Re: Our friend Bob Walters

Re: Our friend Bob Walters

[Fred E.J. Linton]

Sad news yet again.

Only a year and a half ago, late in June of 2013, we were mourning 
Aurelio Carboni, at a Conference in his memory organized in Milano 
by none other than his friend and colleague Bob Walters. And now, 
far sooner than any of us would have wished, time has culled Bob 
himself from our earthly stage.

In Milano on June 26, 2013, at that Carboni memorial conference, I 
snagged a few pictures of Bob -- and of Lawvere père et fils -- using,
alas, just a simple cell phone camera. May I offer them as tribute to 
Bob's memory? -- 

: http://tlvp.net/~fej.math.wes/Milano-2013/index.htm .

And may I offer as well the URL of Bob's Insubria vita page:

: http://www.uninsubria.eu/research/dsat/cv_Walters.htm .

Sadly, -- Fred Linton

[PS: I'll gladly correct any infelicity in the posted date 
31.01.2015 if it's called to my attention. Thanks. -- FEJ] 
---

------ Original Message ------
Received: Sat, 31 Jan 2015 10:23:21 AM EST
From: wlawvere <wlawvere@buffalo.edu>
To: <categories@mta.ca>
Subject: categories: Our friend Bob Walters

> Dear colleagues,
> 
> It is with great sorrow that I inform you of our loss of RFC Walters.
> 
> Bob has been a highly valued friend and collaborator for several decades.
> 
> One of the organizers of the Sydney Category Seminar, as well as of 
> International meetings at Como, his contributions to pure and applied 
> category theory remain of fundamental value in many diverse disciplines. 
> He published one of the first books applying category theory to computer 
> science, and was one of the main developers of Yoneda structures and other 
> explicit concepts guiding category theory in geometry and logic.
> 
> He is sadly missed by his friends and his colleagues all over the world.
> 
> My deepest condolences go to his family.
> 
> Bill Lawvere
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]




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Re: Our friend Bob Walters

[Matias M]

I visited Bob and his family just before ct2014 and he was strong and
happy, so it is a very sad surprise that he had to go.

Others have already said a few words about his mathematical legacy. I would
like to emphasize his kind and joyous personality. It was a pleasure to
work under his direction with Nicoletta, and it was incredibly entertaining
to share a conversation with them and Aurelio (with whom Bob shared a witty
symbiosis).

   Bob also shared with Aurelio the worries that Marta mentioned in her
email. Some of them are clearly and politely expressed in his blog,
together with many other interesting thoughts and information.

   I will miss him a lot.

   M. Menni.


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RE: Our friend Bob Walters

[Marco Grandis]

I would join what so many of you, and Marta in particular, have
expressed so well.
It is a great loss.
My deep condolences to Nicoletta
Marco



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RE: Our friend Bob Walters

[Marta Bunge]

Dear colleagues and friends,








We have suffered yet another great loss to our categories group - RFC 
(Bob) Walters. The last time I saw him was at the Memorial Conference 
for Aurelio Carboni, Milano, June 2013. The photo whose link is given 
below, taken by Danilo Lawvere, shows from left
to right:  me, George Janelidze, Patrizia Giachetti, Bob Walters, Bill 
Lawvere, and Davide Bernardini. 





https://www.dropbox.com/sh/mjnj9tepsi20gyc/AABGfb5vk-BeTMj4ifB8iIWJa?dl=0








Both Aurelio and Bob worked together during several years at Insubria, 
Como. When Aurelio did not show up at the Calais CT Conference, I asked 
Bob Walters why, and he told me that Aurelio was not sick but worse - 
"disillusioned" with the "new developments"
in Category Theory, a sentiment which several of us shared. Bob 
encouraged me then to visit Aurelio in Como. An interchange of emails 
followed but I could not make it. Aurelio and I had worked together 
during my sabbatical in Genova, 2005-06 and had plans for
a sequel. Our joint paper "The symmetric topos" benefited from his 
incredible algebraic intuition and led to further work. What Aurelio was
  suffering from, however,  was not just disillusionment, as Bob Walters 
and even his wife Patrizia Giachetti believed,
but something much more serious and he died shortly after. 








Having now lost both Aurelio Carboni and Bob Walters has been a big blow
  to our group of colleagues and friends in Italy and elsewhere. My deep 
condolences go to Bob's wife and collaborator Nicoletta Sabadini, to his
  Italian colleagues and friends, and to the
entire Category Theory Community.








