tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post5346163628211376315..comments2024-03-27T23:06:03.736-05:00Comments on The Music Salon: Bob Dylan RevisitedBryan Townsendhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-29892537061228298202016-10-27T10:43:46.596-05:002016-10-27T10:43:46.596-05:00Thanks for this fine comment filling in some conte...Thanks for this fine comment filling in some context for us. I didn't know much of the story regarding the Poincaré conjecture. Perelman reminds me a bit of Grigory Sokolov, who also lives for the beauties of music, though makes a very good living at it!<br /><br />I've been re-reading Proust lately and the kind of moral integrity that so many characters in the novel exhibit is very, very far above the very low levels of moral integrity shown by so many prominent public figures today.Bryan Townsendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09482696991279345516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8827040061563065922.post-52720624252947202912016-10-27T10:31:09.579-05:002016-10-27T10:31:09.579-05:00Excellent post.
Perelman is one of my heroes. Not...Excellent post.<br /><br />Perelman is one of my heroes. Not only is he a genius (a term often abused though not in this case) but a model of integrity for all others. He believes mathematics is, like music (he claims his true passion is opera, not math), a source of beauty to be revealed to the world by the experts -- not a source of enrichment and self-glorification. He's very much like Bach in that sense. And because of that attitude, he revealed his proof in dribs and drabs, with half-finished arguments, in the hope other mathematicians would fill in the holes so the whole thing would appear to be a collective effort with no one in particular taking credit for it. He had no particular interest in attaching his name to the proof. But then a group of Chinese mathematicians abused his trust by rushing to fill in the holes and then claiming credit for the proof while barely acknowledging his contribution. To its credit the mathematical community was incensed and quickly made sure that the credit was restored to Perelman. But the incident only confirmed his view that society was corrupt. He quit math and now spends all his time indulging his passion for opera (which in Russia can be done at low cost).<br /><br />That said, I feel sorry for his mom, with whom he lives in a small, dinky apartment in Saint Petersburg. She could have used that one million dollars!<br /><br />Some say he is a nut case. There's probably a bit of truth to that, but it also speaks poorly of our culture that turning down millions of dollars in the name of purity and integrity should be considered a sign of mental illness.<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com