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Grigory Perelman and the Poincare Conjecture
EagleHasLanded writes "Russian mathematician Grigory Perelman doesn't talk to journalists. Actually, he doesn't talk to anyone anymore. So we'll have to settle for insights via his biographer, Masha Gessen, who, strangely enough, has never talked to him either. But she has spoken with just about everyone who has ever had any significant interaction with Perelman, and the result is the book Perfect Rigor, which more than adequately explains why Perelman has gone into self-imposed exile, and why he probably won't collect the million dollars he won by solving the Poincare Conjecture."
Brittany Murphy is dead and we're supposed to give a fuck about some Russian hermit? Life is not worth living anymore.
... he probably won't collect the million dollars he won by solving the Poincare Conjecture.
May I collect it?
By not buying or reading this book, I am doing what Perelman surely would have wanted.
Sylvia Nasar, also the author of "A Beautiful Mind", wrote a great piece about Perelman shortly after the publication of his proof. Deeply moving, in my opinion.
I know you were going for the cheap laugh and Funny mod points (no the joke did not go over my head). However there is more to the world than C, C++, Java and C#. Many computer languages still use = for equivalence. More importantly, in a story about mathematics, using = for the equivalence operator is probably more appropriate somehow.
Atlas stands on the earth and carries the celestial sphere on his shoulders.
See, it pays to buy books with extra large margins.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
There seems little doubt, based on this interview with the biographer, that he is indeed firmly entrenched somewhere on the higher end of the autistic Spectrum.
I feel a stronger connection with people like Perelman than the vast majority of my alleged peers, though still not an emotional one. People like Perelman have a more instinctive grasp of ethics than any neurotypical types. Another rather well-known person who I would consider very similar (if just a bit more social) is Craig Newmark, of Craigslist.org fame. Wired Magazine had what I thought was a very telling article about Newmark and his Aspie "eccentricities".
Eccentricities or not, if the rest of the world were to (voluntarily) take lessons from the ethics of those two men, the Earth would be a dramatically different place, indeed.
I guess I have to be more than a little skeptical of the opinion of someone who's only built up a view of someone based on hearsay. Trying to spin this like it's an advantage is at best self deception. Maybe it's an advantage because you get to make more stuff up, but it's certainly no advantage in actually trying to understand the person, or honestly convey who they are.
I don't really blame the guy for not wanting to talk to journalists. With few exceptions, journalists don't represent the interests of the truth, (and most certainly not YOUR interests). Generally they're trying to sell some eyeballs, and you're the bait. Gessen talks about how the when you interview someone you're always fighting their own perception of them self. That may be true (though I'm not sure it's exactly a negotiation as much as it is an integration). When you read a journalists biography, you're constantly fighting what the journalist might have thought was the most interesting story to tell, (as opposed to the most accurate one).
AccountKiller
This is a universal affliction among mathematicians I've known. They tend to look at the world mathematically, and aren't really able to understand things they can't reduce to an equation. This leads to a very black and white view of the world, where things must be a certain way, and anything that doesn't fall into that worldview is just wrong. Everything that people do must have a rational reason, and if they can't find one they will construct a reason that seems rational to them--regardless of how simplistic it is, or how dim a view of their fellow human beings it leads them to.
Mathematicians, by and large, tend to be very unhappy people in my experience. Not all of them, of course. Some mathematicians have a certain "spark" that allows them to abandon mathematics temporarily and give themselves over to the pleasure of an interpersonal relationship; but even so it is still against their nature to do so, and they will always slip back into the comfort of a mathematical outlook sooner or later.
I suspect that extraordinary skill in mathematics is not the cause of such a personality, but rather they are both common effects of some psychological variation that simply causes such people to perceive the world in a particular way.
whose work was robbed by the Chinese paper publishing cottage industry? The one where the Chinese students who are of the wrong sex and not pretty are writing the papers, and their professor takes credit?
Perelman's proof is fairly skeletal, though most/all now agree it contains all the required components and enough of a sketch of the missing details. However,some Chinese mathematicians (Cao and Zhu) filled in some of the details in a massive 300-page journal article. A famous Chinese mathematician, Shing-Tung Yao, was accused of promoting the Cao-Zhu article as the real proof, and taking away credit rightfully due to Perelman. There were other shenanigans alleged on both sides.
