User talk:Chan-Ho Suh/archive4

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an archive of old messages. Do not edit this page. Leave me new messages here.

Other archives: Archive1 Archive2 Archive3

Contents 1 Greetings 2 Thanks for comment on my talk page and request 3 JDoorjam's RfA 4 New articles 5 arXiv 6 Kwantus 7 Thanks 8 Thanks (II) 9 Rosalind Franklin 10 Cardinal number 11 Bacon Numbers 12 Apologies 13 thanks 14 Ray Tomes AfDs 15 Reply to your comment on TeX font size in the Village Pump 16 Argh vandalsim 17 Homology sphere 18 Need help 19 Hello 20 Perelman at arXiv 21 is this you? 22 Cornell 23 User boxes 24 Milnor 25 Takuya Kimura 26 Grigori Perelman: topology and Thurston geometries 27 About Dennis DeTurck 28 About Louis de Branges 29 Arf invariant of a knot 30 Sorry about the Sol geometry error on the Geometrization conjecture article 31 CfD

[edit] Greetings

I blocked him about 5 minutes ago; there was quite a lot of vandalism in his history. Thanks for keeping an eye on that article! Antandrus (talk) 16:26, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks for comment on my talk page and request

Could you guys take a moment to update Irishpunktom on marking edits as minor and commenting/discussing reverts? It looks like he is an administrator (so should know how things are supposed to be done), but he reverted me without good reason or appropriate comment and then marked as a minor edit. He didn't respond to a couple of requests to explain the reasons for his revert on his talk page; he did reply to my note that the revert should not have been marked "minor" to say that "all reverts are minor". Hard to assume good faith here. elizmr 18:31, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

sorry for non-working link. try this: Irishpunktom\^talk elizmr 18:44, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Since this is an ongoing discussion on your talk page, I will respond there. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 22:23, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! elizmr 23:53, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] JDoorjam's RfA

[edit] New articles

Yes, I know, I have a project to expand all my new articles. If any are flagged for deletion, I shall of course give them priority. They're all Fellows or overseas members of the Royal Society so are pretty notable. - Newport 12:46, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] arXiv

Hi, I notice you added a "citation needed" tag in the arXiv paper, regarding the claim that some work remains unpublished. However I wonder if any such reference exists or is likely to exist in the future. On the other hand, all one needs to do to check is just to go to the arXiv, and several-year old articles will be found which still do not have a journal reference (and if one is really keen, an ISI search will reveal no publication either), Cheers, Deuar 08:48, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Deuar. Perhaps you did not notice that your last edit changed the claim from actually saying "some work" remains unpublished to a different but related claim; your recent edit changed the statement that "some work" remained unpublished to "with a small fraction of work remaining purely as e-prints and not published in paper peer-reviewed journals." Clearly, as you say, some work does remain unpublished, and some of this is actually very important work also. But the last edit is making an assertion that "a small fraction of work" remains unpublished. I'm not sure if that's even true, or what even "a small fraction" means. Is it less than 20%? 10%? 3%? In the subjects I look at, I get the impression that the percentage of unpublished work might be as much as 10%. That certainly doesn't appear to be "a small fraction" to me! If one has a number, one should use it. Otherwise, the statement is giving the impression of being a rather precise quantitative statement while actually remaining vague. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 15:49, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Ok - now I see your point. I have a similar impression to you, ~10%, but no reference for any precise number, indeed. Since I can't see any reference forthcoming, I've made it less precise and removed the {{citation needed}} Deuar 16:07, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kwantus

Oh, I see you removed the box. Thank you anyway.--Tdxiang 陈 鼎 翔 (Talk)Contributions Chat with Tdxiang on IRC! 10:07, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

Doreme1248(in Chinese wikipedia known as Ilovehk1248) kept adding information based on bias of Falungong into Chinese Wikipedia, so he got blocked. In my opinion, Doreme1248 deserves what he got. I am one of the administrators and also a bureaucrat in the Chinese Wikipedia, and I am from Taiwan, no relationship with the Chinese government or Chinese Communist Party. This matter is totally not related to any censorship from the PRC government. Pubuhan took his action after discussed with several administrators in an online chatting room with no objection. Please don't get mislead by Doreme1248.--zh:User:Theodoranian 18:30, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks (II)

Hi.. thanks for your message ;-) I'm finding a lot less time for Wikipedia all of a sudden... but it's all good! Graham 12:29, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rosalind Franklin

