New Set Theory Historiography and Relativity

Author: John Ryskamp
Posted: October 9, 2007 at 12:22PM
Source: The Nucleus collection

You might be interested in some of the new history of set theory, which sheds a great deal of light on Poincare's understanding and his influence on Einstein.  For some reason, we seem to be enjoying a renaissance in this field.  It has importance for relativity, because Poincare's responses to the set theory discussions found their way into Science and Hypothesis, which so influenced Einstein.  I think it is becoming more clear that Einstein's adoption of natural mathematics (what he called "practical geometry") through Poincare and others, was really the important step in his thinking, with consequences which were not so good.

Above all, you should read Garciadiego's book on Russell (BERTRAND RUSSELL AND THE ORIGINS OF THE SET-THEORETIC 'PARADOXES,' in spite of its many typos.  If you haven't read that yet, you should do so first thing.

I discuss some of the new work in the essay below.

Cordially yours,
John Ryskamp


Ryskamp, John Henry, "Paradox, Natural Mathematics, Relativity and Twentieth-Century Ideas" (May 19, 2007). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=897085

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