To some extent it comes down to a question of insight vs. work, with some on the Chinese mathematicians' side claiming that Perelman basically came up with the high-level breakthrough, but didn't follow through with the work to actually prove the theorem, which they claim is non-trivial--- and so the credit for the proof should go to Cao-Zhu, while Perelman gets credit for coming up with the major ideas that inspired the proof. Others view Perelman as essentially coming up with the proof.
Here's a brief bloggy summary with some links.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Well, by all means then, master, please enlighten me. How is refusing either lucrative positions or the prize in his particular context somehow ethically praiseworthy rather than simply eccentric?
FTFA:
What do you think the future holds for Perelman?
Some people who are very fond of him have speculated that when he is finally awarded the Millennium Prize, he will come out of hiding, claim his just reward, and perhaps reveal that he never really abandoned mathematics. It’s a wonderful but unlikely scenario. The commercialization of mathematics offends him. He was deeply hurt by the many generous offers he received from U.S. universities after he published his proof. He apparently felt he had made a contribution that was far greater than any amount of money—and rather than express their appreciation in appropriately mathematical ways, by studying his proof and working to understand it—they were trying to take a shortcut and basically pay him off. By the same token, the million dollars will probably offend him. I don’t think we will be hearing from Perelman again.
Thank you for posting that. I surprised myself having made it through all 11 pages, but it was well written and highly interesting. I know it happens in all fields, but it was entertaining (if a bit sad) about the infighting that occurs in ground breaking mathematics.
Anonymous cause I modded you up,
-Tynin
Well, I did RTFA. His view that the commercialization of math is somehow wrong, that money is an offensive form of compensation for mathematical success, is idiosyncratic but not especially insightful ethically (if it's not outright mistaken); I wouldn't call it genius of moral philosophy. People will study and try to understand his proof, regardless of whether or not he takes a position teaching it; there's even a good argument to be made that he, the one person who clearly understands his proof, could do much good by accepting a position at a prestigious university because then he can help others to study and understand it.
I'm not saying he's a bad person. I'm saying his position on money and math is very narrow and eccentric. I don't see how this corresponds to ethical genius. You clearly do. Please explain it to me.
Anyone who loves or hates any language, platform, or manufacturer, doesn't know what they're talking about.
Yeah, and I think C (and all its derivatives) went the wrong route. The single "=" should have been comparison, and something else (like ":=") should have been assignment. I think that's logically cleaner, and gets along nicer with mathematics.
Well, by all means then, master, please enlighten me. How is refusing either lucrative positions or the prize in his particular context somehow ethically praiseworthy rather than simply eccentric?
From an article on the New Yorker, I think it sums it up better than TFA:
Perelman repeatedly said that he had retired from the mathematics community and no longer considered himself a professional mathematician. He mentioned a dispute that he had had years earlier with a collaborator over how to credit the author of a particular proof, and said that he was dismayed by the discipline’s lax ethics. “It is not people who break ethical standards who are regarded as aliens,” he said. “It is people like me who are isolated.” We asked him whether he had read Cao and Zhu’s paper. “It is not clear to me what new contribution did they make,” he said. “Apparently, Zhu did not quite understand the argument and reworked it.” As for Yau, Perelman said, “I can’t say I’m outraged. Other people do worse. Of course, there are many mathematicians who are more or less honest. But almost all of them are conformists. They are more or less honest, but they tolerate those who are not honest.”
Then another bit at the very end of The New Yorker:
Mikhail Gromov, the Russian geometer, said that he understood Perelman’s logic: “To do great work, you have to have a pure mind. You can think only about the mathematics. Everything else is human weakness. Accepting prizes is showing weakness.” Others might view Perelman’s refusal to accept a Fields as arrogant, Gromov said, but his principles are admirable. “The ideal scientist does science and cares about nothing else,” he said. “He wants to live this ideal. Now, I don’t think he really lives on this ideal plane. But he wants to.”
If you still do not understand why his refusal to accept the money, I'm not sure I can help you. Somethings are greater than any amount of money.
