Dear MORPHMET community,
I am still struggling to process this tragic news. Dennis was on my master’s thesis committee at Florida State University in 2010–2012. He was truly a great mentor who introduced me to the theory and practice of geometric morphometrics, which has shaped my research career in tremendous ways. Beyond his remarkable academic accomplishments, he was a warm, thoughtful, and brilliant person who always had his office door open for deep conversations about shape theory. I learned so much from him and deeply saddened by the fact that I am no longer able to discuss shape with him. Couple things I’d like to share. When asked about what he studies, Dennis proudly said that he works on triangles, the most basic shape that can be described mathematically. He showed the beauty, elegance, and seemingly endless possibilities that the study of triangles can offer in his geometric morphometric course at FSU. As a student who had absolutely no background in programming, he also encouraged me to learn Python and R. One of my favorite quotes by him is: “If you need to do something more than twice, you should program it.” I tell this to many students who are beginning to learn coding. Dennis’ passing will leave a giant hole in my heart as well as the morphometrics community. I feel enormously honored to have known him. For those who have not had the privilege of meeting Dennis, you can get a taste of his character watching his Rohlf Medal presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqxFfXDyFC4 Sincerely, Aki On Saturday, June 15, 2019 at 10:55:45 AM UTC-4, mitt...@univie.ac.at wrote: > > Dear subscribers to morphmet, > > With the deepest grief we must inform you of the sudden > death on June 13 of Prof. Dennis E. Slice, > holder of the fourth Rohlf Award for Excellence in Morphometrics > and tireless founder and moderator of this newsgroup, > who suffered a heart attack in his home town of > Tallahassee, Florida. Morphometrics will not be the same > without him. > > Jim Rohlf, Fred Bookstein, Paul O'Higgins, > Benedikt Hallgrimsson, June 15, 2019 > -- MORPHMET may be accessed via its webpage at http://www.morphometrics.org --- To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to morphmet+unsubscr...@morphometrics.org.
