Clint Eastwood is 76.
In honor of his birthday,
a three-part meditation
on quality:
Part I --
From The Quality of Diamond,
Log24 entries from Feb. 2004:
The Quality
with No
Name
…
The Mathematical
Association of Americadiscusses
finite geometry: The Fano Plane by Ed Pegg Jr., May 30, 2006: "One
thing in the Fano plane that bothered me for y…
Keir Dullea is 70 today.
"There are some extremely odd things about this mission."
-- HAL
Lifetime
Achievement
In honor of
the long and rewarding
life of Henry Bumstead,
Oscar-winning
production designer,
who died last Wednesday
in Pasadena at 91: and
Background for
the above material:…
For John F. Kennedy's birthday:
The Call Girls
Revisited
See The Shining of May 29
from 2002
and the references to
the marriage theorem
in Dharwadker's Alleged Proof
from 2005.
"By groping toward the…
Strange Bedfellows
Ted Berkman, author of books about the Israeli military, died at 92 on
May 12, 2006.
Dennis Hevesi in today's New York Times:
"In
World War II he served as the Middle East chief of the Foreig…
Wittgenstein's
Passion From today's
London Daily Mail:
Related
Philosophy:
6.54 My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who
understands me finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has
…
Time Travel
"Since thirty mornings are required to make
A day of which we say, this is the day
That we desire, a day of blank, blue wheels,
Involving the four corners of the sky,
Lapised and …
For Stevie Nicks,
whose birthday is today
"The quidditas or essence of an angel is
the same as its form."
-- William T. Noon, Society of Jesus,
Joyce and Aquinas, Yale, 1957
Related material
from Oct. 27, …
A Living Church
continued from March 27
"The man who lives in contact with what he believes
to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and
Shakespeare to-morrow at breakfast."
-- G. K. Che…
Ennui
May there be an ennui of the first idea?What else, prodigious scholar,
should there be?
-- Wallace Stevens, "Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction"
Related material: The Line.
Order and Ennui
Meanwhile, back at the Institute for Advanced Study:
May 25, 4:40 PM -- Research Seminar
(Simonyi Hall Seminar Room) --Pirita Paajanen,
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem: Zeta functions of
fin…
Dark Lady
Today is the feast of St. Sarah,
patron saint of the Gypsies. In her honor, as well as that of Bob Dylan
and Rosanne Cash,
whose birthdays are today,
here are a picture and
two songs.
Sunrise …
May 24 Related material:
Canonization,
Trinity and Counterpoint
Evening Star
Reba Shines in Vegas
ART WARS
continued
Exhibit A:
A science vulgarizer in today's New York Times-- In the Quest for
Coolness, Science Could Really Use a Vito Corleone "Somewhere out
there, more elusive than a snow
…
A Kind of Cross
Google Maps image
of the isle of Delos,
birthplace of Apollo:
"I faced myself that day with the nonplused apprehension of someone who
hascome across a vampire and has no crucifix in hand."
…
A Labyrinth
for Penelope
Story
Balanchine, Dunham
In memory of
Katherine Dunham,
who died Sunday at 96
"How much story do you want?"
-- George Balanchine
From pbs.org:
"In 1940 Dunham and her company appeared in t…
"Das Ewig-Weibliche Zieht uns hinan." ("The
Eternal-Feminine Draws us on.") -- Conclusion of Goethe's Faust At
Amazon.com, a search
inside
The
Da Vin…
Women-Only
Meeting at Princeton
From May 15 through May 26, there is a women-only meeting on zeta
functions at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.
Today's
activities: 8:00- 9:45 a.m…
Peter Viereck
August 5, 1916 - May 13, 2006
The Great Bartender
by Peter Viereck (1948)
Being absurd as well as beautiful,
Magic-- like art-- is hoax redeemed by awe.
(Not priest but clown, the …
Star and Diamond continued
" 'I know what it is you last saw,' she said; 'for that is also in my
mind. Do not be afraid! But do not think that only by singing amid the
trees, nor even by the slender arro…
Space Cadet"They should havesent a
poet."You'd never know it,But buddy,
I'm a kind of poet...Starring in tonight'sNew York Times obits:
One formy baby
Artist JoyceBallantyne Brandin 2004
And one morefor th…
Tombstone
From today's New York Times:
Obituary--
"Jiri Frel, a mercurial and eccentric curator who helped build the J.
Paul Getty Museum into a major center for Greek and Roman art but
resigned after revelati…
For the next generation:
"'Zeta, Zeta, Zeta!'"
-- Robert A. Heinlein,
The Number of the Beast
Some websites on zeta functions (a classic topic of considerable
current interest): The course descriptions, le…
Today's birthday: George Lucas,
creator of the mother of all battle epics.
STAR WARS continued: March 29 eclipse Star of Venus
(See March 26-29)
ART WARS continued...
A Fold in Time
From May 13, Braque's birthday, 2003:
Braque
Above: Braque and tesseract
"The senses deform, the mind forms. Work to perfect the mind. There is
…
The Carlin Code
Happy birthday, George: Sources:
Tom Hanks's birthday, 2005
Salute to Anthony Hopkins,
May 3, May 4, May 5
Today's Wizard of Id
Judeo-Christian Heritage:
The Wiener Kreis
André…
Tesseract
"Does the word 'tesseract'
mean anything to you?"
-- Robert A. Heinlein in
The Number of the Beast(1980)
My reply--
Part I:
A Wrinkle in Time, by
Madeleine L'Engle
(first published in 1962)…
My Space "... we have condensed six
dimensions into four,
then we either work by analogy into six, or we have to use math that
apparently nobody but Jake and my cousin Ed understands. Unless you can
think of some way…
Today is the feast of
Saint Robert Heinlein,
who died on this date
in 1988.
Why "saint"? See his
accurate depiction of evil, the
"Eater of Souls" in Glory Road.
Related material:
"Steven Cullinane is a Cra…
Bagombo Snuff Box (in memory of Burt Kerr
Todd)
"Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord But you're gonna have
to serve somebody."
-- "Bob Dylan" (pseudonym of Robert Zimmerman), …
Born on this date
100 years ago: André Weil
"... just as God defeats the devil: this bridge exists...." --
André Weil "... I always prefer saying chance rather than
Providence...." -- Simone W…
Mathematics and
Narrative
continued
Related material:
Anthony Hopkins Writes Screenplay
about God, Life & Death
First of all...
On this date in 1927, the
Academy of Motion Picture
Arts and Sciences was chartered.
Related material:
Dante and Plato,
Plato, Pegasus, and the Evening Star,
Mathematics and Narrat…
Ontology Alignment
continued
"Mathematics ushers one into the realm of abstraction and universality,
grasped only through pure reason. Mathematics is the threshold we cross
to pass into the ideal, the truly real…
Quarter to Three
continued
For Henriette D. Avram, a systems analyst who "had to enter the mind of
the library cataloger, a profession whose
arcane knowledge-- involving deep philosophical questions about
taxonom…