-Tynin
http://englishrussia.com/?p=998
Lots of people refuse to give public interviews yet don't end up with stories like this. He's turned down a major prize and a million dollars, meaning he doesn't want recognition or money. It's one thing to not talk to journalists or a big conference, but if you're not talking to anyone you have and will develop major issues. All it'd take to dismiss this is for some good friends and colleagues to come forward and say he's a nice guy who doesn't want attention and would like to keep his personal life private, so thanks but no thanks.
Instead, he really does sound like the kind of obsessive shut-in who isn't coping very well with the world not working like mathematics. I remember seeing a TV show about people with heavy OCDs, it was quite amazing how stuck they could be because they couldn't decide or needed perfection or just spent all day going through rituals to the point of doing nothing else. This might be one of those persons that in a very few ways are not just functional but exceptional while otherwise just like them. I'm not saying there's proof to say that, just that I believe it to be possible.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Want not to read = you have a desire to leave the book unread
Not want to read = you don't have a desire to read the book
So if you're feeling neutral about the whole thing, the second one fits but not the first.
Now, when I become a very conspicuous person, I cannot stay a pet and say nothing. That is why I had to quit.” We asked Perelman whether, by refusing the Fields and withdrawing from his profession, he was eliminating any possibility of influencing the discipline. “I am not a politician!” he replied, angrily.
It is clear that he is hurt by the backstabbing politics and lack of ethics (as he perceives it) that have corrupted mathematics. He seems more like an artist entirely dedicated to his craft; the Greta Garbo comparison somewhere above fits well.
He is raging coz others (in particular Yau) tried to (and to a certain extent succeed) take credit for his work. Instead of issuing a proper and deserved smack-down to these people he just hides. He is refusing the prizes as a protest against the lack of ethics in the mathematical community. In his mind he believes this demonstrates how he is totally committed to mathematics, and that only. Given that he was quite happy to accept prizes before and didn't feel that interfered with his work I suspect this is his way of raging as he is personality wise unsuited to direct confrontation.
Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
and you've had a happy lives. the people he describes are 1) smarter than you or 2) had it tough emotionally
1) you don't know me, and 2) I'm sorry for them.
I've worked or studied at a variety of places: large state schools, smaller private schools, and in between. I've worked at one of the top five math departments in the country. I've met a lot of mathematicians, from ordinary to world-class. This is just to give you an idea where I'm coming from.
Why do you think people who are smart or good at math must be emotionally or socially troubled?
The original poster said:
This is a universal affliction among mathematicians I've known.
I'm just trying to provide a different perspective.
If you still do not understand why his refusal to accept the money, I'm not sure I can help you.
Who said anything about understanding? He stated his reasons, we understand them. Instead, I too am curious what makes his refusal ethically significant to you. While your selected quotes indicate a consistent and logical approach to ethics (barring that Perelman's characterization of mathematics as a dishonest culture isn't nuanced and may even be self-serving), we also have a quote from another reply at your level:
The commercialization of mathematics offends him. He was deeply hurt by the many generous offers he received from U.S. universities after he published his proof. He apparently felt he had made a contribution that was far greater than any amount of money--and rather than express their appreciation in appropriately mathematical ways, by studying his proof and working to understand it--they were trying to take a shortcut and basically pay him off. By the same token, the million dollars will probably offend him. I don't think we will be hearing from Perelman again.
Assuming that characterization is correct, then it's not fair on Perelman's part to dictate what other peoples' perception of a reward should be. For example, what sort of communication did he make with the outside world to curb those job offers? How are they supposed to read his mind and determine what he wants for recognition? This sounds a lot like spite (as a strategy of altruism, I apologize for the connotation), sacrificing benefits both to yourself and others in order to harm someone in particular. While there can be ethical versions of spite, this seems more driven by pride than by some ethical standard.
Finally, I don't have the ability to distinguish between an eccentric ethical system which is poorly communicated to me and a system of rationalization to avoid something the holder fears or dislikes. This could be a sophisticated ethical system or it could be sour grapes.
I'm not saying there's proof to say that, just that I believe it to be possible.
Maybe, who's to say? All we have is a few words from a journalist who's never actually talked to the man.
AccountKiller
If nothing else he could give it to a charity that helps children who have a gift in Math.