You have contributed to the Rosalind Franklin article in the past. It has recently had a rewrite and been had a request for peer review. Your comments would be appreciated. Alun 14:04, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

I'll take a look, but I don't really have time to do much. If I see something that really sticks out, I'll make a remark at the peer review page. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 13:51, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cardinal number

In Talk:Cardinal number, you mentioned that there were other mathematical cultures (apart from the Jains) which derived concepts that have a direct bearing on cardinal numbers. I am quite interested in finding out about which other cultures derived such concepts and some examples of their works. Thanks. Jagged 23:37, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

I would suggest trying the usual history of science, math, etc., journals in addition to more specific sources, such as books on Chinese and Japanese mathematics. The other cultures I was thinking of were the ancient Greeks, Chinese, and Edo-era Japanese. For example, even though the mathematics developed by Cantor and his contemporaries were clearly very influenced by the Greeks (in addition to of course, influences from the Middle East and India), it's been believed by many historians that Cantor's concepts diverged from the previous Greek tradition. However, more recently, work by for example, Reviel Netz, a scholar of Archimedes, based on newly deciphered lost manuscripts, suggests that some Greeks, such as Archimedes, did in fact consider a kind of "transfinite" arithmetic, although it's unclear how similar their work is to Cantor's, or how extensively it was researched.

As for the Japanese, before the Meiji restoration, there was a thriving form of Japanese mathematics called Wasan, with notable figures such as Seki Kowa. This tradition was heavily influenced by Chinese texts. Seki is thought to have formulated some of the mathematics of infinitesimal calculus, before Newton. His work on infinite series clearly has some bearing on what constitutes a number, the size of a number, and also infinity as a number. I found, through Google, that a student of his, Takebe also wrote some stuff dealing with "types" of infinity that arose in Wasan. I think Wasan has been written about frequently in the literature (I found many articles using MathSciNet), so it shouldn't be hard to dig up sources for this and more info. Hope that helps! --Chan-Ho (Talk) 13:49, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bacon Numbers

I mistyped when I wrote that section, and I meant to type Christopher Lee. My information is from late 2003, but from the same site, so I guess that yours is more accurate. Jared W!!! | Write to me, why don't you? 11:04, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Apologies

Dear Chan-Ho Suh,

I must apologize for the comments left on the Hyperbolic 3-manifold page. The comments were not left by me; I use a shared computer and I forgot to log off of Wikipedia last time...so someone (who will remain nameless at this time) went Red-link-Removal crazy and was unbelievably rude while using my account. The problem has been dealt with, and I must apologize for the comments.

Sincerely,

Sam Swicegood AKA Porphyric Hemophiliac ^{(Contribs/Talk)}

Ok, no problem. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 23:23, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] thanks

Dmharvey 23:19, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

No need to thank me! Just part of the normal day-to-day on Wikipedia :-) --Chan-Ho (Talk) 23:23, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ray Tomes AfDs

Hi, Chan-Ho, I think you goofed; from your comment I think that you meant to vote keep in the Edward R. Dewey AfD and to vote delete in the AfD of Cycle Theory/Cycles Research Institute/Unified Theory of Cycles and in the AfD on The Foundation for the Study of Cycles! (Pretty much what I've done myself.) I know it is confusing having three AfD's, but unfortunately the nominator munged the scope of the first AfD at the outset, which is why I reinstated the other two.---CH 03:51, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Dear Chan-Ho, best wishes! Have a good time! The Four of Erkabo 17:45, 2 May 2006 (UTC) - especially Rolf

[edit] Reply to your comment on TeX font size in the Village Pump

Just want to let you know that I responded to your comment on TeX font size in the Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#Text_Font_ Size - mbeychok 18:59, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Argh vandalsim

Thanks for the revert on my user page Kevin_b_er 01:01, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Homology sphere

I reworded some of your work on a construction of the Poincaré sphere at Homology sphere and I wanted to make sure it is still factually accurate. If not, feel free to do what you think is necessary. In other words, I won't be offended by a revert. Originalbigj 03:12, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The wording has been somewhat improved, so I didn't do a complete revert. But there are a few things that were not satisfactory, which I changed. Mentioning "orientation preserving" is unnecessary verbage since the next sentence explicitly describes the gluing. Second, it's important to mention the amount of twisting in gluing the faces; the result depends on it. Finally, thinking of it as one pair of gluings as a time, I don't think is more helpful, and might be confusing to people trying to imagine what the space looks like after the first gluing. Anyway, keeping these things in mind, feel free to reword things to your satisfaction. You may also want to look at and improve a similar description of a related space at Seifert-Weber space. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 04:21, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Need help

Could you help? This G. Patrick Maxwell article seems to be intended as advertisement, or a CV. The paragraph and the sentence Jossie included keeps getting deleted. "Recognition" about being a visiting professor (this is worthy of a bio????) is not only in its own section but was added to the main page. The anon author (who is Rob) does not explain the changes or the edits but merely changes them.

