Subject: Re: Goedel and Einstein at the IAS; 2 PMC22 anecdotes Date: Sun, 28 May 2000 02:02:42 +0200 From: Werner DePauli To: "Robert Jantzen" , Kurt-Goedel-Society , (Onkel Kay-Kay) Eckehart.Koehler@univie.ac.at, (Michael Stoeltzner Physico-Philosophicus) , Michael.Stoeltzner@sbg.ac.at, Matthias Baaz CC: Andrzej Krasinski , Bahram Mashhoon , sf@csli.Stanford.EDU, dmalamen@uci.edu, jwd7@psu.edu, Engelbert L Schucking , Remo Ruffini , George Ellis dear robert jantzen, i see you are making a good job. but unfortunately i am not longer in the goedel-research business. i am working in traffic-engeneering since 5 years. the only thing i have to do with goedel now is: documenting my work i did long ago. in this concern you ask better sol feferman or john dawson, with whom i worked together since 1982. you can proof my conjecture that goedel learnded about the rotating universes from hans thirring by visiting the archive of the university vienna. but you should make a look to my film K.G: ein mathematischer mythos (maybe that sol or john have a NTSC copy) and to my booklet (same title, hoelder-pichler-tempsky verlag). john casti overworked it completely and made quasi a new book which will be published in october at perseus books (K.G: a logical life). furthermore consult my 3rd homepage and visit the photogallery of goedel. we made also about 20 interviews with time whitnesses (? in german: zeitzeugen) which will be published partially in the 700 pages book K.G: Wahrheit und Beweisbarkeit (also h-p-t verlag, editor in chief michael stoeltzner, see his mail in the To:-slot). for further information consult eckehart koehler or the kurt-goedel-society. i wish you a good success of the project in future! <3 <3 <3 (=cordially) jimmy ###################################################################### At 11:01 AM 5/25/00 -0400, Robert Jantzen wrote: > >>From John Kemeny's interview in The Princeton Mathematics Community in >the 1930s: > >http://www.homepage.villanova.edu/robert.jantzen/princeton_math/pmc22.htm >unfortunately there is no date associated with this first story: > >... > >Kemeny: >I should mention one more thing. When I really got to know Gödel was >during the year that I was Einstein's assistant. They had gotten to be >good friends and often walked home together from the Institute. I was >with them on a number of these occasions. > >Incidentally, there was another sort of strangeness at the Institute you >might be interested in. Do you know how Gödel and Einstein got to know >each other? > >Tucker: No > >Kemeny: It's a Paul Oppenheim story. Oppenheim was a great story-teller. >It's the story of what he described as his only contribution to >science---a typical Oppenheim statement. > >When Gödel started working on the mathematics of general-relativity >theory, Paul Oppenheim asked him, "What does Einstein think of your >work?" Gödel said, "Unfortunately, I don't know Einstein." Paul was >amazed at this: first of all because two such famous people at the >Institute should know each other, and secondly because they were surely >the only two people at the Institute working on relativity theory. Gödel >said, "Yes, it strikes me as strange too, but I just have never met him. >" Paul decided to do something about it, and went down to Fuld Hall the >next day. It turned out that Gödel had been moved quite recently; he >actually had the office across the hall from Einstein's. So Paul said >his one contribution to science was to lift his two hands and knock >simultaneously on two doors. The doors opened, and he said, "Einstein >this is Gödel, Gödel this is Einstein." By the time I worked with >Einstein they were close friends. But it took somebody not connected >with the Institute to introduce the two of them to each other. > >Tucker: Oskar Morgenstern was another person who was a close friend of >Gödel's. > >Kemeny: Yes, as a matter of fact, I think---I'm never certain of these >things-it was a party at Oskar's house when the wristwatch incident >occurred. I got to know Oskar very well. He would visit Dartmouth >periodically. As a matter of fact, he made a major contribution to >Finite Mathematics. > >Tucker: Oskar used to talk to me about Gödel. Indeed, he made no bones >about saying that Gödel was greater than Einstein. This was the time >when Gödel was working on the unified theory. Oskar thought that Gödel >was going to pull a coup and surpass Einstein. > >Kemeny: I don't know if he ever completed that. > >Tucker: I knew Gödel only as someone I saw and said good-day to, because >I was never a logician. > >Kemeny: One more Gödel incident. The only public lecture I heard by >Gödel, I think, was during the Princeton Bicentennial. A horrible thing >happened. The lecture notes were good, but Gödel walked in and faced the >blackboard and delivered the half-hour lecture facing the blackboard >without ever writing anything. It was the most uncomfortable thing I >ever sat through in my life. I wished that he would pick up a piece of >chalk and write one word on the blackboard just as an excuse. It was >clear that he just could not face his audience. I heard a couple of >lectures by von Neumann, which were, of course, brilliant. I heard one >by Einstein, in Fine Hall, which was excellent. The content of Gödel's >lecture was excellent, but the lecture itself was a disaster because of >this peculiarity he had of not facing the audience. > > -- ********************************************************* Werner DePauli-Schimanovich-Göttig Institut fuer Statistik und Computermethoden, Universitaetsstrasse 5, A-1010 WIEN / Austria, Homepages: http://w3.smc.univie.ac.at/jimmy, and: http://www.univie.ac.at/cognition/jimmy and (europolis1): http://www.univie.ac.at/bvi #######################################