From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Msuck: nntp://news.gmane.io/gmane.science.mathematics.categories/4620 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: "Meredith Gregory" Newsgroups: gmane.science.mathematics.categories Subject: Re: Bourbaki and Categories Date: Sun, 21 Sep 2008 23:54:38 -0700 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: main.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1241020061 14067 80.91.229.2 (29 Apr 2009 15:47:41 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2009 15:47:41 +0000 (UTC) To: "Andre Joyal" , categories@mta.ca Original-X-From: rrosebru@mta.ca Mon Sep 22 11:47:49 2008 -0300 Return-path: Envelope-to: categories-list@mta.ca Delivery-date: Mon, 22 Sep 2008 11:47:49 -0300 Original-Received: from Majordom by mailserv.mta.ca with local (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1KhmcE-0000RW-6D for categories-list@mta.ca; Mon, 22 Sep 2008 11:42:18 -0300 Content-Disposition: inline Original-Sender: cat-dist@mta.ca Precedence: bulk X-Keywords: X-UID: 116 Original-Lines: 81 Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.science.mathematics.categories:4620 Archived-At: All, i have been utterly delighted by this conversation. What i can't help but think about, however, is that with the internet we have a different sort of opportunity. Let me try to describe it. - What is missing in most mathematical presentations is a view into the often very human and very messy process of getting to the presentation. = What young mathematicians need -- in my view -- is a view of mathematicians d= oing mathematics. They need to see very top-down orientations rubbing elbows = with very bottoms-up orientations. They need to see highly inventive, unifyin= g viewpoints come up against skeptical viewpoints armed with vast arrays o= f counter-examples. They need to see people desperately trying to organize while others are desperately trying to de-construct. This is where the l= ife of mathematics is. This is how people bring mathematics to life. - With the internet we have the opportunity to record not just the final artifact, tractate or wiki, but the process. Ever since Andre Joyal mentioned a 2nd life for Bourbaki i can't stop thinking about a Bourbaki colloquium run in Second Life -- so that whatever the outcome of a given process is in terms of artifact, people = can go back and look at the process, itself. They can see how people argued = and counter-argued. There is getting to be a precendent for this, from Harvardto Intel , to run serious technical conversation in Second Life. Perhaps this idea is too far out, but i would urge those who seriously consider a second life for Bourbaki to remember to record the living part a= s well as the outcome. After all, looking over the last many emails to categories so much of it is an attempt to recover process -- how things got to be where they are. Best wishes, --greg On Sat, Sep 20, 2008 at 1:21 PM, Andre Joyal wrote: > On Fri, Sep 19, 2008, John Baez wrote: > > >Do we imagine this new Bourbaki as just systematizing and > >presenting what we know already, or struggling to create > >brand new mathematics? > > This is an important question. > We need to have a clear view of the goal of such an enterprise. > From my point of view, the goal should be "educational": > to help students and researchers to learn mathematics > and cross the boundary between fields. > Mathematics is vast, and every mathematician is a permanent student. > The traditional way to learn is to read the litterature and to discuss wi= th > a master. > I was told that Grothendieck had learned algebraic geometry by discussing > with Serre. > But few peoples have this chance. > Obviously, Internet is opening new avenues for learning. > Many peoples (and myself) have learned a lot by reading your bulletin > "This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics". > You have a real talent to explain a subject by exposing the heuristic! > A discussion forum like the "Categories list" is also very helpful. > Wikipedia is a useful place to gather informations about a subject. > But the Bourbaki Tractate was offering something more: > a unified presentation of mathematics, including the proofs. > > The Bourbaki Tractate was the result of a sustained collaboration > of many generations of mathematicians from different fields. > Conflicts are inevitable and mathematics evolve quickly. > A unified, final presentation seems impossible. >