I used to have a t-shirt that said "Topologists twist the facts" MollyBloom 16:19, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I haven't been editing very much recently, and it's going to be like that for quite a bit longer. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 04:06, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hello

Hi Chan-Ho, I've noticed since I've been here that we have some common interests. In fact, we may have met at the topology conference at UT Austin a while back. I went to lunch once with some California people at Texadelphia during that conference - were you one? I would put my name on your LDT list but I haven't even started writing my thesis yet.. Anyway, I like what you're doing here (especially with straightening out the wackos at the Poincare conjecture talk page). Orthografer 03:46, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi! Yes, I remember that. I wouldn't worry about being pre-thesis, but if you don't want to add your name that's fine. You may want to add your name to the list of participants at WikiProject Mathematics if you haven't already. The talk page for the project is a good place to discuss matters with other people involved in editing mathematics on Wikipedia. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 12:20, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Perelman at arXiv

Please check the three arXiv 'Ricci Flow' PDF's by Perelman: all three have "May 21, 2006" as date printed under the heading.

Re "the main result of the 3rd paper has already been reproven differently and published in Journal of the American Mathematical Socieety." - could you then please give exact reference (issue, date, name of article) of the Journal of the American Mathematical Society that elaborated on the topic? And also, please, give a rendering of what was asserted in that publication regarding the Poincaré conjecture there and then. If you've got trouble citing sources for assertions, see WP:CITE on how to proceed. --Francis Schonken 13:07, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

I think you are confused as to the printed date on the pdfs you downloaded and the actual submission and revision dates. The date on the pdf is a result of the last time the pdf was generated form the TeX source which contains a date command. The actual dates for which you can tell Perelman uploaded something is on the abstract page for the article. And I see no such revision dates. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 13:56, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

No worries, everything I said in my quoted comment can certainly be easily backed up. See [1]] for information on the JAMS article. The abstract says "We show that the Ricci flow becomes extinct in finite time on any Riemannian -manifold without aspherical summands." This is the main result of Perelman's 3rd preprint. In their introduction, Colding and Minicozzi explain that even though Perelman's preprint appeared slightly before they had finished their work, they feel their "slightly different approach may be of some interest". --Chan-Ho (Talk) 14:00, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm a little puzzled by your demand for a "rendering". I never asserted that publication asserted anything about the Poincare Conjecture. Certainly any expert reading that paper would realize that it relies on certain key results in Perelman's first two preprints (referenced at various points of the paper) and that given the validity of those key results, that paper does in fact finish off the conjecture. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 14:08, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] is this you?

Is this vote at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Regular number you? Is it a joke, or what? -lethe ^{talk +} 05:22, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

OF COURSE. It's extreme sarcasm. (Even if Chan-Ho didn't write it.) When I moved from Australia to the US, one of the biggest cultural differences that hit me like a ton of bricks, something I completely didn't expect, is that people don't expect irony. In Australia you can talk bullshit to a complete stranger and they totally know where you're coming from, they don't get offended or confused or anything, they join right in. In the US people do a double-take, and sometimes even get offended. Now after three years here, my bullshit detector is a bit blunted, but I still hear a feeble siren from time to time... (Chan-Ho, did you grow up in the US?) Dmharvey 10:54, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Well I'm not international enough to know about cultural differences, but I can tell you that I sometimes miss obvious sarcasm from my more cynical american friends, so I must be particularly bad at it. But whatever, anyway, in this case I did initially suspect sarcasm, but some others asked about it so I thought best be sure. It's probably harder to recognize through a text based internet medium. Dmharvey's assurances have certainly placated me though. -lethe ^{talk +} 18:15, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

A joke? Are you so stuck inside your own Weltanschauung that others' opinions appear to be mere humor to you? I'm affronted. EXTREMELY so. And I'm gonna tell your mummy what a naughty child she raised! --Chan-Ho (Talk) 16:26, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm.... a clue.... I thought americans say "mommy".... or is it a double bluff....? Dmharvey 01:30, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't call it a clue :-) Anyway, in response to your questions, if you look at my real webpage there's some personal info that should clear things up. Interesting observation about the cultural differences, but I don't know how accurate it is or relevant it is here. There might be an issue of culture, but I think more an issue of "Wikipedia culture". I left enough clues, and it may be that Wikipedia denizens (as compared to Usenet ones, for example) aren't used to picking up such clues. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 14:15, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

HELP! Australians are holding me hostage in Utah! They hacked my account! Gotta go now, they

[edit] Cornell

I have just started WikiProject Cornell University, an attempt to thoroughly cover topics related to Cornell. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks. Thanks! —mercuryboard^talk 05:20, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User boxes

{{User PurePwnage}}

LAWL BOOM! Headshot! This user watches Pure Pwnage.

