[HN Gopher] A man who tried to redeem the world with logic (2015)
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A man who tried to redeem the world with logic (2015)
Author : porterbeats
Score : 50 points
Date : 2022-02-09 17:52 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (nautil.us)
(TXT) w3m dump (nautil.us)
| jll29 wrote:
| Great history of science reporting, I enjoyed reading it.
|
| Errata: The article says "The higher the probability, the higher
| the entropy and the lower the information content." It should say
| "the lower the entropy", of course, as the definition of
| information is the same as the definition of entropy (they are
| correlated, not anti-correlated): white noise has the lowest
| probability (it's impossible to predict), the highest entropy and
| therefore the highest information content, according to Shannon's
| original Theory of Communication.
| openknot wrote:
| This is one of my favourite pieces of science feature reporting.
| I lack the background in computer science to better appreciate
| the technical angles of the story, but for the present, the
| article made a strong impression because of the underdog story:
|
| "The library was familiar ground, where he had taught himself
| Greek, Latin, logic, and mathematics--better than home, where his
| father insisted he drop out of school and go to work. Outside,
| the world was messy. Inside, it all made sense.
|
| "Not wanting to risk another run-in that night, Pitts stayed
| hidden until the library closed for the evening. Alone, he
| wandered through the stacks of books until he came across
| Principia Mathematica, a three-volume tome written by Bertrand
| Russell and Alfred Whitehead between 1910 and 1913, which
| attempted to reduce all of mathematics to pure logic. Pitts sat
| down and began to read. For three days he remained in the library
| until he had read each volume cover to cover--nearly 2,000 pages
| in all--and had identified several mistakes. Deciding that
| Bertrand Russell himself needed to know about these, the boy
| drafted a letter to Russell detailing the errors. Not only did
| Russell write back, he was so impressed that he invited Pitts to
| study with him as a graduate student at Cambridge University in
| England. Pitts couldn't oblige him, though--he was only 12 years
| old. But three years later, when he heard that Russell would be
| visiting the University of Chicago, the 15-year-old ran away from
| home and headed for Illinois. He never saw his family again."
|
| ~~
|
| It also made an impact because of its description of the nature
| of a deep friendship and mentorship: "Pitts had found in
| McCulloch everything he had needed--acceptance, friendship, his
| intellectual other half, the father he never had. Although he had
| only lived in Hinsdale for a short time, the runaway would refer
| to McCulloch's house as home for the rest of his life. For his
| part, McCulloch was just as enamored. In Pitts he had found a
| kindred spirit, his "bootlegged collaborator," and a mind with
| the technical prowess to bring McCulloch's half-formed notions to
| life. As he put it in a letter of reference about Pitts, "Would I
| had him with me always.""
|
| [...] "Some years earlier, in a letter to McCulloch, Pitts wrote
| "About once a week now I become violently homesick to talk all
| evening and all night to you." Despite his success, Pitts had
| become homesick--and home meant McCulloch. He was coming to
| believe that if he could work with McCulloch again, he would be
| happier, more productive, and more likely to break new ground.
| McCulloch, too, seemed to be floundering without his bootlegged
| collaborator."
|
| ~~
|
| The tragic end also left an impression, where the article
| explores the consequence of creating an identity based on
| relationships with other people (arguably codependency): "Now,
| alienated from Wiener, Pitts' despair turned lethal. He began
| drinking heavily and pulled away from his friends. When he was
| offered his Ph.D., he refused to sign the paperwork. He set fire
| to his dissertation along with all of his notes and his papers.
| Years of work--important work that everyone in the community was
| eagerly awaiting-- he burnt it all, priceless information reduced
| to entropy and ash. Wiesner offered Lettvin increased support for
| the lab if he could recover any bits of the dissertation. But it
| was all gone."
|
| [...] "Pitts remained employed by MIT, but this was little more
| than a technicality; he hardly spoke to anyone and would
| frequently disappear. "We'd go hunting for him night after
| night," Lettvin said. "Watching him destroy himself was a
| dreadful experience.""
|
| ~~
|
| The loss of the friendship was compounded by Pitts's attempt to
| substantiate an ambitious goal related to much of the work in his
| life, but perceiving failure along the way (the results were
| disproven): "The results shook Pitts' worldview to its core.
| Instead of the brain computing information digital neuron by
| digital neuron using the exacting implement of mathematical
| logic, messy, analog processes in the eye were doing at least
| part of the interpretive work. "It was apparent to him after we
| had done the frog's eye that even if logic played a part, it
| didn't play the important or central part that one would have
| expected," Lettvin said. "It disappointed him. He would never
| admit it, but it seemed to add to his despair at the loss of
| Wiener's friendship.""
|
| ~~
|
| Analysis: On the one hand, it's an amazing story of defying one's
| likely station in life, through self-study and earning the
| support of a mentor who takes a chance on you.
|
| But on the other, it's also a tragedy of deeply relying on
| others, and how a breach in that relationship can cause a
| negative spiral of thoughts and emotions.
|
| I wonder how Walter Pitts's life would have turned out if he had
| a wider support network or at least friends, preferably outside
| of his field of work and in academia (it's possible he may well
| have, but I didn't read about it in the article). Then, perhaps,
| the loss of his friendship with Wiener wouldn't have made such an
| impact, and the negative result also wouldn't have had such a
| profoundly negative impact, either.
|
| I also wonder why the loss of his friendship with Wiener had such
| an impact, when he still had the near-lifelong friendship of
| McCulloch. It's impossible to really know, but perhaps he saw
| Pitts more as a close friend, and McCulloch more as a family
| member and mentor.
| randcraw wrote:
| Yeah, I was struck by the article when I first read it too. I
| suspect the author warrants a closer look; great writing.
|
| I've always been intrigued by mathematicians, which is probably
| the best label for Pitts. That world can be as virtual as it
| gets. Based on his fascination for Principia Mathematica, I
| have the sense that Pitts may have needed the world to fit into
| a neat representation that he felt he could navigate. Perhaps
| when he found it didn't, he lost 'faith' and became untethered
| from it.
| dang wrote:
| Previous threads:
|
| _A man who tried to redeem the world with logic (2015)_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26637134 - March 2021 (66
| comments)
|
| _A Man Who Tried to Redeem the World with Logic_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13190601 - Dec 2016 (16
| comments)
|
| _The Man Who Tried to Redeem the World with Logic_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9003735 - Feb 2015 (23
| comments)
| varjag wrote:
| Oh wow. I read early Wiener account of McCulloch&Pitts work and
| even have one of their papers in my copy of 1956 Dartmouth
| workshop proceedings. It always puzzled me how Wiener and the
| whole cybernetics thing sort of just faded away. Had no idea that
| one woman single-handedly killed it.
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