Back to AtD Zeta functions

Paul Mackin mackin.paul at verizon.net
Sun Jul 15 14:42:27 CDT 2012


On 7/15/2012 3:22 PM, Mark Kohut wrote:
> Paul,
> see just posted bloviating post....I do see a difference 
> metaphorically, at least.
> Most of us don't see anything uncomfortable-making in photographs 
> either. I think TRP does.
> as Susan Sontag and others have remarked: a photograph 'shoots' life. 
> Kills it, as the word implies.
> In some sense.

However photo shoots are for lovers--where Annie Leibovitz met Susan S.

:-)


  Annie Leibovitz

> Thanks,
> Mark
>
> *From:* Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at verizon.net>
> *To:* pynchon-l at waste.org
> *Sent:* Sunday, July 15, 2012 2:50 PM
> *Subject:* Re: Back to AtD Zeta functions
>
> On 7/15/2012 11:47 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:
>> Very helpful, Prashant and it leads me to my textual speculation based on
>> TRP using it here, as he does almost everything, as a metaphor.....
>> One level (specualtive): the imaginary is the future that is being 
>> more than hinted at here.
>> More speculative second level: imaginary numbers are, by definition, 
>> not real.....it is
>> unreality---unnatural nation-states, nations BEYOND natural 
>> formations, math beyond
>> what we need to get the world---that will kill.
>
> I don't think, Mark, imaginary numbers would make a very good analogy 
> for something that is "unnatural,"  unreal, or happening in the future.
>
> When we're first presented with imaginary numbers, in high school 
> algebra II, they do seem kind of weird, but a short time latter, after 
> a smattering of Cartesian geometry, they seem as normal and usual as 
> anything.
>
> Whoever decided to call them "imaginary" because they don't fall on 
> the one dimensional number line has some explaining to do.
>
> P
>>
>> *From:* Prashant Kumar mailto:siva.prashant.kumar at gmail.com
>> *To:* Mark Kohut mailto:markekohut at yahoo.com
>> *Cc:* pynchon -l mailto:pynchon-l at waste.org
>> *Sent:* Sunday, July 15, 2012 9:25 AM
>> *Subject:* Re: Back to AtD Zeta functions
>>
>> First we're gonna need complex numbers, made of a real part (normal 
>> numbers) plus an imaginary part. Imaginary numbers are defined by 
>> multiples of /i/=squareroot(-1). Imagine a 2D graph, the vertical 
>> axis marked with multiples of /i/ and the horizontal axis with real 
>> numbers. So on this 2D graph we can define a complex number as a 
>> point. Call such a point s = \sigma + \rho, \sigma and \rho being 
>> real and imaginary numbers resp.
>>
>> Since it takes real and imaginary inputs, and we plot the output in 
>> the third dimension, the Riemann Zeta function can be visualised as a 
>> surface sitting above the complex number graph; that's what you saw, 
>> Mark (see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riemann_zeta_function for 
>> the same thing with magnitude represented as colour).  If I have a RZ 
>> function, writing R as a function of s as R(s), the zeroes are the 
>> values of s for which R(s)=0.  The Riemann Hypothesis (unproven) 
>> states that the zeroes of the RZ function have real part 1/2. 
>> Formally, R(1/2 + \rho) = 0. This gives you a line on the surface of 
>> the RZ function (known as the critical line) along which the zeroes 
>> are hypothesised to lie. That wasn't too bad, right?
>>
>> Verifying this hypothesis is notoriously hard.
>>
>> On 15 July 2012 21:27, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com 
>> <mailto:markekohut at yahoo.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     "Except that this one's horizontal and drawn on a grid of
>>     latitude and longitude,
>>     instead of rel vs imaginary values---where Riemann said that all
>>     the zeroes of the
>>     Beta function will be found."
>>
>>     p. 937 Don't know enough math to have a feel for Zeta
>>     functions but Wolfram's
>>     maths guide online shows Beta functions kinda graphed in three
>>     dimensions,
>>     with raised sections, waves, folds etc....
>>
>>     And all I can associate at the moment are the raised maps,
>>     showing land formations,
>>     and the phrase
>>
>>     History is a step-function.
>>
>>     Anyone, anyone? Bueller?
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
>


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