4 ms·

Not disagreeing with you necessarily, but the 70s were hardly an economic boom time in the USA either.

by acheron 12y ago

dragonwriter 12y ago
OTOH, the time when Lisp (1958), Smalltalk (1969), and ML (1973 is what Wikipedia has for "first appeared in", but unlike Lisp and and Smalltalk I can't find information on definition vs. release) were first defined all (except the last, which is on the cusp) precede the 1973 recession, and the preceding period actually was an economic boom time.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
darkmighty 12y ago
And von Neumann lived mostly though war and 30's financial crisis. I honestly think it's more a question of (lack of) will/confidence from part of academia. I bet if had really good ideas about new languages and really wanted to dig deep on that he would be able to do so without starving. Maryam Mirzakhani (this year's female fields Medalist) commented that she's quite a slow thinker, and left a clear impression that it's more a matter of asking important questions and actually trying to solve them with perseverence. It's just far more secure to chase the low-hanging fruits. http://www.simonsfoundation.org/quanta/20140812-a-tenacious-explorer-of-abstract-surfaces/ http://www.simonsfoundation.org/quanta/20140812-a-tenacious-... " Another notable and enviable trait of von Neumann's was his mathematical courage. If, in the middle of a search for a counterexample, an infinite series came up, with a lot of exponentials that had quadratic exponents, many mathematicians would start with a clean sheet of paper and look for another counterexample. Not Johnny! When that happened to him, he cheerfully said: "Oh, yes, a thetafunction...", and plowed ahead with the mountainous computations. He wasn't afraid of anything." That's an inspiration!
- tachyonbeam 12y ago
  My understanding is that during the war, the american government was throwing money around liberally. Trying to do everything it could to outwit and outdo the enemy. This is part of what caused the post-war economic boom, money being distributed and more people getting a chance to prosper.
  - e12e 12y ago
    Makes one wonder what the NSA have been doing since the 80s. They're supposed to be the biggest employer of mathematicians, and since the 90s they've had their very own "war budget". Maybe in 2050 we'll say -- oh wow, look at all the great stuff that came out of the islamophobic-fuelled war on the middle east that the US spearheaded. Shame about the future ruined for half a billion people, but boy did they come up with some crazy stuff at the NSA!
    - darkmighty 12y ago
      We're more likely to say "what a huge burden was NSA!". Major crypto breakthroughs created there (in either breaking something/creating something) would be kept secret for years, so it just bogs down innovation. GCHQ infamously invented public key crypto but no one was allowed to show outsiders for comment so it just died there until it was reinvented a few years later.
    - gwern 12y ago
      > Makes one wonder what the NSA have been doing since the 80s. They're supposed to be the biggest employer of mathematicians, and since the 90s they've had their very own "war budget". I wonder. Does anyone have recent sources indicating the NSA really might be the biggest employer of mathematicians? I'd also point to the Snowden and other leaks and attacks like Stuxnet - so far, everything revealed has been fairly humdrum in the sense that they are more or less what you'd expect if you threw a few billion dollars at known vulnerabilities in the Internet and current OSes. Portmapping entire countries' computers may be impressive in some respects, but not in the sense of beyond-cutting-edge cryptography/mathematics.
      - 12y ago

Not disagreeing with you necessarily, but the 70s were hardly an economic boom time in the USA either.

by acheron 12y ago

Not disagreeing with you necessarily, but the 70s were hardly an economic boom time in the USA either.

OTOH, the time when Lisp (1958), Smalltalk (1969), and ML (1973 is what Wikipedia has for "first appeared in", but unlike Lisp and and Smalltalk I can't find information on definition vs. release) were first defined all (except the last, which is on the cusp) precede the 1973 recession, and the preceding period actually was an economic boom time.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

darkmighty 12y ago

And von Neumann lived mostly though war and 30's financial crisis. I honestly think it's more a question of (lack of) will/confidence from part of academia. I bet if had really good ideas about new languages and really wanted to dig deep on that he would be able to do so without starving. Maryam Mirzakhani (this year's female fields Medalist) commented that she's quite a slow thinker, and left a clear impression that it's more a matter of asking important questions and actually trying to solve them with perseverence. It's just far more secure to chase the low-hanging fruits. http://www.simonsfoundation.org/quanta/20140812-a-tenacious-explorer-of-abstract-surfaces/ http://www.simonsfoundation.org/quanta/20140812-a-tenacious-... " Another notable and enviable trait of von Neumann's was his mathematical courage. If, in the middle of a search for a counterexample, an infinite series came up, with a lot of exponentials that had quadratic exponents, many mathematicians would start with a clean sheet of paper and look for another counterexample. Not Johnny! When that happened to him, he cheerfully said: "Oh, yes, a thetafunction...", and plowed ahead with the mountainous computations. He wasn't afraid of anything." That's an inspiration!

tachyonbeam 12y ago
My understanding is that during the war, the american government was throwing money around liberally. Trying to do everything it could to outwit and outdo the enemy. This is part of what caused the post-war economic boom, money being distributed and more people getting a chance to prosper.
- e12e 12y ago
  Makes one wonder what the NSA have been doing since the 80s. They're supposed to be the biggest employer of mathematicians, and since the 90s they've had their very own "war budget". Maybe in 2050 we'll say -- oh wow, look at all the great stuff that came out of the islamophobic-fuelled war on the middle east that the US spearheaded. Shame about the future ruined for half a billion people, but boy did they come up with some crazy stuff at the NSA!
  - darkmighty 12y ago
    We're more likely to say "what a huge burden was NSA!". Major crypto breakthroughs created there (in either breaking something/creating something) would be kept secret for years, so it just bogs down innovation. GCHQ infamously invented public key crypto but no one was allowed to show outsiders for comment so it just died there until it was reinvented a few years later.
  - gwern 12y ago
    > Makes one wonder what the NSA have been doing since the 80s. They're supposed to be the biggest employer of mathematicians, and since the 90s they've had their very own "war budget". I wonder. Does anyone have recent sources indicating the NSA really might be the biggest employer of mathematicians? I'd also point to the Snowden and other leaks and attacks like Stuxnet - so far, everything revealed has been fairly humdrum in the sense that they are more or less what you'd expect if you threw a few billion dollars at known vulnerabilities in the Internet and current OSes. Portmapping entire countries' computers may be impressive in some respects, but not in the sense of beyond-cutting-edge cryptography/mathematics.
    - 12y ago