People may wonder what the latests cat fight regarding infinity is all about ...
This is about Cantor and Boltzmann ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km9Xa8MODYM
The second half, on the same YouTube channel, is about Turing and Goedel.
Infinity doesn't drive you insane. Handling it without proper safety equipment does.
(http://images.halloweencostumes.com/products/25555/1-1/hazmat-suit-mask.jpg)
And I thought that diseases were the results of virus, bacteria, defects in your DNA, etc. I guess biologists should add "infinity" to that list...//s
If you believe that all mental illnesses are physiological, and never psychosomatic ... then no grand mal obsession can kill ... or at least increase your stress so that your immune system collapses .... thereby letting you succumb to biological agents. Everything in the universe is connected to everything else ... so that cause of anything, is everything.
I think Cantor's insanity was due, in part, to the mathematical communities rejection of his work because it went against their dogmatic beliefs. He was belittled and treated unfairly by the mathematical community which, I think, contributed to his breakdown.
Quote from: DeltaEpsilon on February 28, 2016, 09:13:24 PM
I think Cantor's insanity was due, in part, to the mathematical communities rejection of his work because it went against their dogmatic beliefs. He was belittled and treated unfairly by the mathematical community which, I think, contributed to his breakdown.
That was one point of the video. But we know people who would be like that, to any academic rival ;-( I think of it as an "idea fixe" that is the core of an obsession. Spending every waking moment on the obsession I think is a symptom of the actual mental breakdown in action, not a cause. A person who could only think of Count Chocula cereal, is a kind of maniac, and mania is a physiological problem, not a psychosomatic problem. Such obsessed people can, because of their concentration and persistence, achieve solutions to hard problems.
Knowledge kills. It should be avoided at all costs.
I suspect these men would have gone insane even if they had not been obsessed by unsolvable problems. I think it's more likely that they just happened to be engaged in a specific problem while they were overcome by mental deterioration. The video premise is one of cause and effect. I don't believe it's that simple or mysterious, but it does make for exciting story telling. The implication that they studied a problem with such insight and ability that the answer itself, as it began to be understood, blew their minds, literally. <Kerschploing!> (picture loose wires and broken springs dangling from the remains of an exploded head). A dark foreboding, "Be careful what you seek. You may not like what you find," but carried to it's most extreme outcome of permanent mental chaos.
But just to be safe, best to pull the kids out of school after the 4th grade, because too much knowledge can only lead to the worst imaginable outcomes. It's easy to learn, but impossible to unlearn.
In those days, little was known about dementia, Alzheimer's disease, bipolarism, etc, so people who suffered from those were regularly misdiagnosed.
Quote from: aitm on February 29, 2016, 11:18:28 AM
Knowledge kills. It should be avoided at all costs.
No. Knowledge should be pursued at all costs.
Baruch
QuoteSuch obsessed people can, because of their concentration and persistence, achieve solutions to hard problems.
I have used this method many times and generally it takes X man hours of focused concentration to solve any given problem. I let the problem consume me 24/7 for a period of time not unlike a brute force attack until something gives way. I have found a person can learn a great deal of new things in a short period of time however it does come with a price. As mentioned you have to be willing to walk away and move on or Mr. Insanity will be knocking at your door.
Quote from: josephpalazzo on January 17, 2016, 07:13:57 PM
And I thought that diseases were the results of virus, bacteria, defects in your DNA, etc. I guess biologists should add "infinity" to that list...//s
Is it insane, or just inane?
Quote from: Fickle on February 29, 2016, 10:36:44 PM
Baruch
I have used this method many times and generally it takes X man hours of focused concentration to solve any given problem. I let the problem consume me 24/7 for a period of time not unlike a brute force attack until something gives way. I have found a person can learn a great deal of new things in a short period of time however it does come with a price. As mentioned you have to be willing to walk away and move on or Mr. Insanity will be knocking at your door.
Any computer programmer is familiar with this ;-)
Ever write 10,000 lines of code in 12hr on a mighty Vic 20 only to have system crash as the infernal tape drive proceeds to devour your work... Ah those were the days.
Quote from: Fickle on March 01, 2016, 09:16:28 AM
Ever write 10,000 lines of code in 12hr on a mighty Vic 20 only to have system crash as the infernal tape drive proceeds to devour your work... Ah those were the days.
Ha, have you ever worked with punched cards, and because one punching machine did not punch a particular symbols in the position of a hole that could be easily processed, the computer which were the size of a three block apartment in those days, would regurgitate nothing but 0's over a hundred + pages??? I have.
Quote from: josephpalazzo on March 01, 2016, 09:28:41 AM
Ha, have you ever worked with punched cards, and because one punching machine did not punch a particular symbols in the position of a hole that could be easily processed, the computer which were the size of a three block apartment in those days, would regurgitate nothing but 0's over a hundred + pages??? I have.
Ever lose your wallet in the back seat of your girl friends mothers car? Yeah....I can imagine it is almost as painful...the wait.....the wait.....the wait... and then the fallout.....oy