User talk:Peter M Gerdes/Archive 1

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Hi, I though you might be interested in the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics#Computability, recursion theory. Cheers, —R. Koot 00:01, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Attractor

A few points:

• The set B(A) is too large, as it requires that all neighborhoods go to the attractor, when what is normally defined is that nearby points go to the attractor.
• A system in one dimension can have a space-dependent velocity field, so the example f(t, (x,v)) = x + t v doesn't quite work.
• The invariance follows from the two conditions, (1) f(t, Λ) ⊃ Λ for large t together with (2) the existence of a fundamental neighborhood that ends up in any open containing the attractor. The invariance condition is redundant.

The definition I had written (equivalent to the one you have given) for an attractor was the definition given by Ruelle for an attracting set (not attractor). An attractor in Ruelle's definition needs to have some stability against small perturbations, which the current definition does not address. – XaosBits 20:48, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

United States National Guard

I noticed you put a disputed tag on the United States National Guard page, but where is your reason? Your edit summary says "bit about intent of founding fathers and stuff" what is the disute? Could you either go to the Talk:United States National Guard page and state your case or remove the tag? When I saw the tag I was ready to throw my pro or con into the fray, but I was disappointed to see there was no fray. --Colputt 16:31, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

New article on Kleene's O

Since you added material on Kleene's O to the article ordinal notation which I reverted, I wanted to let you know that I used it as the basis for creating a new article on Kleene's O itself. You might want to add your ideas to that article. Ordinal notation is a narrower concept where each system of ordinal notations is recursive as a whole. Kleene's O as a whole is $\Pi _{1}^{1}$ rather than recursive. JRSpriggs (talk) 02:14, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Usernames

I would like you to consider changing your username. Please understand that, although you mean no particular harm by it, you are cheapening the term - and making light of the organized butchery of millions of people. You may post a request at Wikipedia:Changing username.

Thank you in advance. DS (talk) 01:05, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Ehh, I'll think about it. But it's actually a nickname given to me in college in reference to the Soup Nazi Seinfeld episode. Ironically, (when I used to use this as an email address) it was only the non-jews I knew who ever got offended, probably largely a result of the fact that the Jews I knew where more likely to be familiar with Seinfeld. Anyway I just mention that fact because because it's an interesting way to point out that it's not offensive to most people in the cultural context from which it arouse. Still, I have since discovered that people without a similar cultural background, particularly people form Europe where the use of nazi as slang to suggest someone is being extremely pedantic doesn't exist. In fact no one had even suggested this might be offensive until some people from Europe saw my email address though I suppose there will be some people in the US who feel similarly.

I certainly don't think there is any harmful cheaping of a term going on here. Literally billions of people have died from bombs but there is nothing wrong with a username of 'DaBomb' and we don't even object to 'Abomb' as a username despite the fact that it occurs to an equally recent event. I'm certainly not suggesting a moral equivalence between these events but the point is that we don't generally accept the rule that one can't use words that relate to instances of catastrophic human suffering in a light fashion. I mean heck it's surprising how many words or phrases in our language refer back to past conflicts that involved awful behavior by our standards. Certainly we don't even raise an eyebrow at non-serious uses of the word decimate even though it was a truly horrible practice by the Romans. Indeed I would argue that we tend to think a term referring to past genocidal or even discriminatory treatment of a group is unacceptable to use in a lighthearted fashion proportional to how much we fear that people in our cultural circle are likely to still harbor such views. Hence, for instance, the reason that X-nazi as slang has been more acceptable in the US than Europe is that in most circles it's seen as less likely that people they know actually harbor such feelings. Indeed then I think we *want* these words to be cheapened (though the history not forgotten) in this sense as it means that sort of antisemitism is less of a threat.

This having all been said I'm of two minds about changing the name. On the one hand if I will upset less people by changing the name that seems good. On the other hand I tend to feel strongly that we can't retreat to those terms and expressions that offend no one, especially on the internet. This is certainly true of ideas that have significance, e.g., expressing criticism of religion/religious figures, but it also seems true that we would lose much vibrance and enjoyment in our communications if we always retreated to something that offends no one. Worse, it would set a president telling people that getting offended is the way to get their way. Would it not be better to encourage people not to be offended when the terms are used without any offensive intent and arising from a context that isn't trying to be deliberately aggravating. Anyway as I'm said I'm of two minds about this issue so if you say some more about why you think it would be better for me to change you might convince me.

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