[ExI] Ramanujan

[Lee Corbin]

Bryan writes

> On Saturday 01 March 2008, Lee Corbin wrote:
> > All that (below) just seems really like anyone who loves his
> > work, or is highly fascinated by something. There is nothing
> > characteristically transhumanist (or even philosophical) that
> > I can see.
> 
> Math, philosophy, logic, reason, numbers, these are all tightly
> intertwingled subjects, and I believe stepwise lead to
> transhumanism or at least futurism, context-exploration, and
> realizing the future by creating it.

Well, there are many, many people who are totally into math,
philosophy, logic, reason and number, but who abhor anything
even remotely connected with longevity research, cryonics,
expanding human capabilities, and---hold your breath---
technology (!).  And I don't think that those things are as
intertwined as you do. Lots of math fiends, for example,
totally disdain anything philosophical.

Now exactly how they can be like this beats me, but that's
the way it is.  One of the most shocking things that ever
happened to me was that my bosom buddies who I knew
between age 20 and 30, who lived in southern California,
who were epitomes of philosophical erudition, good taste,
interests in math and science---were completely uninterested
when (when we were about 40) the new advent of cryonics,
later ideas of David Pearce (www.hedweb.com), and talk
of the singularity.  I was baffled, and still am.

> In this context, Ramanujan was an amazing journeyman in
> such explorations, able to map out more territory that
> should [not] have been possible with the limiting circumstances
> he was born into, and isn't this transcension?

He was totally amazing, all right, but only in the narrow area
of pure math.  I expect that if he'd been born in the West,
or in India now, he would have turned into a much more
conventional---but still tremendously, tremendously good
--- regular mathematician.  I think that Hardy thought so too.

Lee