See Five Ninths in this journal and Colorful Tale.
Cross of Black and Gray
See also "Why do Muslims pray five times daily?".
Monday, April 27, 2015
Saturday, March 29, 2014
Five Ninths
“For every kind of vampire, there is a kind of cross.” — Gravity’s Rainbow
“I don’t write exclusively on Jewish themes or about Jewish characters.
My collection of short stories, Strange Attractors , contained nine pieces,
five of which were, to some degree, Jewish, and this ratio has provided me
with a precise mathematical answer (for me, still the best kind of answer)
to the question of whether I am a Jewish writer. I am five-ninths a Jewish writer.”
— Rebecca Goldstein, “Against Logic”
Related material: The cross of five ninths, from Epiphany 2006.
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Thursday, April 17, 2014
Thursday with the Nashes
“For every kind of vampire, there is a kind of cross.” — Gravity’s Rainbow
“I don’t write exclusively on Jewish themes or about Jewish characters.
My collection of short stories, Strange Attractors , contained nine pieces,
five of which were, to some degree, Jewish, and this ratio has provided me
with a precise mathematical answer (for me, still the best kind of answer)
to the question of whether I am a Jewish writer. I am five-ninths a Jewish writer.”
— Rebecca Goldstein, “Against Logic”
Midrashim for Rebecca:
The Diamond Theory vs. the Story Theory (of truth)
Story Theory and the Number of the Beast
The Palm Sunday post “Gray Space”
For those who prefer the diamond theory of truth,
a “precise mathematical” view of a Gray code —
For those who prefer the story theory of truth,
Thursday with the Nashes —
The actors who portrayed Mr. and Mrs. John Nash in
‘A Beautiful Mind’ now portray Mr. and Mrs. Noah…
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Sunday, July 19, 2009
Sunday July 19, 2009
"L’unité jointe à l’infini ne l’augmente de rien, non plus qu’un pied à une mesure infinie. Le fini s’anéantit en présence de l’infini, et devient un pur néant….
Nous connaissons qu’il y a un infini, et ignorons sa nature. Comme nous savons qu’il est faux que les nombres soient finis, donc il est vrai qu’il y a un infini en nombre. Mais nous ne savons ce qu’il est: il est faux qu’il soit pair, il est faux qu’il soit impair; car, en ajoutant 1 unité, il ne change point de nature; cependant c’est un nombre, et tout nombre est pair ou impair (il est vrai que cela s’entend de tout nombre fini). Ainsi…."
"Unity joined to infinity adds nothing to it, no more than one foot to an infinite measure. The finite is annihilated in the presence of the infinite, and becomes a pure nothing….
We know that there is an infinite, and are ignorant of its nature. As we know it to be false that numbers are finite, it is therefore true that there is an infinity in number. But we do not know what it is. It is false that it is even, it is false that it is odd; for the addition of a unit can make no change in its nature. Yet it is a number, and every number is odd or even (this is certainly true of every finite number). So…."
— Pensées (trans. W. F. Trotter), Courier Dover Publications, 2003
"Le fini s’anéantit
en présence de l’infini,
et devient un pur néant…."
en présence de l’infini,
et devient un pur néant…."
Un Pur Néant:
"So did God cause the big bang?
Overcome by metaphysical lassitude,
I finally reach over to my bookshelf
for The Devil's Bible.
Turning to Genesis I read:
'In the beginning
there was nothing.
And God said,
'Let there be light!'
And there was still nothing,
but now you could see it.'"
— Jim Holt, Big-Bang Theology,
Slate's "High Concept" department
Ainsi….
"In the garden of Adding,
Live Even and Odd"
— E. L. Doctorow
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Wednesday, September 13, 2006
Wednesday September 13, 2006
The Krauss Cross
"If we open any tract– Plastic Art and Pure Plastic Art or The Non-Objective World, for instance– we will find that Mondrian and Malevich are not discussing canvas or pigment or graphite or any other form of matter. They are talking about Being or Mind or Spirit. From their point of view, the grid is a staircase to the Universal, and they are not interested in what happens below in the Concrete.
Or, to take a more up-to-date example, we could think about Ad Reinhardt who, despite his repeated insistence that 'Art is art,' ended up by painting a series of black nine-square grids in which the motif that inescapably emerges is a Greek cross. There is no painter in the West who can be unaware of the symbolic power of the cruciform shape and the Pandora's box of spiritual reference that is opened once one uses it."
Rebecca Goldstein on
Mathematics and Narrative:
"I don't write exclusively on Jewish themes or about Jewish characters. My collection of short stories, Strange Attractors, contained nine pieces, five of which were, to some degree, Jewish, and this ratio has provided me with a precise mathematical answer (for me, still the best kind of answer) to the question of whether I am a Jewish writer. I am five-ninths a Jewish writer."
Jacques Maritain,
October 1941:
"The passion of Israel
today is taking on
more and more distinctly
the form of the Cross."
E. L. Doctorow,
City of God:
"In the garden of Adding,
Live Even and Odd."
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Friday, January 6, 2006
Friday January 6, 2006
Cross
"In the garden of Adding,
Live Even and Odd"
— City of God
Adapted from
Ad Reinhardt
"… I don't write exclusively on Jewish themes or about Jewish characters. My collection of short stories, Strange Attractors, contained nine pieces, five of which were, to some degree, Jewish, and this ratio has provided me with a precise mathematical answer (for me, still the best kind of answer) to the question of whether I am a Jewish writer. I am five-ninths a Jewish writer."
For related remarks,
click on the cross.
click on the cross.
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