Sunday, February 8, 2015

Sunday Musing…


For rumination, two quotes that Brian Hayes employs at the start of Chapter 11 of his volume, "Group Theory In the Bedroom":
"Suppose I had once borrowed your boat and, secretly, replaced each board with a similar but different one. Then, later, when I brought it back, did I return your boat to you? What kind of a question is that? It's really not about boats at all, but about what people mean by 'same.'"  -- Marvin Minsky

"I have heard of a touchy owner of a yacht to whom a guest, on first seeing it, remarked, 'I thought your yacht was larger than it is'; and the owner replied, 'No, my yacht is not larger than it is.'" 
-- Bertrand Russell

[…If you have a favorite math-related passage that might make a nice Sunday morning reflection here let me know (SheckyR@gmail.com). If I use one submitted by a reader, I'll cite the contributor.]

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