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Von Neumann, Einstein, Morgenstern, Morse and Lefschetz (1952)

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Re: Von Neumann, Einstein, Morgenstern, Morse and Lefschetz (1952)

#12
post #9

[flagged]

> I know this is a cynic take,

It’s worse than that. This take is a trivial restatement of history, namely that whites and men had most of the power, while amplifying outrage with people already agreeing with you, not contributing to lessening the divide, and causing people like myself to self censor by replying using throwaway accounts.

Re: Von Neumann, Einstein, Morgenstern, Morse and Lefschetz (1952)

#15
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cherry picking some facts to build up your narrative is indeed cynical, yes. You could similarily point out that none are wearing shorts or sandals.

Quoted post unavailable.

I understand about shorts, but it's not offensive to compare ethnicity with sandals.

Re: Von Neumann, Einstein, Morgenstern, Morse and Lefschetz (1952)

#16
post #9

[flagged]

> I know this is a cynic take, It’s worse than that. This take is a trivial restatement of history, namely that whites and men had most of the power, while amplifying outrage with people already agreeing with you, not contributing to lessening the divide, and causing people like myself to self censor by replying using throwaway accounts.

No post body was provided.

Re: Von Neumann, Einstein, Morgenstern, Morse and Lefschetz (1952)

#18
post #9

[flagged]

The military-industrial complex you refer to would be the war efforts of allied nations. Those war efforts didn’t start in earnest until the Munich Agreement in the case of the UK and quite a bit later in the case of the US. Your writing seems to paint this in a negative light and this is an extreme position. One may view current military spending in the U.S. negatively but to view the WW 2 efforts thusly is bizarre.

As to them being men and white it is a historical fact that at that time white men dominated in science and economics. That is not the fault of the referenced men and it’s not as if in hindsight we are glorifying the male scientists while diminishing the contribution of their female counterparts. There were very few of them. Marie Curie is still the only person to win the Nobel Prize in two separate fields so it’s not as if female contributions were always ignored or downplayed.

I don’t think your take is cynical but rather somewhat pointless. I can’t see what point you are trying to make or highlight.

Re: Von Neumann, Einstein, Morgenstern, Morse and Lefschetz (1952)

#20
post #2

I have no idea why, but it is always interesting and inspiring to read about how known figures of historic interest were related to each other and how their (normally seperatly told) stories intertwined. Thanks!

I've read a handful of biographies of 20th century physicists recently, which I enjoyed for the same reasons. Ulam was a Los Alamos mathematician (and a great friend of Von Neumann). Anderson discovered the meson, which Yukawa had predicted. Fritzsche named nuclear fission (after doing important work on it). Elasser was a wandering scientist, who (to me) seemed to be "on the outside of the inside"; he gives accounts…

If you are also a little bit interested in philosophy, Heisenberg's "Physics and Beyond: Encounters and Conversations" is a wonderful recommendation.
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