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A Mathematician’s Apology

en.wikipedia.org

11–20 of 55 posts

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#11
> He justifies the pursuit of pure mathematics with the argument that its very "uselessness" on the whole meant that it could not be misused to cause harm.

honestly, why not do something good and apply yourself to a cause that you believe in instead of doing something you intently don't believe in. It honestly reads like something out of badly written marxist satire of bourgeoisie.

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#12

Great read! The bit that I found the most curious is actually listed on Wikipedia (this was written in 1940): > "No one has yet discovered any warlike purpose to be served by the theory of numbers or relativity, and it seems unlikely that anyone will do so for many years."

Relativity, particularly the mass-energy equivalence principle of special relativity, lead to the thinking that lead to The Bomb less than five years later.

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#13

Great read! The bit that I found the most curious is actually listed on Wikipedia (this was written in 1940): > "No one has yet discovered any warlike purpose to be served by the theory of numbers or relativity, and it seems unlikely that anyone will do so for many years."

>> "No one has yet discovered any warlike purpose to be served by the theory of numbers or relativity, and it seems unlikely that anyone will do so for many years."

> The GPS project was started by the U.S. Department of Defense in 1973 [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#14
> On the other hand, Hardy denigrates much of the applied mathematics as either being "trivial", "ugly", or "dull", and contrasts it with "real mathematics", which is how he ranks the higher, pure mathematics.

Not sure if this surprising, since he was a vocal pure mathematician. But since I don't agree (and it sometimes looks like the pure mathematicians look down on the applied), I wonder whether there are some texts from famous applied mathematicians defending their branch.

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#15

> On the other hand, Hardy denigrates much of the applied mathematics as either being "trivial", "ugly", or "dull", and contrasts it with "real mathematics", which is how he ranks the higher, pure mathematics. Not sure if this surprising, since he was a vocal pure mathematician. But since I don't agree (and it sometimes looks like the pure mathematicians look down on the applied), I wonder whether there are some text…

History's greatest example of irony is that Hardy's field of interest ended up being one of the most widely cited examples of the practical applications of abstract mathematics.

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#16
It almost sounds like this book is the reason we so often hear and talk about the imposed hierarchy between "pure" and "applied", and that "mathematics is a young man's game". Did it have a huge impact? Or were these ideas commonplace before it was published?

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#17

Great read! The bit that I found the most curious is actually listed on Wikipedia (this was written in 1940): > "No one has yet discovered any warlike purpose to be served by the theory of numbers or relativity, and it seems unlikely that anyone will do so for many years."

What about elliptic curve cryptography?

What about pretty much all of cryptography?

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#18

Great read! The bit that I found the most curious is actually listed on Wikipedia (this was written in 1940): > "No one has yet discovered any warlike purpose to be served by the theory of numbers or relativity, and it seems unlikely that anyone will do so for many years."

Relativity, particularly the mass-energy equivalence principle of special relativity, lead to the thinking that lead to The Bomb less than five years later.

Atomic weapons were far more an outgrowth of quantum research than relativity. The mass-energy equivalence is a pretty minor part of the energy release of the atomic bomb at ~10%. Most of the energy is simple atomic binding energy; energy before and energy after.

Einstein’s politics had more to do with the bomb than his physics.

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#19

> On the other hand, Hardy denigrates much of the applied mathematics as either being "trivial", "ugly", or "dull", and contrasts it with "real mathematics", which is how he ranks the higher, pure mathematics. Not sure if this surprising, since he was a vocal pure mathematician. But since I don't agree (and it sometimes looks like the pure mathematicians look down on the applied), I wonder whether there are some text…

History's greatest example of irony is that Hardy's field of interest ended up being one of the most widely cited examples of the practical applications of abstract mathematics.

https://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?id=4130

Re: A Mathematician’s Apology

#20

Great read! The bit that I found the most curious is actually listed on Wikipedia (this was written in 1940): > "No one has yet discovered any warlike purpose to be served by the theory of numbers or relativity, and it seems unlikely that anyone will do so for many years."

What about elliptic curve cryptography?

Yep, or RSA and most modern cryptography.
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