Pynchon & Math (Aristotle vs. Plato)

[Iris Sirius]

I meant to sayyyyyyayyy.

That Monte, for , sayyyyd something quasi intresting, for once in his life.

The Monte... .Monster?

Hes cacelled me, but somebody who hasnt, Michael.  Tell him.
On Jan 27, 2013 1:11 AM, "Iris Sirius" <irissiriustce at gmail.com> wrote:

> That, youre, note,just here, what was I just on aboot?
> On Jan 26, 2013 6:02 AM, "Monte Davis" <montedavis at verizon.net> wrote:
>
>> I think there may be a conflation of “reality” with “exactness” and
>> “precision” lurking here. First, a silly and wise old science/math joke: A
>> wealthy horse fancier decides to bring science to bear on his passion, and
>> hires three professors to learn what makes the fastest horse. A year later,
>> the biologist tells him: “There appears to be an association with descent
>> from the Darley Arabian, and with high levels of creatine phosphatase.” The
>> engineer tells him: “The optimal ratio of third metacarpal length to
>> proximal phalanx length is between 2.15 and 2.35.” And the physicist tells
>> him: “I’m making real progress on the frictionless spherical homogeneous
>> horse.”****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Pedestrian (bipedal) unfolding: in the spectrum sketched here, the
>> mathematical-physics end promises rigor and precision – and maybe, down the
>> line, predictive power -- *because* of its abstraction. The initial
>> model is chosen to be mathematically tractable, and to have no relevant
>> attributes that are not explicit in the model. At the other end, the
>> biologist is much less certain: so many other developmental and
>> environmental factors are at work that these two are bare starting points.
>> And the engineer, somewhere in between, settles for a working rule of, uhh,
>> thumb that could actually be applied (and evaluated, and incrementally
>> refined) in the stable rather than the lab.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Bertrand Russell’s alternate, gnomic version: "Mathematics is the
>> subject in which we know neither what we are talking about nor whether what
>> we say is true." Again, the certainty gained by abstraction – whether 2+2=4
>> or Cantor’s hierarchy of infinities – may or may not carry over to any
>> particular entities “out there” which we talk about, or to predictions
>> about them.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Consider the exemplars in AtD, from Yashmeen’s airy math and relativity
>> to the purposeful metal of ocean liner/warships and submarines and dive
>> bombers. Consider the seriously punning juxtapositions, such as “wormholes”
>> blasted and drilled by sweating miners, or a magic mirror smack dab in the
>> reflective center of the text. Pynchon has an extraordinary awareness of
>> both the spectrum (pure math -> mathematical science ->
>> technology/engineering) and the strange colors you can get by mixing.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> FWIW, I’m 90% Aristotelian: I do feel the Platonic and gnostic appeal of
>> abstraction/certainty, but I think it’s the shadow rather than the
>> substance, not the other way around.  ****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> *From:* owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] *On
>> Behalf Of *Paul Mackin
>> *Sent:* Friday, January 25, 2013 4:07 PM
>> *To:* pynchon-l at waste.org
>> *Subject:* Re: Pynchon & Math (Aristotle vs. Plato)****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> On 1/25/2013 2:07 AM, Prashant Kumar wrote:****
>>
>> The interesting thing about this dichotomy (in the proper approach to
>> Ethics) you mention is that it presupposes a  Platonic conception of
>> mathematics; mathematics as a menagerie of axiomatically true pieces of
>> abstraction. ****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> A fallibilistic conception of mathematics (the mathematical empiricism of
>> Quine and Putnam), itself descended from the american pragmatists, which
>> conceives of mathematical theorems as contingent truths, will result in a
>> more nebulous notion of precision.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> I would argue this sort of naturalism, nature as a series of convenient
>> but contingent truths, is a staple of american fiction more generally. For
>> example, look at how Pynchon handles the feud between the Quaternionists
>> and the Vectorists in AtD.****
>>
>>
>>
>> "Mathematics once seemed the way--the internal life of numbers came as a
>> revelation to me, perhaps as it might have to a Pythagorean apprentice long
>> ago in Crotona--a reflection of some less accessible reality, through close
>> study of which one might learn to pass on beyond the difficult given world."
>>
>> AtD. p. 749.
>>
>> P
>>
>>
>>
>> ****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> P.****
>>
>> On 24 January 2013 22:57, alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
>> wrote:****
>>
>> Several critical studies examine Pynchon and the American Pragmatists.
>>
>> I think a good place to turn is to Aristotle. Here in an Introduction
>> we see a basic difference in Aristotle from Plato and Socrates, and
>> specifically, on Ethics. The wisdom of Aristotle is that he accepts
>> the idea that it is wise to examine or explore a topic only so far as
>> the topic permits, that there is an exhaustion point, and that in
>> Ethics, and in Politics, the topic does not allow for examination as
>> it does in other sciences.
>>
>> Is the application of math to Ethics and Politics Fascist? Maybe.
>> Maybe something in that GR....
>>
>> Is Plato a Fascist?
>>
>> No, but the math....
>>
>> The main difference between Plato and Aristotle is this: Plato thought
>> ethics was an exact (theoretical) science; Aristotle thought precision
>> was extremely difficult in a science such as ethics. Please note that
>> "science" is being used in its ancient sense of knowledge in general.
>>
>> THE PROPER METHOD FOR ETHICS (Bk. I, Sec. 3)
>>
>> >From ethics one can expect only as much precision as the subject
>> matter allows. This is opposite to Plato's belief, because it does not
>> allow for any mathematical exactness. Does this mean, then, that moral
>> rules are "conventions," made up or created by humans? No, they are
>> natural, but they are not like Plato's immutable forms. Aristotle
>> avoids ethical relativism because of his confidence in human reason
>> and experience to decide on general courses of action.
>>
>> Plato approached ethical questions with a formal, abstract approach,
>> analyzing each just as he would analyze a math problem. Aristotle,
>> though, believed that because of all the human variables found in
>> ethics (but not found in the formal sciences), mathematical precision
>> was impossible.
>>
>> http://www.class.uidaho.edu/ngier/103/aristotle.htm****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> ** **
>>
>
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