Just in that limited context that you mention, that could seem plausible, but the larger context of his life screams otherwise: his limited social engagement, his obsession with both math and music, his social and moral rigidity, his inability to adapt... those are all trademark clues. It's the sum of his behaviors that gives it away, not any one of them taken singularly.
Another person I'd suggest is a close parallel: John Draper, aka Cap'n Crunch.
I doubleunwant toread letterspeak.
I had but a simple dream, to destroy all humans.
Because he didn't have a good agent... And he is motivated by a self-destructive personal ethics, as opposed to Garbo, who didn't want to be alone as much as she simply wanted to be let alone, and pursued seclusion as a conscious strategy to maintain a certain lifestyle. As the TFA states, he got offers from all over the world to be paid handsomely to teach and do maths, but he rejected them all, because he thinks getting paid to do work is some sort of prostitution.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
I feel a stronger connection with people like Perelman than the vast majority of my alleged peers, though still not an emotional one. People like Perelman have a more instinctive grasp of ethics than any neurotypical types.
Actually it's called obsessive-compulsive personality disorder. It's not any genuinely thought-out ethics, it's a rigid, reflexive narcissistic dogmatism that is unpleasant to deal with.
That's a curious thing to say. I thought his explanations of his motives seemed rather well thought-out, frankly, and I suspect he left out quite a bit of the thought that went into it. I'm also not at all convinced that your alternative diagnosis is the correct one.
So you're saying that people with OCPD cannot be ethical? That seems quite a stretch, regardless whether it even applies to Perelman or not.
Albert Einstein is the most well-known example of an eccentric genius. Grigory Perelman is another example. So is Claude Shannon, the "father" of communications theory.
Yet another example will likely be Burkhard Heim. He formulated the mathematics for warp-drive, and the Department of Defense is actively studying his work in an attempt to build a prototype of a warp-drive engine.
Because the field of mathematics has too many toxic personalities (such as the Chinese maths guy who tried to defraud Perelman of credit) and because the maths should be an object of beauty in itself, the personalities who uncover it are merely the instruments by which the maths is revealed. If you go to a museum, do you look with amazement at the ancient works of wonder, or do you look at the collection of 1920s trowels? If you are willing to accept that a modern digging tool is nothing compared to what the tool has discovered, then accept Perelman's view that he is nothing compared to the discoveries he has made.
Having said all that, it's b* obvious to anyone with half a brain that Perelman is showing classic signs of Geek Syndrome (Asperger's Syndrome). Personally, I'd suggest he goes to a Buddhist monastary in another country, as meditation alters brain chemistry to reduce the feelings of stress and anxiety. It would also likely be much healthier than living in an environment as chemically polluted as Russia. It'll also keep his brain reasonably agile, should he ever decide to return to maths.
Probably the worst thing he could do is nothing. Sir Conan Doyle's view of a stagnant mind designed to work at high power is that it'll rip itself to shreds. History concurs, for the most part.
Who said anything about understanding?
Actually I was responding to jjohnson, who in his question asked for enlightenment.
He stated his reasons, we understand them.
If you understood them, why are you still asking questions about them?
Instead, I too am curious what makes his refusal ethically significant to you.
Because he refuses to work in a system he feels has been driven by cut throat politics. Because he, with all his eccentricities, was able to reach above all of that and find comfort in a life not dictated by men with agenda's who'd smile while sticking a dagger in your back for a place in history.
While your selected quotes indicate a consistent and logical approach to ethics (barring that Perelman's characterization of mathematics as a dishonest culture isn't nuanced and may even be self-serving), we also have a quote from another reply at your level:
The commercialization of mathematics offends him. He was deeply hurt by the many generous offers he received from U.S. universities after he published his proof. He apparently felt he had made a contribution that was far greater than any amount of money--and rather than express their appreciation in appropriately mathematical ways, by studying his proof and working to understand it--they were trying to take a shortcut and basically pay him off. By the same token, the million dollars will probably offend him. I don't think we will be hearing from Perelman again.
That quote is taken by the author of TFA who admittedly has never spoken with Perelman. What I've read from Perelman was taken by sources with whom he did speak with, and in them I found nothing about his disdain over the perception of being bought off. Perhaps that is just creative writing on the part of TFA, or maybe it is the truth, but I cannot tell. From my readings I took from it that it was his belief that math isn't something that should need a monetary reward, that the simple discovery of a new proof and the recognition that automatically goes with it are more than enough. It is a rare day we get to advance the knowledge of mankind, and he did so in a noble fashion, all the while his peers (Yau, Cao, and Zhu) worked hard to take the credit.
