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Article 2438 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: torkel@sics.se (Torkel Franzen)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech,sci.logic,sci.math,comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Penrose on Man vs. Machine
Message-ID: <1991Dec30.120557.7746@sics.se>
Date: 30 Dec 91 12:05:57 GMT
References: <1991Dec19.041945.27038@oracorp.com>
	<1991Dec22.131401.6869@husc3.harvard.edu>
	<1991Dec23.042312.10049@cambridge.oracorp.com>
	<1991Dec23.112144.6884@husc3.harvard.edu>
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In-Reply-To: zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu's message of 23 Dec 91 16:21:42 GMT

In article <1991Dec23.112144.6884@husc3.harvard.edu> zeleny@zariski.harvard.
edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

   >Yes, I am outraged at the fact that
   >the man who is not only arguably the most important living constructivist
   >thinker, but also a hero of the struggle against the Communist political
   >oppression, can find himself much lauded when persecuted, and without a job
   >when released.  It seems that the West likes its freedom fighters
   >conveniently dead and enshrined.  I should add that I am not personally
   >acquainted with Yessenin-Volpin, knowing him and his story only from
   >publications and the account by Gabriel Stolzenberg.


   Well, I don't know him either, but I've met him, and his dinner
conversation quite lacked the flavor of your outrage. Calling Yesenin-Volpin
a "constructivist thinker" is a bit like calling Groucho Marx a movie
actor. Sure he's a constructivist thinker, but his constructivism is
very funny, and not concerned with any paltry restrictions on mathematical
thinking. On the contrary, he introduces a score of new concepts and
principles, promising to achieve wonders. In conversation, I made a
cautious attempt to sound him out on an interesting point: what did he
have in mind when suggesting that his methods could prove the consistency
not only of ZFC, but of Quine's NF? His reply was a great booming laugh,
Russian bear style, and some hearty remarks on how we would in the future
work together on proving the consistency of NF. Thus learning that he was
definitely not a humorless windbag, I have come to regard ultra-intuitionism
as great stuff.