Marta Bunge



> Date: Sat, 31 Jan 2015 10:11:03 -0500
> From: wlawvere@buffalo.edu
> To: categories@mta.ca
> Subject: categories: Our friend Bob Walters
> 
> Dear colleagues,
> 
> It is with great sorrow that I inform you of our loss of RFC Walters.
> 
> Bob has been a highly valued friend and collaborator for several decades.
> 
> One of the organizers of the Sydney Category Seminar, as well as of 
> International meetings at Como, his contributions to pure and applied 
> category theory remain of fundamental value in many diverse disciplines. 
> He published one of the first books applying category theory to computer 
> science, and was one of the main developers of Yoneda structures and other 
> explicit concepts guiding category theory in geometry and logic.
> 
> He is sadly missed by his friends and his colleagues all over the world.
> 
> My deepest condolences go to his family.
> 
> Bill Lawvere
> 

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Re: Our friend Bob Walters

[Joyal, André]

Dear Giuseppe, dear all,

I am shocked to learn that Bob Walters is gone.
I knew him from the time I visited Max Kelly in Australia.
He was a very friendly person with a good sense of humor.
And a good mathematician too.
He was an adventurer, both in math and in life.
The last time I saw him was at the CT2010 meeting in Genova.
I am using his work with Carboni and Kasangian in my latest paper
with Gambino.

My deepest condoleance to his friends and family,
André


________________________________________
From: Giuseppe Rosolini [rosolini@unige.it]
Sent: Sunday, February 01, 2015 5:07 AM
To: wlawvere; categories@mta.ca
Subject: categories: Re: Our friend Bob Walters

Dear Bill, dear all,

this is terribly sad news. I feared the worst when Bob did not show up at Cambridge for CT2014, but hoped that it was just a wrong feeling.

The strongest and happiest link I had with Bob was in the organization of two major conferences at Como and Genova: in both occasions the many, strangely difficult tasks which we had to confront always appeared easier than they were because of his willingness to make things work and of his amazing sense of humour.

My image of Bob is forever connected to cartesian bicategories (I, II, III,...). They constitute landmarks in the research in mathematics, and I am certain they will prove fundamental in the philosophy of the subject in the decades to come. It is the saddest of thoughts that I shall not discuss it with him any more.

At this terrible moment my heart is with Nicoletta and Sofia.

Pino

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Re: Our friend Bob Walters

[Giuseppe Rosolini]

Dear Bill, dear all,

this is terribly sad news. I feared the worst when Bob did not show up at Cambridge for CT2014, but hoped that it was just a wrong feeling.

The strongest and happiest link I had with Bob was in the organization of two major conferences at Como and Genova: in both occasions the many, strangely difficult tasks which we had to confront always appeared easier than they were because of his willingness to make things work and of his amazing sense of humour. 

My image of Bob is forever connected to cartesian bicategories (I, II, III,...). They constitute landmarks in the research in mathematics, and I am certain they will prove fundamental in the philosophy of the subject in the decades to come. It is the saddest of thoughts that I shall not discuss it with him any more.

At this terrible moment my heart is with Nicoletta and Sofia.

Pino

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Re: Our friend Bob Walters

[Ross Street]

Dear Colleagues

This is devastating news. 

Bob started at Sydney University after finishing his PhD in 1970 at 
the Australian National University. I started at Macquarie the same
year. That is when our friendship and collaboration began. He was
an exciting person to work with and I admired him greatly. We
started thinking about Yoneda structures almost immediately.

Bob was a major influence on category theory in general but
especially on Australian category theory. His charismatic lectures
to undergraduates at Sydney University encouraged many students 
to continue in mathematics and category theory. He saw early, 
in his own original terms, how categories applied to computer
science.

One of Bob’s great achievements was understanding Higg’s
work on Heyting-valued equality in the light of Bill Lawvere’s
insight into Cauchy completion via adjointness. This gave a
vital reason for extending enriched category to a base bicategory.

There is so much to Bob’s work and influence. 

The latest issue of Applied Categorical Structures landed on my 
desk just last week; Bob is a joint author of a paper there. 

I was hoping to see Bob at CT2014 in Cambridge. He had planned
to go and to speak. This wasn’t to be.

As Bill said, our deepest condolences are with his family. 

Ross
 
 

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Our friend Bob Walters

[wlawvere]

Dear colleagues,

It is with great sorrow that I inform you of our loss of RFC Walters.

Bob has been a highly valued friend and collaborator for several decades.

One of the organizers of the Sydney Category Seminar, as well as of 
International meetings at Como, his contributions to pure and applied 
category theory remain of fundamental value in many diverse disciplines. 
He published one of the first books applying category theory to computer 
science, and was one of the main developers of Yoneda structures and other 
explicit concepts guiding category theory in geometry and logic.

He is sadly missed by his friends and his colleagues all over the world.

My deepest condolences go to his family.

Bill Lawvere




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