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Vladimir Voevodsky has died

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Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#41

Post by linkmotif »

andrewflnr wrote: post #36
madez wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A sincere question: Why is it bad to speculate that it was suicide? I assume there is some intention-guessing or social norm coming into play that I don't see. Could you explain your reasoning? Edit: Is it that it is not considered okay to consider suicide a plausible explanation? Is suicide a taboo, or something that would make a person seem less?

Suicide is a very sensitive topic. There's issues of blame and justifiability and stuff (like what you mentioned in your edit) that are highly emotionally fraught. It's better not to open that can of worms without a good reason. To just casually toss out the idea in a low-effort content with no evidence appears to make light of suicide and the surrounding issues, and/or be insensitive to the stressful, unproductive d…

You’re a good person for explaining this.

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#43

Post by naasking »

madez wrote: post #25
danso wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfounded speculation is now "PC"?

You got it wrong. He complained that speculation is considered non-PC here. Speculation is at the heart of science. We shouldn't forget that.

Speculation without justification is not part of science. The original post didn't add anything substantive to the discussion. Anyone seeing the age of the deceased would consider suicide as a possibility. It's completely obvious.

Now if the OP had said "possibly suicide because ...", that would have been a valuable contribution. As it stands, saying "suicide?" is no more a contribution than me saying "flying blue elephant landed on him?"

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#44

Post by madez »

naasking wrote: post #43
madez wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You got it wrong. He complained that speculation is considered non-PC here. Speculation is at the heart of science. We shouldn't forget that.

Speculation without justification is not part of science. The original post didn't add anything substantive to the discussion. Anyone seeing the age of the deceased would consider suicide as a possibility. It's completely obvious. Now if the OP had said "possibly suicide because ...", that would have been a valuable contribution. As it stands, saying "suicide?" is no more a contribution than me saying "flying blue el…

Is talking about the obvious explanation now taboo? Do we really want to pretend the emporer is wearing cloths? I certainly do not.

What is obvious to me might not be obvious to others. I learned that time and time again. That is why I'll tell the emporer that he is naked.

But besides that, speculation without evidence is part of science. The scientific method does not restrict how to come up with hypotheses to test. We may have heuristics, like intuition, but they are not required. Random guessing is sound, while it might not be efficient.

In this case, the speculation was ironically completely motiviated by reason.

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#45

Post by sillysaurus3 »

downandout wrote: post #38
shivak wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He struggled deeply with alcoholism, but the cause of his death has not been announced.

It’s a frightening testament to the power of addiction that even some of the smartest, most logical people in the world cannot control some of their own extremely illogical decisions.

On the other hand, lacking proof this comment chain amounts to nothing more than a smear.

"Vladimir Voevodsky alcohol" gives zero results.

Can we let one person's death be a little respectful? Just once.

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#46

Post by sillysaurus3 »

madez wrote: post #33
danso wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is someone whose cause of death is unknown because, as far as we know at this point, the revelation of his death is new, not because it's a scientific field of inquiry and experiment.

I disagree politely. Even the death of a beloved person is not above the scientific method. One may choose not to investigate, but that is a personal decision. I don't see a problem if someone far away speculates. Also, I don't see a problem talking about these speculation. As long as speculations stay speculations in the absence of evidence and are discarded in front of conflicting evidence, it seems sound to me.

Nonsense. Someone died. This is disrespectful and distasteful.

Elsewhere in the thread people are speculating he died of alcoholism. Just stop.

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#47

Post by sillysaurus3 »

tuxguy wrote: post #18

Does anyone know what happened ? Was he sick ? Was it cancer ?

Can we not? Do you think that they would have wanted the thread about their death to be filled with speculation about whether he killed himself or drank himself to death? No one knows anything, and even if they did it would be impolite to offer up that information.

He was a great mathematician. RIP.

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#48

Post by pandaman »

mathgenius wrote: post #39

The name Voevodksy comes from two old russian words: vodit, which means "to lead", and voena which means war. So, voevod, would mean something like "war leader", or general. (Source: russian friend that I just consulted.)

The word is voevoda (воевода) and, indeed, originally meant "a general". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voivode

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#49

Post by madez »

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #46
madez wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree politely. Even the death of a beloved person is not above the scientific method. One may choose not to investigate, but that is a personal decision. I don't see a problem if someone far away speculates. Also, I don't see a problem talking about these speculation. As long as speculations stay speculations in the absence of evidence and are discarded in front of conflicting evidence, it seems sound to me.

Nonsense. Someone died. This is disrespectful and distasteful. Elsewhere in the thread people are speculating he died of alcoholism. Just stop.

That is an arrogant and aggressive appeal to emotion. But even following that non-logic, as soon as someone dies we are supposed to turn our head off and to shut up? I think quite the contrary, we should think even harder why it happened, and learn from that. After all, it is a significant event, and, in this case, a loss for all of us.

Ironically, your comment was putting fuel into the fire of speculation because here we weren't even conversing about the details and circmustances of the death. Now, a debate about the danger of alcohol, and, more interesting, the causes of alcoholism would be helpful. Alcoholism often has a cause, in my experience. Is that really so? Are these causes identifiable and fixable? That are questions that I wish we knew more about.

Re: Vladimir Voevodsky has died

#50

Post by agumonkey »

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #45
downandout wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a frightening testament to the power of addiction that even some of the smartest, most logical people in the world cannot control some of their own extremely illogical decisions.

On the other hand, lacking proof this comment chain amounts to nothing more than a smear. "Vladimir Voevodsky alcohol" gives zero results. Can we let one person's death be a little respectful? Just once.

Just for the sake of it, I may say that first I understand your concern, but whatever takes away someone, might be a source of shame, disrespect or lack of care for the parent poster. Maybe the opposite even.

Regards

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