|
“The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, — Joseph Conrad in Heart of Darkness
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy, |
Tuesday, December 12, 2023
If It’s Tuesday…
Thursday, October 12, 2023
A Groping
Financial Times today informs us that the new 48-page novel by
Nobel Lit Prize winner Jon Fosse, with title translated as
"A Shining," will be published not on Halloween, as previously
reported here, but instead on the next day, All Hallows. Good.
The novel's original title, in Norwegian, is Kvitleik .
The Web indicates that this means "White Game."
See as well yesterday's post "Void Game." A relevant quote —
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Saturday, August 14, 2021
North of Big Snake
The title refers to a Log24 post of Feb. 8, 2021.
Detail from an image in that post:
By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us." — Arthur Koestler
Related Hollywood remark:
"You've blown communication
…as we've known it… right out of
the water. You know that, don't you?"
— Cliff Robertson in Brainstorm (1983)
Ave Atque Vale
Ave
A letter in The Mathematical Intelligencer , January 1988
http://www.log24.com/noindex-pdf/
Cullinane-letter-Artes_Liberales-Intelligencer.pdf —
Vale
A farewell lecture at Yale, April 2013
Kagan's obituary in the online New York Times tonight
says that he died at 89 on August 6, 2021.
The above farewell lecture of Kagan was on Thursday, April 25, 2013.
From this journal on Kagan's "born yesterday" date — April 24, 2013 —
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
For Julie Heng, Harvard Crimson writer
Heng today states clearly the obvious problem with peer review —
“… because reviewers must have a certain level of authority
in the subject, their work is often in direct competition with
what’s presented in these potential publications.”
Thursday, August 21, 2014
NoxFiled under: Uncategorized — m759 @ 1:00 AM ( A sequel to Lux ) “By groping toward the light we are made to realize — Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Robin Williams and the Stages of Math i) shock & denial A related description of the process — “You know how sometimes someone tells you a theorem, — Tom Leinster yesterday at The n-Category Café |
“Why did no one tell me this before?” See The Crimson .
Thursday, November 12, 2020
Storylines
Related material for comedians —
Thursday, August 21, 2014
NoxFiled under: Uncategorized — m759 @ 1:00 AM ( A sequel to Lux ) “By groping toward the light we are made to realize — Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Robin Williams and the Stages of Math i) shock & denial A related description of the process — “You know how sometimes someone tells you a theorem, — Tom Leinster yesterday at The n-Category Café |
See as well . . .
Damonizing Your Opponent
Sunday, April 26, 2020
Crux
This post was suggested by a David Justice weblog post yesterday,
Coincidence and Cosmos. Some related remarks —
“The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning
of which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not
typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the
meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside,
enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a
haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that sometimes
are made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.”
— Joseph Conrad in Heart of Darkness
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us.”
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
See as well posts now tagged Crux.
Sunday, April 12, 2020
Blackboard Jungle Continues.
From a post this morning by Peter J. Cameron
in memory of John Horton Conway —
| ” This happened at a conference somewhere in North America. I was chairing the session at which he was to speak. When I got up to introduce him, his title had not yet been announced, and the stage had a blackboard on an easel. I said something like ‘The next speaker is John Conway, and no doubt he is going to tell us what he will talk about.’ John came onto the stage, went over to the easel, picked up the blackboard, and turned it over. On the other side were revealed five titles of talks. He said, ‘I am going to give one of these talks. I will count down to zero; you are to shout as loudly as you can the number of the talk you want to hear, and the chairman will judge which number is most popular.’ “ |
Thursday, August 21, 2014
NoxFiled under: Uncategorized — m759 @ 1:00 AM ( A sequel to Lux ) “By groping toward the light we are made to realize — Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Robin Williams and the Stages of Math i) shock & denial A related description of the process — “You know how sometimes someone tells you a theorem, — Tom Leinster yesterday at The n-Category Café |
Sunday, September 8, 2019
The Groping (for Stephen King)
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us.”
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Friday, June 8, 2018
For Anthony Bourdain
Flashback —
|
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Nox
|
Thursday, March 16, 2017
“Bulk Apperception”
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
"Dear boys — We’re going to have some fun, aren’t we?"
— Maeve in "Westworld," Season 1, Episode 6,
after her "bulk apperception" has been upgraded
to the maximum.
"Bulk apperception" is defined in the script as "basically,
overall intelligence." The phrase is apparently unique to "Westworld."
