Subject: categories: Re: cracks and pots

From: Krzysztof Worytkiewicz <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 17 Mar 2006 11:24:23 -0500

Vincent, you sound like this Beatles song, you know, in the White
Album... Fully agree with you on the essentials of point 2 (you know
that). However,  uncritically referring to vociferations out of a
some hate blog only because the blogger is labeled "string theorist"
is not unlike point 1, at least in my modest opinion.

Among the problems with the way research is sponsored there is this
particularly modern one:  the commitment to the short-term. It is
quite similar to what happens in other sectors of the globalised
society (of "high civilisation index" as L.Motl would presumably say
-:( ) and leads to a growing disbalance in the allocation of
resources. Cats are a very fine tool to organise concepts and proofs.
Surprisingly enough, most mathematicians are quite reluctant or
openly hostile. On the high-end, cat theory is crucial when it comes
down to unify seemingly disparate areas of maths (which is unlikely a
goal for itself) and this kind of work is quite clearly long-term.

My 2 p: cat theory needs to be demystified in first place rather than
to be sold. In particular, I think that the (still somehow ongoing)
debate if it is a better foundation for maths or not is absolutely
pointless.

>  Category theory is just not very trendy at the
> minute and to get the money one needs to do theoretical physics
> (there had been also Computer Science at some point - that was poor
> is not it?).

Now we have the best of both worlds: quantum computing :-))

Cheers

Krzysztof

-- my government will categorically deny the incident ever occurred