Go with the Flow
The previous entry links to a document that discusses the mathematical concept of “Ricci flow (pdf).”
Though the concept was not named for him, this seems as good a time as any to recall the virtues of St. Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit who died in Beijing on May 11, 1610. (The Church does not yet recognize him as a saint; so much the worse for the Church.)
There was no Log24 entry on Ricci’s saint’s day, May 11, this year, but an entry for 4:29 PM May 10, 2006, seems relevant, since Beijing is 12 hours ahead of my local (Eastern US) time.
The relevance of this structure
to memory and to Chinese culture
is given in Dragon School and in
Geometry of the 4x4x4 Cube.
For some related remarks on
the colloquial, rather than the
mathematical, concept of flow,
see
Philosophy, Religion, and Science
as well as Crystal and Dragon.
Yesterday’s entry on the 1865
remarks on aesthetics of
Gerard Manley Hopkins,
who later became a Jesuit,
may also have some relevance.