From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Msuck: nntp://news.gmane.io/gmane.science.mathematics.categories/5388 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Vaughan Pratt Newsgroups: gmane.science.mathematics.categories Subject: Re: A well kept secret? Date: Sat, 19 Dec 2009 12:55:14 -0800 Message-ID: References: Reply-To: Vaughan Pratt NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1261320854 26396 80.91.229.12 (20 Dec 2009 14:54:14 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 20 Dec 2009 14:54:14 +0000 (UTC) To: categories@mta.ca Original-X-From: categories@mta.ca Sun Dec 20 15:54:07 2009 Return-path: Envelope-to: gsmc-categories@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from mailserv.mta.ca ([138.73.1.1]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1NMNAc-0003JK-Mx for gsmc-categories@m.gmane.org; Sun, 20 Dec 2009 15:54:06 +0100 Original-Received: from Majordom by mailserv.mta.ca with local (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1NMMX6-0001Ae-6S for categories-list@mta.ca; Sun, 20 Dec 2009 10:13:16 -0400 In-Reply-To: Original-Sender: categories@mta.ca Precedence: bulk Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.science.mathematics.categories:5388 Archived-At: KCHM wrote: > For the record, there was a course in category theory for undergraduates > at Monash University (Melbourne) in the early 1970s. The (a?) counterpart of this at Berkeley at the start of the 1970s was Ed Spanier's algebraic topology course, whose first lecture would begin by exhibiting a functor between two categories, I forget which (I was not then at all into categories) but perhaps Top and Grp, and giving a two-line proof (of a representation?) to make the point that category theory could be a powerful tool when expertly deployed. I mention this because the experience at the UACT conference in 1993 at MSRI on the hill overlooking Berkeley rather created the impression that Berkeley would be the last place to welcome category theory, particularly when then-director of MSRI Bill Thurston welcomed us all at the opening of the meeting with his announcement that the very thought of the opposite of a category made him ill. Such an opening remark would be more appropriately made about CO2 at the currently running conference in Copenhagen. Vaughan [For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]