Assuming that characterization is correct, then it's not fair on Perelman's part to dictate what other peoples' perception of a reward should be.
I don't believe he tried to push his views on the world. When they tried to give him the Fields metal, they spent weeks trying to talk him into it, they even gave him three options; accept and come; accept and don’t come, and they'd send the medal later; third, I don’t accept the prize. From the very beginning, he told them he didn't accept. He didn't tell them that the prize and those that accept it were his lessers, just that he did not want it. He felt that if the proof was correct, that was all then he needed with no further recognition.
For example, what sort of communication did he make with the outside world to curb those job offers? How are they supposed to read his mind and determine what he wants for recognition?
This sounds a lot like a problem that will work itself out naturally. Why should a winner of a contest/prize have to announce to the world their intentions and how they'd like to be recognized? These people, companies, universities came to him, he has no responsibility to anyone to even return their calls as it were.
This sounds a lot like spite (as a strategy of altruism, I apologize for the connotation), sacrificing benefits both to yourself and others in order to harm someone in particular. While there can be ethical versions of spite, this seems more driven by pride than by some ethical standard. Finally, I don't have the ability to distinguish between an eccentric ethical system wh
I'm not saying he's a bad person. I'm saying his position on money and math is very narrow and eccentric. I don't see how this corresponds to ethical genius. You clearly do. Please explain it to me.
Global warming.
Look at how many dollars are being sent towards that. How much certain political agendas are spending to have guys in white coats say what whey wish them to say. And now the issue is so muddied nobody can say for certain what the facts actually are. Money and science are occasionally poor bedfellows. And getting paid puts you in someone's pocket.
That seems like the antithesis of this guy. Money and truth are very nearly orthogonal - he knows this. So he doesn't wish to have the shadow of someone else's influence over his work. He wishes it to be pure math and nothing else.
It's inspiring, actually.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Ah, and how about we use \/ for OR and /\ for AND. Oh the world will be a better place! || and &&, we spit on you!
Maybe he didn't stop "doing" math, maybe he just stopped publishing math? A mind like his probably sees math in everything he senses..
Have you fscked your local propeller head today?
More to the point, he is willing to speak out on bad ethics in math, and VERY few mathematicians do so. Whether it is due to conformity, as he says, or a more complex reason, I cannot say. But he is correct that the open nature of math goes along with a lot of questionable crediting of work. Sometimes it is just people trying to make a difficult academic situation function. The subject has become so vast that students have a hard time reaching competence by the end of their PhD's. (Physics has a more regularized system of post-docs.) And full supervision of dissertations becomes lax: other faculty are too specialized and too busy and too lazy. Add to these more or less well-meaning types of lapses actual greedy chicanery and it all becomes rather unpleasant.
There have been worse times in math. The competition for jobs in the 1930s was brutal, and professors were expected (to some extent) to appear mean, not nice as now. But our period has its peculiar frustrations. You almost cannot exaggerate the vastness of published work these days, something which has happened across academia, but causes its own particular stresses in math. You will hear mathematicians complain about that, but not so much the ethical problems of which they are well aware.
Maybe it is under control, relative to other disciplines, who knows. But keeping problems in proportion is not a strong suit for many math types!
I insult only those who would needlessly be insulted I suppose. Anyone, regardless of profession, has the right to be paid for their work. Perelman was given the offer to be paid, but he took the road less traveled, opting to give something he took from his mind and share it with the world freely. I guess it is things like this that got me into the Open Source movement, because money shouldn't always be the motivation. Sometimes giving something to the community, something that you toiled away on for a huge portion of your life creates a better world for tomorrow. Anyone that wants a life of luxury has a good chance of getting it if they put in the time. I am of the belief that those that put in the time to become masters of a field, and then give selflessly back to the world, should be celebrated as they are a rarity. All of humanity is richer for their efforts regardless of the motivation of the selfless giver.
I'm not sure why you felt insulted, as I feel you've insulted a large number of great minds when you assumed that money should be the primary goal in any effort worth dedicating yourself to.
