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The Birth of the Institute for Advanced Study (1930)
"A first-rate research institution with no teachers, no students, no classes, only researchers protected from the vicissitudes and pressures of the…
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Jørgen Veisdal
5
The Beautiful Life of John Forbes Nash, Jr.
Mathematician John Forbes Nash, Jr (1928-2015). was born in Bluefield, West Virginia in 1928. He died in a car crash in New Jersey on the 23rd of May…
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Jørgen Veisdal
Paul Samuelson's Flavors of Randomness (2004)
“The baseball announcer has it, of course, conveniently all wrong. Ted Williams is due to hit because he hasn’t hit for seven days. That’s red noise…
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Jørgen Veisdal
1
The Legend of Abraham Wald
Historians of science sometimes lament the fact certain historical figures are famous for the wrong reasons. Alan Turing (1912-54) is perhaps the best…
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Jørgen Veisdal
Cantor's Diagonal Argument (1891)
“Diagonalization seems to show that there is an inexhaustibility phenomenon for definability similar to that for provability” — Franzén (2004) Georg…
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Jørgen Veisdal
John F. Nash's Work in Pure Mathematics
It’s fair to say that John F. Nash Jr. (1928-2015) didn’t earn much respect from pure mathematicians for his work in game theory. To them, his use of…
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Jørgen Veisdal
Einstein's Emigration to America (1932)
In May of 1932, a viciously anti-Semetic illustrated brochure entitled Juden Sehen Dich An (“Jews are Watching You”) featured Einstein in its prologue…
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Jørgen Veisdal
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