You may enjoy this user box on your use page! Thanks for all your help to the wikipedia! This is a friendly thank you! :) --DragonWR12LB 19:41, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with PurePwnage, except in passing. I thank you for your kind words, but a bit cynically, I can't help but wonder if this has anything to do with the template being up for deletion. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 17:56, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Milnor

Dear Chan-Ho Suh -- I noticed that on Milnor's page you wrote that there are 15 exotic spheres in dimension 7 and there are 28 when orientation is kept track of. I am wondering if this is a typo? Surely 14 is correct here? (Ie one half of 28). If it is not correct, could you explain what it is I am obviously missing??? Best, Sam nead 02:45, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi Sam. I don't mean to be pedantic here, but let's avoid some confusion. The page actually says there are 14 exotic spheres in dimension 7. The standard one isn't considered "exotic", right? So the way the article is written, there are 15 total smooth structures neglecting orientation. And yes, it really is 15, not 14.

Why? Well consider that the standard sphere with its two orientations gives only one differentiable structure. If you consider oriented structures, then the equivalence must be by orientation preserving diffeomorphism. But then the antipodal map is an orientation preserving way to go from one orientation to the other. There is also an exotic sphere that has orientation reversing diffeomorphism. All the others don't! That means that orienting them actually gives extra smooth structures.

You are making a small mistake here -- The antipodal map is orientation preserving in odd dimensions. (Think -- it can be obtained as the product of an even number of reflections. A reflection is always orientation reversing.) The antipodal map is orientation reversing in even dimensions. I guess if I replace "antipodal map" by "reflection" in what you are saying above then I follow you. It does make my head hurt, however.

Oops! Hehe, yeah, you got me. "Antipodal" should be replaced by "reflection". Anyway, the point is that an exotic 7-sphere does not necessarily have an orientation reversing diffeomorphism. Weird, eh? Actually, in Milnor's original paper "On manifolds homeomorphic to the 7-sphere" that's how he shows the spheres he constructed are exotic. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 05:23, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

So you don't really want 24/2; you want 2 + 26/2. What's going on is this. Consider the group of (smooth) h-cobordism classes of (smooth) homotopy 7-spheres under the operation of connected sum. This can be considered the group of oriented differential structures of the 7-sphere, and is (isomorphic to) the integers mod 28. This group has the interesting property that an element's inverse is obtained by reversing orientation. So 0 and 14 are the only elements that are their own inverse.

I skimmed the paper (Part I) last night, but I didn't understand it. I've looked again today and I think I follow the outline now, per your remarks.

So I haven't studied this, but that's about all I know about this stuff. You can check the Kervaire-Milnor paper to verify the above statements. I haven't seen you edit much lately...I guess you are busy? Regards, Chan-Ho (Talk) 13:44, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I will add a version of your remarks to the page. If I found it confusing then maybe others will. (To be honest, when I first saw the "15" instead of a "14" I assumed it was subtle vandalism.) As for your question: I am pretty much always busy -- also, my wife scolds me when I spend too much time editing (thank god.) best, Sam nead 21:29, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Takuya Kimura

I don't think I can make anymore contributions to this page anymore. Try to make it NPOV in whatever ways you see fit. I think you might be able to change the tone. mirageinred 06:06, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I made some edits. I also removed the tags as I think the major issues are gone. Of course, there are always improvements that can be made. If you're interested in polishing the article and getting other perspectives, you can try Wikipedia:Peer review. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 03:34, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Grigori Perelman: topology and Thurston geometries

You are right that strictly speaking I oversimplified, but since this is an article for a layperson, I think my version is more comprehensible and less misleading in a wider sense.---CH 00:49, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. I don't see how referring to different flavors of geometry as topologies makes it more comprehensible to laypeople. I would guess each wording speaks about the same to someone who has little experience with different geometries or topologies. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 01:03, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] About Dennis DeTurck

