Yesterday I saw the documentary "N is a Number" by George Csicsery. Its a nice piece of work about Paul Erdos (pronounced as "air-dish"), one of the greatest mathematicians of the century. He surpassed any other mathematician by the sheer volume of papers-about 1600 with the co-authors all around the globe. To me, Erdos presents himself as a truly spiritual person. Just that his religion is Mathematics and his God-Combinatorics. He thought about mathematical problems 24-7. The very characteristics of a great spiritual person at the height of realization was present in him. He was not able to stand physical pleasure and didn't marry. His possessions where just two half-empty suitcases. He never stayed in a place, roamed all around the world giving lectures and gave whatever money he got as an endowment. Totally dispassionate life. More than these things, a childlike behavior found in spiritual maturity was found in him (he was very pleased with the emergence of velcro footwear as he found buckling his sandals difficult). He just loved kids and called them 'epsilons' ('epsilon' usually denotes a very small quantity in math). He passed away in 1996 with the great amount of collected works yet to be amassed. He never strived to be a mathematical god, he was just one by himself.Saturday, October 22, 2005
(1/Epsilon) and Epsilon.
Yesterday I saw the documentary "N is a Number" by George Csicsery. Its a nice piece of work about Paul Erdos (pronounced as "air-dish"), one of the greatest mathematicians of the century. He surpassed any other mathematician by the sheer volume of papers-about 1600 with the co-authors all around the globe. To me, Erdos presents himself as a truly spiritual person. Just that his religion is Mathematics and his God-Combinatorics. He thought about mathematical problems 24-7. The very characteristics of a great spiritual person at the height of realization was present in him. He was not able to stand physical pleasure and didn't marry. His possessions where just two half-empty suitcases. He never stayed in a place, roamed all around the world giving lectures and gave whatever money he got as an endowment. Totally dispassionate life. More than these things, a childlike behavior found in spiritual maturity was found in him (he was very pleased with the emergence of velcro footwear as he found buckling his sandals difficult). He just loved kids and called them 'epsilons' ('epsilon' usually denotes a very small quantity in math). He passed away in 1996 with the great amount of collected works yet to be amassed. He never strived to be a mathematical god, he was just one by himself.
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8 comments:
great he is indeed:)
Thanks 4 sharing ur thoghts after watching the documentary
rare soul indeed in this materialistic world
Good one Kasthuri, liked this very much
hearing first time abt this chap!
Very dedicated indeed.
Very interesting character. He never strived to be a mathematical god, he was just one by himself. Reminded me of this - Talent does what it can, genius does what it must. BTW, have you seen this movie Pi? I've read the script and would love to see it someday...
@ krishna : Thanks buddy.
@ parvati : You assume God is not present in the ideas of Combinatorics or in the selfless love of widowed mothers. For me spirituality doesn't confine itself to a personal being called God. Yogi is one who is in the sincere pursuit of Yoga selflessly. It need not confine to any religion. Dispassionate resolve is enough to term one as a spiritual person. I think if one has "abhyasa and vairagya" (Just as Sri Krishna advises) in any field whatsoever he is spiritual. Moreover, doesn't He appear in whatever form one wants to see Him ?
@ satya : More than being a mathematician, he was a good human.
@ ganesh : Yes Ganesh, he had his intellectual ability to support him.
@ saravana : Thanks.
@ tj : Welcome to the US. Thanks.
@ sriram : Cool lines. No Sriram, I haven't watched it. I'll take your recommendation.
Cool post!
Mathematics is my favourite subject! :) And I have heard of Erdos.
Do you know of a number called "Erdos Number"? It is used as an indicator of the number of papers that an author has presented with Erdos. And that number, the higher the more prestige the author has.
I had heard of this number long back. If somebody has updated knowledge kindly let me know.
thanks for the reco.
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