These two words do, however, nearly occur together in
at least one book — Andrew Feffer's The Chicago Pragmatists
and American Progressivism :
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Bell de Jour
This journal on Saturday, Dec. 19 —
|
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize how deep the darkness is around us.” — Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy, Random House, 1973, page 118 |
In memory of Madame Claude, who
reportedly died in Nice December 19:
"There were fairies and spirits."
Amen.
Monday, October 12, 2015
Ex Tenebris
|
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize how deep the darkness is around us.” — Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy, Random House, 1973, page 118 |
"The Tesseract is where it belongs: out of our reach."
— Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury,
quoted here on Epiphany 2013
Earlier … (See Jan. 27, 2012) …
"And the Führer digs for trinkets in the desert."
Friday, April 24, 2015
Love and Darkness, 2003
The previous post mentions an Amos Oz
novel, A Tale of Love and Darkness
(Sipour Al Ahava Vehoshekh, סיפור על אהבה וחושך),
apparently first published in Hebrew in 2002.
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us.”
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Nox
( A sequel to Lux )
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us.”
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Robin Williams and the Stages of Math
i) shock & denial
ii) anger
iii) bargaining
iv) depression
v) acceptance
A related description of the process —
“You know how sometimes someone tells you a theorem,
and it’s obviously false, and you reach for one of the many
easy counterexamples only to realize that it’s not a
counterexample after all, then you reach for another one
and another one and find that they fail too, and you begin
to concede the possibility that the theorem might not
actually be false after all, and you feel your world start to
shift on its axis, and you think to yourself: ‘Why did no one
tell me this before?’ “
— Tom Leinster yesterday at The n-Category Café
Friday, July 25, 2014
Magic in the Moonshine
“The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning
of which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not
typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the
meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside,
enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a
haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that sometimes
are made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.”
— Joseph Conrad in Heart of Darkness
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us.”
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
“Spectral evidence is a form of evidence
based upon dreams and visions.” —Wikipedia
See also Moonshine (May 15, 2014) and, from the date of the above
New York Times item, two posts tagged Wunderkammer .
Related material: From the Spectrum program of the Mathematical
Association of America, some non-spectral evidence.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Art Wars for Odin’s Day
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy , Random House, 1973, page 118
Friday, May 25, 2012
Desert of the Real
Monday, May 30, 2011
Darkness at Noon
A Meditation on the NY Lottery of May 29
Yesterday's NY Lottery— Midday 981, Evening 275.
As noted in yesterday morning's linked-to post,
The Shining of May 29…
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy ,
Random House, 1973, page 118
One interpretation of the mystic numbers revealed by the Lottery yesterday—
981 as the final page* of David Foster Wallace's famed novel Infinite Jest …
275 as a page in Wallace's non-fiction book about infinity Everything and More …
Gregory Chaitin points out that this is nonsense …
As noted elsewhere in this journal, I have a different concept of "math's absolute
Prince of Darkness"— and, indeed, of a "quest for Omega." (See posts of May 2010.)
Yesterday's numbers indicate a different struggle between darkness and light—
Light —
Darkness —
* From infinitesummer.org/archives/168 — "A note about editions:
As it turns out, all (physical) editions of Infinite Jest have 981 pages:
the one from 1996, the one from 2004, the paperback, the hardcover, etc.
A big thank you to the men and women in the publishing industry who
were kind and/or lazy enough to keep things consistent."
Friday, December 10, 2010
Cruel Star, Part II
Symmetry, Duality, and Cinema
— Title of a Paris conference held June 17, 2010
From that conference, Edward Frenkel on symmetry and duality—
"Symmetry plays an important role in geometry, number theory, and quantum physics. I will discuss the links between these areas from the vantage point of the Langlands Program. In this context 'duality' means that the same theory, or category, may be described in two radically different ways. This leads to many surprising consequences."
Related material —
See also "Black Swan" in this journal, Ingmar Bergman's production of Yukio Mishima's "Madame de Sade," and Duality and Symmetry, 2001.
This journal on the date of the Paris conference
had a post, "Nighttown," with some remarks about
the duality of darkness and light. Its conclusion—
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Mathematics and Narrative, continued
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
A 1973 review of Koestler's book—
"Koestler's 'call girls,' summoned here and there
by this university and that foundation
to perform their expert tricks, are the butts
of some chilling satire."
