Stephen
Wolfram's
A New Kind
of Science
Once again* we press this book on our readers. Its basic ideas are that science made a wrong turn at mathematics when it should have followed the primordial foundations of modern computing and that doing so now will give us more knowledge of ourselves and the universe and perhaps lead to the computational equivalent of "The Grand Unified Theory."
These claims were not met with, as were those of Newton and Einstein, universal acceptance in their fields. That is perhaps because Wolfram is wrong. It may be too because he is an immodest writer. Immodesty is one of man's graver defects and is universally annoying. The effect, even among general readers, is to discount the claims of the immodest. That may be a mistake with Wolfram. To turn Churchill's putdown of Atlee around, Wolfram is a very immodest man with much to be immodest about.
There is an upside to his immodesty however: large parts of the 1200 page book can be skipped. This is more the case because Wolfram would suffer no editor and so many points are repeated.
Still, the view here, as it was in 2002 when the book was published, is that Wolfram is on to something and that it is worthwhile for people to be acquainted with his work. This is Public Occurrences.
*See below, June 9, 2002.
of Science
Once again* we press this book on our readers. Its basic ideas are that science made a wrong turn at mathematics when it should have followed the primordial foundations of modern computing and that doing so now will give us more knowledge of ourselves and the universe and perhaps lead to the computational equivalent of "The Grand Unified Theory."
These claims were not met with, as were those of Newton and Einstein, universal acceptance in their fields. That is perhaps because Wolfram is wrong. It may be too because he is an immodest writer. Immodesty is one of man's graver defects and is universally annoying. The effect, even among general readers, is to discount the claims of the immodest. That may be a mistake with Wolfram. To turn Churchill's putdown of Atlee around, Wolfram is a very immodest man with much to be immodest about.
There is an upside to his immodesty however: large parts of the 1200 page book can be skipped. This is more the case because Wolfram would suffer no editor and so many points are repeated.
Still, the view here, as it was in 2002 when the book was published, is that Wolfram is on to something and that it is worthwhile for people to be acquainted with his work. This is Public Occurrences.
*See below, June 9, 2002.
