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Terry Tao's generals (2012)

web.math.princeton.edu

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Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#51

Post by thsksbd »

NooneAtAll3 wrote: post #19
OldGuyInTheClub wrote: post #14

Thought this Oppenheimer anecdote may amuse the HN contingent. "Oppenheimer obtained his Doctor of Philosophy degree in March 1927 at age 23, supervised by Max Born.[28][29] After the oral exam, James Franck, the professor administering, reportedly said, "I'm glad that's over. He was on the point of questioning me."[30] " Franck had won the Nobel two years earlier. Sources: [Refs] quoted directly from Wikipedia artic…

I keep making this mistake. I almost asked "why philosophy, didn't he study physics?" That does make me wonder: why DOES the qualification/position/status name mention only philosophy?

PhD is a license to teach (i.e. doctor) philosophy. Specifically, in "science" fields, natural philosophy.

Natural philosophy was the original (and i think better) name for science, especially physics. It was understood to be an important subbranch of philosophy.

I think its better name because it elucidates an important epistemological difference: science is a method, not knowledge. I learn science when I learn about experimental design. Im not learning science when I learn about evolution; rather Im learning a theory, very likely to be true, that is almost impossible to put under scrutiny using the scientific method.

The Pythagorean theorem has no science and is 100% true. In fluids, Bernoulli devised experiments to demonstrate to his calculus illiterate colleagues what he had already mathematically proven.

Science is a bad term.

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#52

Post by eru »

teraflop wrote: post #15
lr4444lr wrote: post #5

I did state though that all second derivatives of u would have L^p norms bounded by that of the Laplacian. Kleinermann asked me for an elementary explanation of this, but I couldn't think of one. I haven't the foggiest idea of what an "elementary explanation" of anything during a math graduate degree committee assessment would even sound like.

"Elementary" is a somewhat subjective term that roughly means "from first principles", i.e. not relying on a bunch of advanced theorems and concepts. It doesn't necessarily mean the explanation is simple or concise.

Often the advanced theorems and concepts make for a simpler and more concise explanation.

I guess the closest equivalent in programming is "implement X without using any external libraries (or perhaps only the standard library)".

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#53

Post by eru »

alkibiades wrote: post #30

so has he accomplished anything big/groundbreaking other than being a child prodigy and having a high iq? serious question. i only know his name for being smart. not anything specific

Have you tried asking your favourite search engine or even chat bot?

See eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terence_Tao#Research_contribut...

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#54

Post by ramraj07 »

alkibiades wrote: post #30

so has he accomplished anything big/groundbreaking other than being a child prodigy and having a high iq? serious question. i only know his name for being smart. not anything specific

I will implore you or anyone to ask ChatGPT to “eli5 compressive sensing”. It was a fun honeymoon day for me with ChatGPT when I did that.

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#55

Post by OldGuyInTheClub »

I_AM_A_SMURF wrote: post #43
OldGuyInTheClub wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel good about myself if I can understand more than the first sentence of any of his posts. Some days I'll even settle for only the first. Great mathematicians are said to be exceptional at visualization. I wonder if the modern greats think in TeX or LaTeX on top of that. It is amazing how fast they post fully-formed, meticulously referenced blog articles or upload preprints.

After a while writing LaTeX becomes second nature. I used to type my master's classes notes straight in LaTeX.

Impressive. I can't think and type fast with accuracy nearly well enough to do that for regular text, let alone a markup/page definition language.

Looking back I wish I had continued practicing typing after the one class I took in it. I should also have learned shorthand.

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#56

Post by irrational »

thsksbd wrote: post #51
NooneAtAll3 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep making this mistake. I almost asked "why philosophy, didn't he study physics?" That does make me wonder: why DOES the qualification/position/status name mention only philosophy?

PhD is a license to teach (i.e. doctor) philosophy. Specifically, in "science" fields, natural philosophy. Natural philosophy was the original (and i think better) name for science, especially physics. It was understood to be an important subbranch of philosophy. I think its better name because it elucidates an important epistemological difference: science is a method, not knowledge. I learn science when I learn abou…

Apparently it is also a license for your brother in law to brag about having a PhD in economics, despite not being able to hold a job for more than 2 years and currently working as a manager at a pest control company after being laid off from his last job.

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#57

Post by [deleted] »

jebarker wrote: post #37

This is the first time I've read a detailed account of "generals" in a US math PhD. I'm surprised how broad the topics covered seem. I did my PhD in the UK and the transition to fully fledged PhD candidate after the first couple of years was significantly less traumatic than this seems!

[deleted]

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#58

Post by thristian »

NooneAtAll3 wrote: post #19
OldGuyInTheClub wrote: post #14

Thought this Oppenheimer anecdote may amuse the HN contingent. "Oppenheimer obtained his Doctor of Philosophy degree in March 1927 at age 23, supervised by Max Born.[28][29] After the oral exam, James Franck, the professor administering, reportedly said, "I'm glad that's over. He was on the point of questioning me."[30] " Franck had won the Nobel two years earlier. Sources: [Refs] quoted directly from Wikipedia artic…

I keep making this mistake. I almost asked "why philosophy, didn't he study physics?" That does make me wonder: why DOES the qualification/position/status name mention only philosophy?

In the medieval university system, there were four fields of knowledge: medicine (MD), law (Juris Doctor, or JD), theology (ThD), or philosophy (PhD).

In the centuries since, new kinds of knowledge were discovered, but they generally got squeezed in as sub-categories of philosophy, so when you specialise in them, you get a PhD.

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#59

Post by Nevermark »

thsksbd wrote: post #51
NooneAtAll3 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep making this mistake. I almost asked "why philosophy, didn't he study physics?" That does make me wonder: why DOES the qualification/position/status name mention only philosophy?

PhD is a license to teach (i.e. doctor) philosophy. Specifically, in "science" fields, natural philosophy. Natural philosophy was the original (and i think better) name for science, especially physics. It was understood to be an important subbranch of philosophy. I think its better name because it elucidates an important epistemological difference: science is a method, not knowledge. I learn science when I learn abou…

Physics was also philosophy for eons in that theories were on par with hard knowledge about the gods and mermaids.

Most early physic had surprisingly little explanatory or experimental connection to the actual physical world.

But it often made up for that with a solid grounding in popular mythology and the produce of some extraordinary imaginations.

You know, like philosophy!

Re: Terry Tao's generals (2012)

#60

Post by Nevermark »

vietvu wrote: post #42
alkibiades wrote: post #30

so has he accomplished anything big/groundbreaking other than being a child prodigy and having a high iq? serious question. i only know his name for being smart. not anything specific

Being a great mathematicians not all about solving Millennium Prize Problems or being a household name like Einstein.

I don’t know, I keep hearing about the Tao of this, or the Tao of that.

I am sure no one has ever ever called him “The Tao of Math” before, but they have now! He is in it. Everywhere!

Legacy Achievement: locked in :)

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