Examples of Light—
Felix Christian Klein (1849- June 22, 1925) and Évariste Galois (1811-1832)
Klein on Galois—
"… in France just about 1830 a new star of undreamt-of brilliance— or rather a meteor, soon to be extinguished— lighted the sky of pure mathematics: Évariste Galois."
— Felix Klein, Development of Mathematics in the 19th Century, translated by Michael Ackerman. Brookline, Mass., Math Sci Press, 1979. Page 80.
"… um 1830 herum in Frankreich als ein neuer Stern von ungeahntem Glanze am Himmel der reinen Mathematik aufleuchtet, um freilich, einem Meteor gleich, sehr bald zu verlöschen: Évariste Galois."
— Felix Klein, Vorlesungen Über Die Entwicklung Der Mathematick Im 19. Jahrhundert. New York, Chelsea Publishing Co., 1967. (Vol. I, originally published in Berlin in 1926.) Page 88.
Examples of Darkness—
Martin Gardner on Galois—
"Galois was a thoroughly obnoxious nerd,
suffering from what today would be called
a 'personality disorder.' His anger was
paranoid and unremitting."
Gardner was reviewing a recent book about Galois by one Amir Alexander.
Alexander himself has written some reviews relevant to the Koestler book above.
See Alexander on—
The 2005 Mykonos conference on Mathematics and Narrative
A series of workshops at Banff International Research Station for Mathematical Innovation between 2003 and 2006. "The meetings brought together professional mathematicians (and other mathematical scientists) with authors, poets, artists, playwrights, and film-makers to work together on mathematically-inspired literary works."
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Nighttown
Continued from yesterday evening's "Long Day's Journey into Nighttown"—
A detail from that post—
Related material from Nighttown—
The Sebastian Horsley Guide to Whoring—
Horsley, the author of Dandy in the Underworld, was
found dead this morning of a suspected heroin overdose.
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Holy Geometry
The late mathematician V.I. Arnold was born on this date in 1937.
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy
Light
Choosing light rather than darkness, we observe Arnold's birthday with a quotation from his 1997 Paris talk 'On Teaching Mathematics.'
"The Jacobi identity (which forces the heights of a triangle to cross at one point) is an experimental fact…."
The "experimental fact" part, perhaps offered with tongue in cheek, is of less interest than the assertion that the Jacobi identity forces the altitude-intersection theorem.
Albert Einstein on that theorem in the "holy geometry book" he read at the age of 12—
"Here were assertions, as for example the intersection of the three altitudes of a triangle in one point, which– though by no means evident– could nevertheless be proved with such certainty that any doubt appeared to be out of the question. This lucidity and certainty made an indescribable impression upon me.”
Arnold's much less evident assertion about altitudes and the Jacobi identity is discussed in "Arnol'd, Jacobi identity, and orthocenters" (pdf) by Nikolai V. Ivanov.
Ivanov says, without giving a source, that the altitudes theorem "was known to Euclid." Alexander Bogomolny, on the other hand, says it is "a matter of real wonderment that the fact of the concurrency of altitudes is not mentioned in either Euclid's Elements or subsequent writings of the Greek scholars. The timing of the first proof is still an open question."
For other remarks on geometry, search this journal for the year of Arnold's birth.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Brightness at Noon (continued)
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Continued from Christmas 2009 and from last Sunday—
The serious reflection is composed
Neither of comic nor tragic but of commonplace."
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Artifice of Eternity
A Medal
In memory of Byzantine scholar Ihor Sevcenko,
who died at 87 on St. Stephen's Day, 2009–
| William Grimes on Sevcenko in this morning's New York Times:
"Perhaps his most fascinating, if uncharacteristic, literary contribution came shortly after World War II, when he worked with Ukrainians stranded in camps in Germany for displaced persons. In April 1946 he sent a letter to Orwell, asking his permission to translate 'Animal Farm' into Ukrainian for distribution in the camps. The idea instantly appealed to Orwell, who not only refused to accept any royalties but later agreed to write a preface for the edition. It remains his most detailed, searching discussion of the book." |
See also a rather different medal discussed
here in the context of an Orwellian headline from
The New York Times on Christmas morning,
the day before Sevcenko died.
That headline, at the top of the online front page,
was "Arthur Koestler, Man of Darkness."
The medal, offered as an example of brightness
to counteract the darkness of the Times, was designed
by Leibniz in honor of his discovery of binary arithmetic.
See Brightness at Noon and Brightness continued.