Please mod parent up. I am an assistant professor in a university and this is what I have observed. The dishonesty in science has reached unprecedented level, especially because today's scientific work is so associated with politics and money.
There are professors in high places who claim authorship to papers that are way beyond their capability (thanks to their post-docs). There are faculty members who place the ability to obtain grants above all other research qualities. There are dubious papers being published in good venues simply because authors of the papers "know people".
These things happen because today scientists are more into personal gain than scientific truth. The point is, scientific truth often conflicts with personal gain. (Compare this to economy, where a market where everybody is driven by personal gain resulted in an extremely dishonest system.)
Perelman's position makes perfect sense in such a backdrop.
As for the reward he wants? All post-docs to rise and revolt against their dishonest professors, and take back science from those who are not interested in it.
Other than Mathmatica? WHO/
Pascal.
This is my sig.
It's thinking like this that brought us a world where people assume doctors are greedy bastards if they want a high-end salary for 12 years of soul-crushing education
From what I've seen, its the influence of money and ego that has made medical school as expensive and soul crushing as it is. In many ways its less about turning out good doctors, and more about maintaining the position and wealth of those who are higher up on the pyramid. If the motives that shape the training were different, it would still be a long period of very hard work, but would yield more of the kind of enjoyment that hard work and learning bring.
Except of course for those who are in it more for the money.
In fact, the very reason that the backslash was added to ASCII was so ALGOL could use the /\ and \/ operators.
At one time, crotchety old men could be grumps and misanthropes without being slapped with a label, assumed to be suffering from some syndrome that could be treated if only the appropriate amount of money is paid to Pfizer.
And what makes you believe that a bunch of Buddhists would even accept an outsider like this? Do monasteries exist just so worldly people can go in retreat for a few years?
You do know that the "high power" mind of Sir Conan Doyle believed wholeheartedly in fairies? "History concurs", my ass!
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
IME, the more beautiful you believe something to be, the more offended you are at the idea that it can be boxed up and sold.
>You do know that the "high power" mind of Sir Conan Doyle believed wholeheartedly in fairies? "History concurs", my ass!
That's a bit of a bad juxtaposition. Conan Doyle only started believing in mysticism in his old age, after the death of his wife - and it is widely believed that his "conversion" was a reaction to severe depression and PTSD.
That is a very different time in his life compared to the man who practically invented the idea of using science to solve crimes. Just reread chapter one of "A study in scarlet" sometime and remember that this was written several decades before the first forensic department opened it's doors, not to mention that his character's habit of deducing details about people from their appearance and mannerisms has a striking parallel to modern criminal profiling.
So yes, Conan Doyle was a highly intelligent and scientifically minded person, who also happened to be a skillfull and entertaining author - sounds like a pretty high-powered mind to me. That he abandoned this out of a desperate longing for dead person, and with it a desperate desire to believe that there was some way to contact her does not change this. Such things happen to the best.
Newton became a mystic in his older years too - and dedicated much of his last years to the study of alchemy, at a time when the rest of the world were already quite busy abandoning it. The man who set us on the route to understanding the universe as obeying laws which can be explained in maths more than anybody else, genuinely believed that the combination of elements can be affected by spirits.
Houdini, after a similar personal loss, went to see a "psychic". Being an expert illusionist, he recognized her fraud quite easily and in anger spent the greater part of his remaining life on an unprofitable and unpopular quest to find and expose fraudulent spiritualists. In this case, his disillusionment ripped him towards a new path of logic, but he only got on it because he was about to abandon it first.
In short, the philosopause happens - it does not negate the work done in a man's life that, being only human, old age can weaken old resolves.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
The other Anon Coward who replied to you did a fine enough job dissecting your arguments; I wouldn't have even bothered. Do you honestly find your arguments valid? They sound to me like the result of someone trying to hang onto a few cherished delusions. I do wanna respond directly to this bit of self-delusion, though:
You're incorrect. "Earning money" can be grossly unethical. Do you not understand that we live on a planet with finite resources, and that it is those resources that underwrite money? If someone is getting wealthy, he's doing it at the expense of a certain number of others: he's hoarding resources and depriving others of the use of those resources. In getting wealthy, that person is disadvantaging others. The wealthier the person is, the more people he had to disadvantage to achieve it. Warren Buffet understands and acknowledges this dynamic... why don't you?
