On Jul 29, 2008, at 9:18 AM, Robert Holmes wrote: > But Owen, why are you trying to put equations into emails? Professor > David > West's thread has already shown that anyone using math is a victim > of the > dominant western scientific episteme's cultural hegemony and as such > should > be helped to overcome their akrasia (the state of acting against their > better judgement) and obtain a proper phronetic relationship with this > world.
Guilty as charged! Actually, I wanted to start some math discussions that were more along the line trying to understand the impact of things I'm studying, rather than the recent batch of metaphysics. The specific example had to do with the Cayley-Hamiltion theorem, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayley_hamiltion_theorem which I just stumbled across whilst going over a review of undergraduate math. It shows that the "characteristic polynomial" (used in finding eigenvalues) is solved by the matrix itself. This sorta blew my mind and I wanted to discuss it amongst those of us within Friam who are so unenlightened to care about such [what you said above]. You see, I think we can enjoy discussions within mathematics without worrying how many Sigmas fit on the head of a pin. > And that includes only using plain text in emails. I have to admit that I prefer plain text as well, generally going to a "rich" format only when necessary. I'll suffer it if it makes discussing math easier. > > metaphorically yours, > > Robert -- Owen ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