Dr. DeTurck was prof of mine. I have much respect for him. But I have many ofher prof at UPenn I like very much. Why is it alright that this article be so small about Dr. DeTurck? Where did he get degrees? Why is article on Dr. Wenocur being deleted? Why is Dr. Zanutto's article gone? It was there a few days ago when I looked. I had them for stats. I do not understand what happens with Wikipedia articles? Whyy are some here, and others are gone or going away? It sseem to me that Dr. Zanutto and Dr. Wenocur good mathematicians, too. Can you explain? Dr. DeTurck is Dennis DeTurck and Dr. Zanutto is Elaine Zanutto and her article is gone and Dr. Wenocur is Roberta Wenocur and people are fighting that she is not worth article. Do you know? Philly Student 23:35, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Gee, your new account and focus on these people would make me suspect you are really a sockpuppet of User:MathStatWoman. I don't wish to get involved in whatever games you are playing, but please don't vandalize the DeTurck article. DeTurck is definitely a notable mathematician and although you were successful in having his rather crappy previous stub speedy-deleted, I doubt that will work now. If you want it deleted (for whatever agenda), you can always put it up for AFD. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 00:04, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] About Louis de Branges

Dear Mr. Chan-Ho,

Please see my post on the discussion page. After having posted it, I saw that I had committed unfair mistakes on saying that the history of the page had been erased (now I see that it is impossible to do so; I had mistakenly checked the history of the discussion page). I meekly accept the mistake and apologize for this rather uncivil outburst. However, I still believe my edits have not been a violation for the very reasons I posed there. There was no malice, either on mine or naturally on your part. My declarations on speciousness and superficiality, by which I stand, are not to be taken as personal. I know I cannot reverse the post now, and that I ought not not to have been transported with my rage at seeing my long effort apparently thwarted. I shall be more careful in the future. The personal comments on the nature of the editor fall just short of libel and my punishment is going to be the infamy of having them published there. If you would like, I will post an apology there and shut my garrulous mouth for good. Still, I am intent on reverting the article to its original form for the reasons I stated, but I would be most pleased to know your opinion on the matter. Again, I am very sorry to have fallen prey of emotion. Will you ever forgive me?

Faithfully yours.

Please do not worry about having offended me. First, I saw this message before your article talk page comments, and secondly, I think overall your comments are written in a measured fashion. I will respond to some of your concerns on the article talk page. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 14:33, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your understanding, it was a great relief to me to know I had not piqued you. May I add, just before we begin to discuss it, one thing I had forgotten to mention in that comment. When I moved superfluous information on de Branges1 from the Riemann Hypothesis artcile, this was supported by other regulars in the mathematical domain of Wikipedia, such as Jitse Nielsen. Furthermore, people have edited the article on de Branges before without opposing its general tone, so my edits have gone by no means unperceived by fellow wikipedians. In a more platonic note, I must say that Wikipedia may have to face a decision in the future, as far as biographies of living persons are concerned. Paper-based encyclopaedias are, as stated in the five pillars, roughly divided into two kinds: general and specialized. I may agree with you that my previous work would have been considered superfluous or inadequate for a general encyclopaedia, but they fit perfectly in the "human interest" profile of specialized biographical works, if we put aside the arguably biased scraps I mentioned in my post on the discussion page. I believe that my rendering fits in the pattern of adding all points of view in order to remain neutral. But more of that when I have read your response. Just for now, I am still intent on reverting your edit.

Sincerely yours.

I have given up and agreed with you. Not because I have accepted your arguments (at least some of which I still think I could counter), but because I have found out de Branges' is not the only one being estranged after all. Carlos Castro and Jorge Mahecha's are just another such proof. I am forced to accept that mathematicians must know better if they choose to ignore these papers, which must be plain bilge. Sigh… my recent email exchanges with de Branges have led me to think that correct he may not be, but he is at least sincerely convinced of his results. He does not sound a crank or an attention-seeker, but this is not the point, as you have said. He has made me privy to his next steps and his views on the subject, and I was impressed by his poise. But who can tell? I have made some changes to the cursory note on the Riemann Hypothesis article to make it more deeply from a journalistic point of view (that is, what is dissociated from the mathematical part, which is beyond my grasp) if I can. May I ask what people on your department think of de Branges' and his proof?

