Beer and Epiphanies

Thank god I took some time to have beers with a math grad colleague
and my non-mathy best friend! They asked me the simple question, "what
is your research good for?" Now, this question is an obvious one, but
most math people have no idea if there's a positive answer to it.

After trying to explain what I do, and explaining the (string theory)
context of it, I was at a loss for why I was going to be spending
years making one type of calculation (counting classes of curves on a
surface). At about the second beer, though, it hit me: I was counting
the number of formations in which a super-string could wrap itself
around the extra invisible dimensions of the universe!

No more derisive looks from my friends when they ask what math is good
for, no sir! I'm working on finding all the possible ways matter and
forces can exist! Take that! And all because of good friends, a couple
beers, and a quarter century of mathematical study!

A Pro Po

Dear Dan (a fellow grad student),

Strangely enough, our conversation about whether blind alleys should be put into expositions about math was take. Up in Spivak's introduction. He suggests describing a nice way that the subject _could_ have arisen instead of the actual way. For, as he writes, "there is no reason, in mathematics any more than in biology, why ontogeny must recapitulate phylogeny. When modern terminology finally is introduced, it should be as an outgrowth of this (mythical) historical development."

Go ahead, look up the words. I did;)

-Brandon

Sent from my iPhone