As my regular readers know, I am taking a class this semester, "Paradoxes and the Limits of Knowledge." It's a sweet mixture of science, philosophy, math and computers. The professor has a charming personality. Anywho, as I take a break from my Microeconomics headache, I thought I'd blog some thoughts I had about Kurt Godel, a character who popped up throughout the course.
Kurt Godel was a mathematician and friend of Albert Einstein's (I had to put that in the title to draw you all in...) Kurt Godel was nicknamed at a young age, Mr. Why, as he was always asking why from a very young age. Michal smiles, as my mother used to ask me, "why are you always analyzing everything to death???" I guess it stands to support my career goal of Market Research Analyst. Ok, train of thought derailed... BACK... ON TRACK!
So, I was reading about this great Mathematician's marriage and I had some thoughts. You see, it occured to me how different his marriage was from the way we are viewing dating and marriage nowadays, especially in the Jewish community. His wife Adele was not some trophy wife as all the men seem to be looking for nowadays. She was thin, yes, I'll grant you that. However, she was six years older and had a disfigured face. This is hardly what the good shidduch stuff is made of in the Jewish circles these days.
Now, it seems impressive that Kurt Godel was probably the greatest mathematician of his time ONLY behind Albert Einstein. He lectured in the hallowed halls of Princeton. He came with so much stature and prestige. Yet, he was not the model husband. What? No, he was a bit... not well. He was convinced someone was poisoning his food. He kept a diary of things like his body temperature and milk of magnesia consumption. This man made his wife test his food for him. This is hardly what the good shidduch stuff is made of in the Jewish circles these days.
So, I think about what would happen to these two in today's shidduch world. Mind you, he was surely not Jewish. She was a Catholic divorcee. In reality, they were devoted to each other, despite the faults they each had. Anyhow, in today's shidduch world, I think they would match him up with size 2 Princesses 10 to 15 years younger. Adele, they would not set up. If they did set her up, it would be with men much older who would be upset that she had a facial disfigurement. If either got married, they would like get divorced...
Just a thought....
Of course, Godel then died when his wife went to the hospital. He was too paranoid to eat without her around and so he starved to death.
ReplyDeleteNow, it seems impressive that Kurt Godel was probably the greatest mathematician of his time ONLY behind Albert Einstein.
There are a lot of issues with that sentence. First, Einstein wasn't a mathematician but a physicist. And it shows in what he knew and what work he did. He had a very good grasp of a lot of what mathematicians were doing, but he was ultimately a physicist not a mathematician.
I think it would in any event be difficult to argue that Godel was the greatest mathematician of his time. He had some very impressive results that potentially have philosophical implications beyond anything mathematicians normally do. But post his work in the 1930s he did very little work. The last major work he did was published in 1940 when he published his work on the consistency of the axiom of choice with ZFC. He did do other work (such as his work with the field equations of general relativity in a rotating universe).
Contrasting Godel with the careers of Erdos or Hilbert or gets a very different pattern.
I'm not sure it is meaningful to talk about whether one mathematician is greater than another except at a very broad outline (i.e. everyone under discussion is much much brighter than I am) but if one does try to make such distinctions putting Godel on top is difficult.
"There are a lot of issues with that sentence. First, Einstein wasn't a mathematician but a physicist."
ReplyDeleteOops...
"The last major work he did was published in 1940 when he published his work on the consistency of the axiom of choice with ZFC"
That was in the extra credit readings in the course, under the section of infinity. Hilbert was on the original syllabus to be covered last but we instead did some stuff on how the calendar was made-give Jocelyn Bell her rewards!!!
Um, because I comment way too frequently and need to spend less time procrastinating and reading blogs?
ReplyDeleteI love comments! I figure this because you are the only one who commented on the other blog post from that class. I forwarded them to prof. who is even Jewish but, I get no blog comments out of him. He did like both posts, though.
ReplyDeleteThere is a whole movie about Einstein's wife and the suspicion that she wrote his theory on relativity. Marriage was different back then, I don't think you can accurately compare the two with modern marriage.
ReplyDelete