I have a great deal of respect for de Branges. It sounds like you do too from talking to him, and there is nothing wrong with that. He is a great mathematician, no doubt about it, but even the greats have been wrong, so even if his RH proof is bogus, that shouldn't be more than an indication that he is mortal. I'm not familiar with Castro or Mahecha, but it looks like they are physicists which tend to make me think that what's going on there is of drastically different flavor than with de Branges. I've had occasion sometimes to talk about de Branges, but I've never taken what I would consider a survey of my department, nor would I be interested in doing so. Not many are qualified to comment on his mathematics, so I expect all I would get is hearsay which I am already familiar with. I believe that he has chosen a peculiar way to go about explaining his proof, but of course, I can't make a judgment upon the mathematics involved.

I'm sorry that you've chosen to give up though you remain unconvinced by my rationale. I expect it must be somewhat devasting to realize that there is a large amount of "plain bilge" produced by otherwise seemingly respectable thinkers (note that I am not saying de Branges is in this group, just speaking in general). Given the limited time and resources mathematical professionals have, they don't really have time to dig through this stuff, so a lot relies on credibility. Mathematicians are in general willing to be forgiving and take some effort to understand a new argument, but their patience will wear out after a certain point, even for a respected colleague. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 15:16, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, I certainly do respect de Branges, but I am not a mathematician, so my respect is purely for his courtesy and the clarity of his exposition. But I am curious about the patience of the mathematical community. I believe you refer to his pattern of premature announcements that have been recanted shortly thereafter. Curiously, I have dug deep into this and, at least from Internet sources, found out that de Branges has made only two such announcements before: back in 1962, when he and Rovnyak claimed to have solved the invariant subspace problem, and sometime in the late nineties when he announced that he had outlined the way to solve RH. In both occasions, he himself identified the mistake and retracted the claim, so I do not think any mathematician could really complain to have wasted time analyzing a flawed proof. As for Conrey, Li and Sarnak having dismissed his methods, there was a recent text by Sarnak in my previous version of de Branges' biography in which he would not go so far as saying such a thing. He in fact admitted that their result countered some assumptions on Euler functions that de Branges had made previously, but they could not affirm that his approach would be fruitless. In fact, I could not find one professional who has dismissed de Branges' controversial papers. But, as you said, 'very few' people are conversant with Hilbert spaces of entire functions, a theory de Branges developed himself, and this could justify the difficulty he is having. This, and not a real problem of credibility, seems to be the most likely cause for the course things have taken.

As for being devastated, this is certainly not the case. I have given up merely because I have conceded that there is not much to be said or done just now. Until de Branges' works are perused seriously, you are right that his biography must remain precisely as it is now. Perhaps because in my own field things happen a bit faster, I had a false impression that they could be expedited in de Branges' case. Thanks for the attention.

[edit] Arf invariant of a knot

I moved the section on Arf invariant of a knot from Arf invariant to Seifert surface just before you added more stuff about it, which seems to have resulted in some confusion. All the stuff on Arf invariants of a knot should probably be in the same article; I dont care which. R.e.b. 17:55, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I see what happened. Anyway, all that stuff is now in arf invariant (knot). --Chan-Ho (Talk) 18:11, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sorry about the Sol geometry error on the Geometrization conjecture article

It actually was the first time I "added" that mistake though. The earlier revision that you were probably talking about, which I made back on October 27, 2005, just clarified the description of Nil geometry that was used at the time ("the group of upper triangular matricies with units on diagonal", which I changed to "the group of normed upper triangular matricies" as I thought some people might not know what was meant by units, although I agree that referring to it as a geometry of the Heisenberg group (not "the" geometry I guess, sorry) is simpler) and added links to the triangular matrix and matrix articles which seemed appropriate at the time. Anyway, I should have not assumed that what somebody, actually Tosha, added earlier on February 26, 2004 about Sol geometry being the "geometry of group of upper triangular 2 by 2 matricies" was correct, especially after someone else, who I now know was you, had changed that. Anyway, I just wanted to make it clear that I hadn't changed the article from not containing that falsehood (which I didn't realize was a falsehood) to containing it twice. The first time was just what I considered to be clarification (assuming what was already there was true) and adding some links. I know I made some spelling errors too. I've been getting a little sloppy recently, and I will work on that. Kevin Lamoreau 06:34, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi Kevin. I'm sorry I misattributed something to you. It's kind of inexplicable why Tosha would add that as he is somebody that ought to know better, but I suppose all this shows it's easy for mistakes to propogate. Sorry if I sounded kind of peeved, but that was due to my mistake in thinking you had added that before. --Chan-Ho (Talk) 22:55, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] CfD

Check this out: [2]bunix 02:04, 14 October 2006 (UTC)