"By groping toward the light we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is around us."
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Thursday April 17, 2008
(at Google News):
In other words:
|
Revelation for
April 16, 2008 —
day of the Pennsylvania
Clinton-Obama debate and
of the Pope’s birthday —
The Pennsylvania Lottery:
Make of this revelation
what you will.
My own interpretations:
the Lichtung of 4/13 and
the Dickung of page 441
of Heidegger’s
Basic Writings, where
the terms Lichtung and
Dickung are described.
See also “The Shining of
May 29” (JFK’s birthday).
“By groping toward the light
we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is
around us.”
— Arthur Koestler,
The Call Girls:
A Tragi-Comedy
Wednesday, September 6, 2006
Wednesday September 6, 2006
Happy birthday, Robert M. Pirsig.
Readings for the hour of the wolf:
- The Shining of May 29 (2002) and
- For John F. Kennedy’s Birthday (2006).
Yesterday was Arthur Koestler’s birthday.
“By groping toward the light
we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is
around us.”
— Arthur Koestler,
The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
Monday, May 29, 2006
Monday May 29, 2006
For John F. Kennedy's birthday:
Revisited
See The Shining of May 29
from 2002
and the references to
the marriage theorem
in Dharwadker's Alleged Proof
from 2005.
"By groping toward the light
we are made to realize
how deep the darkness is
around us."
— Arthur Koestler,
The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy,
Random House, 1973, page 118
For related material on
academic darkness, see
Mathematics and Narrative.
Wednesday, April 5, 2006
Wednesday April 5, 2006
Quarter to Three
(continued from
Dec. 20, 2003,
and from
April 3, 2006)
… so put another nickel in the machine….
Related material:
- The death of
jazz percussionist Don Alias,
- Miles Davis’s album
Bitches Brew
(“Miles Runs the Voodoo Down“), - Joni Mitchell’s album
Shadows and Light
(“God Must Be a Boogie Man“), - the Log24 entry
from the day Alias died,
which contains the following: - “By groping toward the light
we are made to realize
how deep the darkness
is around us.”— Arthur Koestler
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
Tuesday March 28, 2006
“What did he fear? It was not a fear or dread, It was a nothing that he knew too well. It was all a nothing and a man was a nothing too. It was only that and light was all it needed and a certain cleanness and order. Some lived in it and never felt it but he knew it all was nada y pues nada y nada y pues nada. Our nada who art in nada, nada be thy name thy kingdom nada thy will be nada in nada as it is in nada. Give us this nada our daily nada and nada us our nada as we nada our nadas and nada us not into nada but deliver us from nada; pues nada. Hail nothing full of nothing, nothing is with thee.”
“A Clean, Well-Lighted Place“
| “By groping toward the light we are made to realize how deep the darkness is around us.” — Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy, Random House, 1973, page 118 |
Teilhard de Chardin’s
The Phenomenon of Man:
|
“It would have been |
“He’s good.”
“Good? He’s the fucking
Prince of Darkness!”
— Paul Newman
and Jack Warden
in “The Verdict“
| Sanskrit (transliterated) —
nada: “So Nada Brahma means not only: — Joachim-Ernst Berendt, |
“This book is the outcome of
a course given at Harvard
first by G. W. Mackey….”
— Lynn H. Loomis, 1953, preface to
An Introduction to
Abstract Harmonic Analysis
For more on Mackey and Harvard, see
the Log24 entries of March 14-17.
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Thursday February 23, 2006
“In The Painted Word, a rumination on the state of American painting in the 1970s, Tom Wolfe described an epiphany….”
— Peter Berkowitz, “Literature in Theory”
“I had an epiphany.”
— Apostolos Doxiadis, organizer of last summer’s conference on mathematics and narrative. See the Log24 entry of 1:06 PM last August 23 and the four entries that preceded it.
“… das Durchleuchten des ewigen Glanzes des ‘Einen’ durch die materielle Erscheinung“
— A definition of beauty from Plotinus, via Werner Heisenberg
“By groping toward the light we are made to realize how deep the darkness is around us.”
— Arthur Koestler, The Call Girls: A Tragi-Comedy, Random House, 1973, page 118, quoted in The Shining of May 29
“Perhaps we are meant to see the story as a cubist retelling of the crucifixion….”
— Adam White Scoville, quoted in Cubist Crucifixion, on Iain Pears’s novel, An Instance of the Fingerpost