Rank zero

Being Lewis Carroll, Dodgson chose not to write a dry textbook but a kind of play with acts and scenes in which a character named Minos takes the side of Euclid while other characters – one is Euclid himself – join the discussions. The side of the 13 rivals is taken by a character named Niemand, i.e., `nobody’, a `phantasm’ German Professor.

Thomas Sonar bespricht in historischem Kontext den Nachdruck von Euclid and his modern rivals [Cambridge Library Collection - Mathematics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2009; Zbl 1210.01003)].

The abbreviation WFE from the title means: weakened field equations. The paper is almost identical to [Bull. Calcutta Math. Soc. 101, No. 5, 445–452 (2009; Zbl 1206.83064)].

Auch in Calcutta denkt man - wie im Fall von Patil-Khapekar-Deshmukhs “Plane gravitational waves of WFE in higher dimensional space-time in general relativity for Z=(z-t) type wave.” [News Bull. Calcutta Math. Soc. 31, No. 7-9, 17-23 (2008; Zbl 05943254)] - wohl “doppelt hält besser”.

“Mr Martin, Miss,” said Crosby, opening the study door. Eleanor looked round. She was standing by her father’s chair with her hands full of long strips of newspaper cuttings, as if she had been reading them aloud. There was a chess-board in front of him; the chess-men were set out for a game; but he was lying back in his chair. He looked lethargic, and rather gloomy.

“Put ’em away. . . . Keep ’em safe somewhere,” he said, jerking his thumb at the cuttings. That was a sign that he had grown very old, Eleanor thought — wanting newspaper cuttings kept. He had grown inert and ponderous after his stroke; there were red veins in his nose and in his cheeks. She too felt old, heavy and dull.

(Aus: The Years.)

‘I’ve not yet made up my mind whether the best men for this kind of job are those who do it with passion or those who keep their heads. Some of them are filled with hatred for the people we’re up against and when we down them it gives them a sort of satisfaction like satisfying a personal grudge. Of course they’re very keen on their work. You’re different, aren’t you? You look at it like a game of chess and you don’t seem to have any feeling one way or the other. I can’t quite make it out. Of course for some sort of jobs it’s just what one wants.’

Ashenden did not answer. He called for the bill and walked back with R. to the hotel.

(Aus: Giulia Lazzari.)

Another time, Paul said he “played chess in coffee-houses.” She had built up a whole structure of imagination on that saying too. She remembered how, as he said it, she thought how he rang up the servant, and she said, “Mrs Rayley’s out, sir,” and he decided that he would not come home either. She saw him sitting in the corner of some lugubrious place where the smoke attached itself to the red plush seats, and the waitresses got to know you, and he played chess with a little man who was in the tea trade and lived at Surbiton, but that was all Paul knew about him. And then Minta was out when he came home and then there was that scene on the stairs, when he got the poker in case of burglars (no doubt to frighten her too) and spoke so bitterly, saying she had ruined his life. At any rate when she went down to see them at a cottage near Rickmansworth, things were horribly strained. Paul took her down the garden to look at the Belgian hares which he bred, and Minta followed them, singing, and put her bare arm on his shoulder, lest he should tell her anything.

(Aus: To the Lighthouse)

Yes; his neighbour was obviously a later—was the latest—Mrs. Wheater; probably two or three removes from poor Joyce. Though why he should think of her as poor Joyce, when in all probability she had moved off across the matrimonial chess-board at the same rate of progression as her first husband….

(Aus: The Children.)

Der Markgraf verneigte sich. “Die Tapferkeit war auf Eurer Seite wie der unseren, der Kampfwert ausgewogen, das Gefecht prächtig. Ihr werdet eine noch offene Schachpartie nicht aufgeben. An welchem Tage gedenkt Seine Hoheit mich die Überlegenheit seiner Kraft und seines Geistes fühlen zu machen?”

(Aus: Die Kinder der Finsternis.)

Eine Kurzpartie zum Geburtstag:

Mecking, Henrique - Rocha, Antonio
Mar del Plata zt
1969, C69

1.e4 e5 2.Sf3 Sc6 3.Lb5 a6 4.Lxc6 dxc6 5.O-O f6 6.d4 Lg4 7.c3 Ld6 8.Le3 De7 9.Sbd2 Sh6?! Seinerzeit war man noch relativ frei in der Eröffnungsbehandlung. Heute würde Weiß sofort die Entscheidung mit h3 erzwingen, und ggf. g4 etc. folgen lassen - nun könnte Schwarz lang rochieren und dies wesentlich erschweren. Der Textzug rutscht in Nachteil ab. 10.h3 Ld7 11.Db3

11…b6? Einer der Züge, die schon aus ästhetischen Gründen schlecht aussehen. Wieder 11…O-O-O hält besser durch.
12.dxe5 fxe5 13.Sc4 Sf7 14.Tfd1 Lc5?

Verliert direkt - noch spielbar ist das hässliche 14…b5 15.Sa5 O-O nebst c5. Jetzt folgt trotz reduzierten Materials ein unwiderstehlich Opferangriff. 15.Lxc5 Dxc5 16.Txd7! Kxd7 17.Sxb6+ Dxb6 18.Dxf7+ Kc8 19.Sxe5 Dxb2? Macht es kurz - 19…Dc5 hält länger durch.20.Dd7+ Kb8 21.Dd1 Dxc3 Erlaubt ein hübsches Matt. 22.Tb1+ Ka7 23.Dd4+! Dxd4 24.Sxc6#

1-0

Behufs Ergründung der invarianten Eigenschaften der Kugelfunctionen wird eine Reihe von neuen Sätzen über die Darstellbarkeit von In- und Covarianten binärer Formen vorausgeschickt, von denen wir folgende hervorheben.

Die JFM-Besprechung der Königsberger Dissertation lässt noch nicht ohne weiteres die kommende blendende Karriere erahnen - kein Wunder, sollte doch auch Gordan drei Jahre später die den darauf aufbauenden Beweis der Endlichkeit des Erzeugendensystems vorerst ablehnen (bei der 1890er Veröffentlichung von “Ueber die Theorie der algebraischen Formen.” [Math. Ann. XXXVI. 473-534 (1890; JFM 22.0133.01)] sah es dann schon anders aus).

Was in der Folge seines Wirkens in Göttingen gedieh, war einer jener seltenen Momente, wo die Wissenschaft für ein ganzes Jahrhundert geprägt wurde. Kurioserweise ist man fast versucht, Lasker als einen seiner erfolglosesten Schüler anzusehen.

Can God have done so? imagine God, as the poet saith, Ludere in humanis, to play but a game at chess with this world ; to sport himself with making little things great, and great things nothing: imagine God to be but at to sport himself with making little things great, and great things nothing: imagine God to be but at play with us, but a gamester; yet will a gamester curse, before he be in danger of losing any thing?

(Aus einer Predigt in Whitehall.)