In an ethical economy, the goal is for every transaction to be an equal exchange of value; I was actually taught this concept in Business 101, as best I can recall.
By contrast, in a capitalist economy, the goal - as its very name suggests - is to create as much inequality as possible in every transaction. Does that sound fair or ethical to you? Do you have even a modest mental inventory of the manipulative tactics that people employ to that end? Virtually all capitalist tactics used to disadvantage others fall into one of three classes:
That's the capitalist playbook, right there; does that sound ethical to you?
*sigh* And here I thought I had nothing in reply.
Just SOME? Try most....
You didn't mention, though I suspect the thought crossed your mind, that perhaps the reason why Perelman's choices, reasoning, and decisions "offend" others is because HIS behavior sets an example that calls the righteousness of their own behavior into question? If your suggestion is indeed true that Perelman offends others, I propose it's because he's holding a mirror up to the less-than-altruistic behavior of others and forcing them to take a critical look at themselves, perhaps for the first time.
I think we need more people like Grigori Perelman... many, many more.
I was sure you were joking until I checked the WP article. Oops, forgot to check the article history. Ah, yup, you're OK (or clairvoyant)....
Someone should invent a word for the weird feeling you get when you do research to understand a joke and it turns out not to be one.
Wow. You must actually teach a forensic debate course in ad hominem. I'm utterly crushed... crushed, I tell ya, that you would say such awful humiliating things about people with beards. Santa Claus is gonna be really depressed when he gets your letter and finds out that he's ugly.
That was interesting. Thank you. I especially liked the following part:
" . . .along the highway between Beijing and the airport there were "billboards with pictures of Stephen Hawking plastered everywhere."
Now that's cool. I've never had the pleasure of seeing a lecture by Hawking in person. Is it common for someone like him to get this type of publicity ANYWHERE in the U.S. ? Apart from a few tiny posters stapled on campus bulletin boards and taped to light poles, I don't recall seeing any type of real publicity for a public appearance by a scientist, mathematician or engineer. Sad reality.
These things happen because today scientists are more into personal gain than scientific truth. The point is, scientific truth often conflicts with personal gain. (Compare this to economy, where a market where everybody is driven by personal gain resulted in an extremely dishonest system.)
It's amazing how ignorant of ethics and economics, an educated person can get. Sure, the academic environment is a remarkably dishonest environment these days, even compared to the business world (which is where the ignorance comes in). I don't question Perelman's desire to leave the environment. What I questioned in my original post is the mythology surrounding his choice. It doesn't take a lot of brain power to see that there is a fairly rigid class structure in most of academia: tenured professors, non-tenured professors and lecturers, various classes of students, and the rest of the staff. There's also considerable stagnation and silly politics making the environment rather limiting. The environment can be rather stressful, especially if you don't like public speaking or teaching. You can't make a lot of money either. There are plenty of good reasons not to enter that mess that have nothing to do with ethics.
Remember this whole thread started because someone boasted that Perelman had a "more instinctive grasp of ethics" than normal people. Ignoring the minor contradiction that ethics is a reasoned approach to morality not an instinctive one, this still seems a bizarre claim to make. My take is that any ethical logic that Perelman pursues is much easier due to his relative isolation. He has fewer conflicts and distractions to dissuade him from whatever he wants to do. What that means is that while he can still serve as some sort of ethical or moral inspiration for us, it remains that most of us we have difficulties and conflicts in our lives that he doesn't have. I resent the confusion of those issues with some sort of mental inadequacy on our part.
There are actually Buddhist Monasteries, many in South Korea, that will take and train foreigners for extended periods of time.
I know the valued-added arguments well enough, but I don't accept their validity as an excuse for what takes place in capitalism. "Creating" an EMOTIONAL value is fallacious in my opinion, and other than that it's just reorganizing and reshaping matter that already existed. What you're really talking about is trying to put a price on the value of human labor, on the effort or skill required to perform that reshaping of matter, and that always leads to unfair comparisons, doesn't it?
Socialism (true mutualism, not the politicized variety) may be Utopian and impossible to implement given the state of our species, but at least it correctly identified the ethical problems with capitalism.