🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Nov6.024607.6831@galois.mit.edu> jbaez@riesz.mit.edu (John C. Baez) writes:
>Gary Merrill writes:
>
>>You can take a mathematician and lock him in his little office with just
>>some writing materials and he will (a) be pretty happy, and (b) be able
>>and willing to do anything of a mathematical nature.  Even a committed
>>*theoretical* physicist will be very distressed under such circumstances
>>since he has not way to determining whether his theories (however abstract)
>>are *good* ones.

Actually, even the most rarefied pure mathematician is not likely to be
happy with this arrangement, although it might be closer to his idea of
nirvana than what he presently occupies. History shows that communication
is essential for the bulk of good mathematics, (as far as I know no other
field is as addicted to its literature as mathematics). Hardy's criteria,
(good mathematics is _new_ _true_ and _interesting_), are not likely to be
much use in isolation. (_New_ and _Interesting_ seem obvious, but you have
to think a little about _true_...)

Later,
Andrew Mullhaupt