The Logic Off Topic list

Thoughts from the mind of GAmoore@..., 10-11-2001:

>  >>  > Mathematicians are very much artists.
>>
>>Some mathematicians, yes.  Most are however just plain dull 9-5
>>office workers.
>
>Oh come on! Just because you can't see the fruits of their labor, doesn't
>mean it isn't beautiful.

Beautiful != art.

>Imagine hanging around a music studio .... if you were deaf. You might
>see a bunch of self-important weirdos and have no idea of what they were
>creating. In the same way, many math people look like wierdo's. Often
>sloppy in their dress. Sometimes their desks are piled in papers.
>
>But they create. The look at chaos and bring order to it.

Not every musician is an artist.

>For example, Wiles at Princeton, who solved Fermat's theorem after 300
>years in 1994...I heard that, at the time, less than 50 people in the
>world could understand the details of his work. But I'm sure he got a
>high from it. His name will go down in history.

And rightfully so.  Solving a theorem that has puzzled many great 
mathematicians for some 350 years _is_ a work of art, I guess.


tata,
HJ
-- 
     Hendrik Jan Veenstra
     email: mailto:h@...
     www:   http://www.ision.nl/users/h/index.html