Mike McCarty wrote: > Ian Halliday wrote: > > >> UNORTHODOXIES: Most mathematicians have had the following experience >> and those whose activities are somewhat more public have had it often: >> an unsolicited letter arrives from an unknown individual and contained >> in the letter is a piece of mathematics of a very sensational nature. >> > > [snip interesting bit of stuff] > > I've had this experience, myself, and I'm not even a professional > mathematician. I once had this experience with a guy who purported > to prove that the function > > f(z) = z > > is NOT ANALYTIC. He used a convoluted contour integral[*] in the > complex plane, neglecting to note that he crossed over branch > cuts when doing the integration. He had published a little booklet > entititled "A Demonstration that the Function F(Z) = Z Is Not > Analytic, Along With Some Consequences, Of Which the Mathematical > Community Remains Wilfully Ignorant" or something similar. He was > convinced that simply because he did not have a math degree, > mathematicians refused to listen to, or believe, or accept his > evidence and proof. > > I spent weeks in exchanging e-mail with this person, showing him how > to do the contour integral properly (after which, of course, the > singularities are no longer present). > > Up until this point we had had convivial, if somewhat unusual, > correspondence, mostly because I patiently listened to what he > had to say. But when the axe finally fell, I suddenly became one > of "them", and he started denouncing me using if not precisely vile > language, certainly pejorative language. Suddenly, our weeks long > correspondence became merely a subterfuge on my part, lulling him into > thinking I could be trusted, when I was really just a part of the Vast > Mathematical Conspiracy devoted to insisting that f(z) = z is analytic, > in face of the fact that he had himself personally proven that it > has singularities. > > I finally realized that this man was not just ignorant of the mistakes > he had made, but was actually mentally ill, and that no amount of > rational discussion could make progress with him, since his delusions > and emotional attachment to being right, in the face of all us, if > not quite evil, certainly self-protective and exclusionary > mathematicians, were paramount. > > [*] In effect, he was using a contour integral to compute > f(z) = arctan tan z, and not noting that arctan has branch cuts > which must be taken into account when doing the integration > to compute it, which the periodicity of tan nullifies. It took > some work to disentangle the mess, and do the contour integral > correctly, after which he went ballistic, thinking I had "led > him down the garden path" with all my mathematical mumbo-jumbo. > > Mike > Very funny, and very well written!
Filed under "Knuckleheads I Have Known." My own folder is bulging. _______________________________________________ Prime mailing list [email protected] http://hogranch.com/mailman/listinfo/prime
