude toward the subject: He didn’t think he was good at math, so he decided to regard it as a barren pursuit of one logically necessary statement piled atop anothe…

This just shows how writers like to sensationalize people and real life events. It is obvious that this guy was a math person who didn't know what trajectory to take. He was not good in math for his own standards, which are certainly much higher than for the rest of the population.

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#15

Post by kafkaesq »

Pamar wrote: post #2

I think that the author is trying too hard to create sensationalism by stressing how the person in the article had decided that "math was not for him", by saying stuff like: After that bad math test in elementary school, Huh says he adopted a defensive attitude toward the subject: He didn’t think he was good at math, so he decided to regard it as a barren pursuit of one logically necessary statement piled atop anothe…

Can someone explain how someone who has decided to distance himself from math can major in PHYSICS?!

The pure math world (and certain rarified branches of physics and CS) are quite different from the "measurement-based" sciences. If anything they're almost more similar to endeavors like musical composition (or even poetry) than any "lab-based" science. Particularly when it comes to the fetishization of "genius", "pure talent" and all that -- and especially when it comes to the character model (myth, really) of the lone genius who locks himself in an attic for N years and not only solves some major problem but totally reimagines the field, front to back.

I mean - at least in terms of the culture of pure mathematics, that's the image one can easily fall into the habit of having about one's self, if one attempts to do mathematics. Such that if you were to switch to physics, astronomy, or CS... you actually would feel like you were "leaving math".

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#16

Post by coliveira »

auntienomen wrote: post #11
HarryHirsch wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can someone explain how someone who has decided to distance himself from math can major in PHYSICS?! Exactly that. At my university first-year physics students would effectively take the same courses as mathematics students and Mathematical Methods in Physics on top of that.

This is true, but becomes a lot less relevant when you're playing in Huh's league. It's not that easy to make a move even from theoretical high-energy physics to pure mathematics. You can read about some interesting success stories in Quanta, but I think most people who try this end up leaving academia. There's a large cultural gap they have to cross, and most will never integrate enough to survive the job market.

Talking daily to a world-class professional mathematician for two years will do a lot to help in this respect.

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#17

Post by ajc-sorin »

On a slight tangent, I find it interesting the contrast the author paints between poetry and math. Perhaps it was unintentional, but it saddens me to hear or read people discuss math as if it were some polar opposite of the arts (or in this article, poetry).

Math, physics, biology, the 'hard' sciences, all have so much more in common with the arts than we give credit. Is a math proof not poetic in its own right? Does a well structured musical composition not engage with our most innate neurology on a microscopic level?

What's sad to me is that we seem to silo people into one of the two camps, which is like locking someone in a room in search of a key that's in the room next door. Businesses do this too - how many engineers get brought on to learn marketing? How many chefs learn the chemistry which serves as a foundation for every recipe they cook?

I say this as a former political-science-major-turned-accountant. I loved tax policy, but struggled to understand the law and treatment of certain issues, so I switched to accounting and found that the same logical, rational work that goes into formulating a political argument can be applied to rationalize control processes or budgeting in businesses. I've tried to un-learn my bias against people who majored in the "soft" sciences and strive to make more of an effort to understand how they think and what drives them.

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#18

Post by xyzzyz »

lumberjack wrote: post #4

I have noticed this in many mathematicians: they will start explaining you something that you are completely unable to grasp, being completely ignorant of the specifics of the field. However they will insist in their pursuit and the polite thing to do is to try to understand some general idea as best as you can, and they don't really expect you to understand everything that they are telling you. This has happened to…

Mathematicians know mathematics is hard, and hardly ever expect you to fully understand they're saying, as you cannot compact in a handful of sentences something that took you hours, days or weeks to fully grasp. It doesn't mean that it's a waste of time: in an otherwise incomprehensible monologue you might find a nugget of knowledge that will stay with you, and will form a foundation on which the future understanding will rest.

Re: A Path Less Taken to the Peak of the Math World

#20

Post by kmill »

xyzzyz wrote: post #18
lumberjack wrote: post #4

I have noticed this in many mathematicians: they will start explaining you something that you are completely unable to grasp, being completely ignorant of the specifics of the field. However they will insist in their pursuit and the polite thing to do is to try to understand some general idea as best as you can, and they don't really expect you to understand everything that they are telling you. This has happened to…

Mathematicians know mathematics is hard, and hardly ever expect you to fully understand they're saying, as you cannot compact in a handful of sentences something that took you hours, days or weeks to fully grasp. It doesn't mean that it's a waste of time: in an otherwise incomprehensible monologue you might find a nugget of knowledge that will stay with you, and will form a foundation on which the future understandin…

I'm surprised how often someone's told me something incomprehensible, but then years later I realize what they meant.
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