Log24

Friday, February 2, 2018

For Plato’s Cave

Filed under: General,Geometry — Tags: , , — m759 @ 12:06 pm

"Plato's allegory of the cave describes prisoners,
inhabiting the cave since childhood, immobile,
facing an interior wall. A large fire burns behind
the prisoners, and as people pass this fire their
shadows are cast upon the cave's wall, and
these shadows of the activity being played out
behind the prisoner become the only version of
reality that the prisoner knows."

— From the Occupy Space gallery in Ireland

IMAGE- Patrick McGoohan as 'The Prisoner,' with lapel button that says '6.'

Thursday, May 25, 2017

Presidential Address of November 19, 1976

Filed under: General — Tags: — m759 @ 2:14 pm

Deep Problems in the Faculty Lounge

Filed under: General — Tags: — m759 @ 7:14 am

The Story of Six Continues

Filed under: General,Geometry — Tags: , — m759 @ 6:00 am

A post of March 22, 2017, was titled "The Story of Six."

Related material from that date —

"I meant… a larger map." — Number Six in "The Prisoner"

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

A Tale Unfolded

Filed under: General,Geometry — Tags: , , , — m759 @ 2:00 am

A sketch, adapted tonight from Girl Scouts of Palo Alto

From the April 14 noon post High Concept

From the April 14 3 AM post Hudson and Finite Geometry

IMAGE- Geometry of the Six-Set, Steven H. Cullinane, April 23, 2013

From the April 24 evening post The Trials of Device

Pentagon with pentagram    

Note that Hudson’s 1905 “unfolding” of even and odd puts even on top of
the square array, but my own 2013 unfolding above puts even at its left.

Wednesday, March 22, 2017

The Story of Six

Filed under: General,Geometry — Tags: , , — m759 @ 8:01 pm

On a psychotherapist who died at 86 on Monday —

"He studied mathematics and statistics at the Courant Institute,
a part of New York University — he would later write   a
mathematical fable, Numberland  (1987)."

The New York Times  online this evening
 


 

From Publishers Weekly

This wry parable by a psychotherapist contains one basic message: though death is inevitable, each moment in life is to be cherished. In the orderly but sterile kingdom of Numberland, digits live together harmoniously under a rigid president called The Professor. Their stable society is held intact by the firm conviction that they are immortal: When has a number ever died? This placid universe is plunged into chaos when the inquisitive hero SIX crosses over into the human world and converses with a young mathematician. This supposedly impossible transition convinces the ruling hierarchy that if SIX can talk to a mortal, then the rest of the numbers are, after all, mortal. The digits conclude that any effort or achievement is pointless in the face of inevitable death, and the cipher society breaks down completely. The solution? Banish SIX to the farthest corners of kingdom. Weinberg (The Heart of Psychotherapy ) uses his fable to gently satirize the military, academics, politicians and, above all, psychiatrists. But his tale is basically inspirational; a triumphant SIX miraculously returns from exile and quells the turmoil by showing his fellow digits that knowledge of one's mortality should enrich all other experiences and that death ultimately provides a frame for the magnificent picture that is life. 

Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See also The Prisoner in this journal.

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