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Steve Awodey
Apr 17, 2022, 11:05:49 AM4/17/22
to Homotopy Type Theory
Dear HoTT Community,
From its beginnings at the IAS, the Homotopy Type Theory and Univalent Foundations research program has been an unusually communal effort, consisting of individuals from diverse scientific, national, and personal backgrounds. Various different and even opposing views were not just tolerated but welcomed and encouraged, in the belief that doing so would ultimately lead to a better and more robust result. Personal ambitions took second place to the common purpose of creating something new and important. The experiment of allowing such a diverse group to create a new field and write its founding document as a community project proved to be a success.
The spirit of cooperation necessary to create a forum where diverse views and backgrounds are included and respected serves the dual purpose of creating an inclusive community of scholars where individuals can thrive, while producing the best mathematical and scientific results as a corollary of those efforts. This attitude of selfless cooperation, striving for inclusivity, and valuing a diversity of opinions may have arisen spontaneously in the setting of the IAS [1], but it was nurtured, then and in the years since, by no one more than by Mike Shulman. Mike has given tirelessly, generously, exhaustively of his time and energy, and more importantly of his mathematical ideas and labors, to make our community what it is today: an exciting and beautiful field of mathematics pursued by a group of generous, thoughtful, and tolerant people. Mike is a brilliant mathematician who I know to also be a kind and generous person. He’s also human and occasionally makes mistakes - both mathematical and personal ones. And when he does, we should afford him the same tolerance that we would any other member of our community. We owe him our gratitude and respect.
Univalent regards,
Steve
[1] “It is fundamental in our purpose, and our express desire, that in the appointments to the staff and faculty as well as in the admission of workers and students, no account shall be taken, directly or indirectly, of race, religion, or sex. We feel strongly that the spirit characteristic of America at its noblest, above all the pursuit of higher learning, cannot admit of any conditions as to personnel other than those designed to promote the objects for which this institution is established, and particularly with no regard whatever to accidents of race, creed, or sex.” — IAS founders Louis Bamberger and his sister Caroline Bamberger Fuld, in a letter of invitation, dated June 4, 1930, to the Institute’s first Board of Trustees. Quoted from "A Diverse Community of Scholars“, The Institute Letter, Fall 2010, https://www.ias.edu/ideas/2010/diverse-community-of-scholars
From its beginnings at the IAS, the Homotopy Type Theory and Univalent Foundations research program has been an unusually communal effort, consisting of individuals from diverse scientific, national, and personal backgrounds. Various different and even opposing views were not just tolerated but welcomed and encouraged, in the belief that doing so would ultimately lead to a better and more robust result. Personal ambitions took second place to the common purpose of creating something new and important. The experiment of allowing such a diverse group to create a new field and write its founding document as a community project proved to be a success.
The spirit of cooperation necessary to create a forum where diverse views and backgrounds are included and respected serves the dual purpose of creating an inclusive community of scholars where individuals can thrive, while producing the best mathematical and scientific results as a corollary of those efforts. This attitude of selfless cooperation, striving for inclusivity, and valuing a diversity of opinions may have arisen spontaneously in the setting of the IAS [1], but it was nurtured, then and in the years since, by no one more than by Mike Shulman. Mike has given tirelessly, generously, exhaustively of his time and energy, and more importantly of his mathematical ideas and labors, to make our community what it is today: an exciting and beautiful field of mathematics pursued by a group of generous, thoughtful, and tolerant people. Mike is a brilliant mathematician who I know to also be a kind and generous person. He’s also human and occasionally makes mistakes - both mathematical and personal ones. And when he does, we should afford him the same tolerance that we would any other member of our community. We owe him our gratitude and respect.
Univalent regards,
Steve
[1] “It is fundamental in our purpose, and our express desire, that in the appointments to the staff and faculty as well as in the admission of workers and students, no account shall be taken, directly or indirectly, of race, religion, or sex. We feel strongly that the spirit characteristic of America at its noblest, above all the pursuit of higher learning, cannot admit of any conditions as to personnel other than those designed to promote the objects for which this institution is established, and particularly with no regard whatever to accidents of race, creed, or sex.” — IAS founders Louis Bamberger and his sister Caroline Bamberger Fuld, in a letter of invitation, dated June 4, 1930, to the Institute’s first Board of Trustees. Quoted from "A Diverse Community of Scholars“, The Institute Letter, Fall 2010, https://www.ias.edu/ideas/2010/diverse-community-of-scholars
Marc Bezem
Apr 17, 2022, 4:26:42 PM4/17/22
to Steve Awodey, Homotopy Type Theory
Thanks Steve, I fully support your point of view and you say it much better than I ever could.
In addition, this just in on sex vs gender:
Marc
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