Asbestblog

Today I read in the entertaining book of math anecdotes assembled by Steven G. Krantz that the following was scribbled on the wall of a New York City subway station: "I have just found a truly marvelous proof of Fermat's Last Theorem. But the train is coming and I don't have time to write it down."

I mean - what have you got to lose?
You know, you come from nothing,
you' re going back to nothing.
What have you lost? Nothing!
(Monty Python)

I always feel ashamed and miserable when I read what happened during the third reich. This page about mathematicians during the third reich gives detailed information about what happened to many famous mathematicians during this inhuman time.

Nach längerer Abstinenz ist mein Blog wieder erreichbar. Zum Jahreswechsel hat mein ursprünglicher Provider sein Geschäft eingestellt und beim Umzug zum neuen ist die Erreichbarkeit des Blogs in Mitleidenschaft gezogen worden. Zum Einen hatte ich ohnehin nicht sonderlich Lust zum Bloggen, zum Anderen war ich bis Ostern gut mit Prüfungsvorbereitung eingespannt, sodass ich mich in der wenigen Freizeit, die mir blieb, nicht mit dem Einrichten/Wiederherstellen des Blogs kümmern wollte. Aber nun funktioniert es ja wieder und es gibt in den kommenden Wochen und Monaten hoffentlich auch Interessantes zu schreiben.

Lieber Augenringe als gar keinen Schmuck!

I was in the beautiful town of Krakow in Poland last weekend.

Was haben Microsoft Windows und Unterseeboote gemeinsam? Sobald man ein Fenster öffnet, fangen die Probleme an.

It's like male geeks don't know how to deal with real live women, so they just assume it's a user interface problem. Not their fault. They'll just wait for the next version to come out - something more "user friendly". (Douglas Coupland - "Microserfs" page 227)

Erster Tag des neues Semesters und ich trete gleich mal auf dem Campus in Hundescheiße.

There is a math film called Dimensions that was made for a wide audience. I have not watched it yet, but it can be downloaded for free and the images on the web page seem very promising. Do not forget that we still have the year of mathematics.

Hier sind zwei Mülleimer, wie man sie manchmal in Berlin sieht. Ich mag die Sprüche.

I was on the Nikolai cemetery in Görlitz. (For example, Jacob Böhme is buried there.) The two photos show a tomb which impressed me because it is simple but beautiful. Alpha and Omega are symbols for god and the unimaginable.

We are made of distances,
We are constantly going further,
Alone and predestined,
Learning slowly,
That stopping is not arriving.
(A.A. Attanasio - "Radix", page 242)

Life is complex - it has both real and imaginary parts.
(Anonymous)

...about the new supercomputer that is so fast that it can do an infinite loop in 2.9 seconds.