Mathematician, outstanding teacher, and UseNet kook.
Wrote three books, including Boolean Rings and The Theory of Sets and Transfinite Arithmetic. It is a very, very easy book. It's still real math. A lot of the reason it's easy is Abian's superb English description of the contents. You can actually read the English without the symbology and get about 80% of the book. And then the meaning of the symbols is just obvious. If it can be done once, why can't it be done all the time?
- How very funny that you would pick Abian, of all people. I mean, I haven't read that book, but yes, I've heard it's good, however, "why can't it be done all the time"? Remember what happened to Cantor? There's something about transfinites, perhaps.... What am I talking about? Abian is one of the most infamous all-time looney net kooks, easily up there with ArchimedesPlutonium; see, e.g., http://www.codehappy.net/site.cgi?ac=1&aid=104 Ok, that's purely ad hominem, I never heard anyone complain about Abian's professional math at all. Still... -- Doug
- Ah, a 1993 sci.physics thread showing Abian at his "best". I made a small joke therein, but some of the other responses, such as several by John Baez, are hysterically funny: http://xrl.us/rbv4
- P.S. you may be thinking this is a coincidence of names. It is not. This is the same Abian.
Yes I know it is the same Abian. I picked him because, damnit, the guy's book is really superb. His still rarer work, BooleanRings?, is even better. Just what drove Abian to become net.kooky is a good question. A calm warm intellect shines like a beacon from his books. I wonder if there is any bio available that would explain what happened to him.
Not senile dementia. He was publishing good math papers up until his death in 1999.
CategoryPerson CategoryMath
Alexander Abian