The Probabilistic Age article on longtail.com
Joseph Dunphy
Let's see how long this comment stays posted:
http://www.longtail.com/the_long_tail/2005/12/the_probabilist.html
So dismayed was I, as somebody who actually has studied Probability at
the PhD level, to learn that the logic of Probability and Statistics
was inaccessible to the Mammalian brain! It was all that I could do to
not look up a certain Biostatistician with whom I have had many
interesting discussions and other meaningful moments and ask her for
clarity. "Honey, are we mammals?" But it was all too easy to picture
her opening her blouse and asking "what do you think, Joe", and there
was no way I'd be able to focus on work after that, so I had to learn
to live with my self-doubt, if only for the moment.
But pray, do tell which branch of the animal kingdom claims those of
us who have pursued studies in and contributed to the building of this
field, which mere Mammalian brains can't take in. On witnessing the
pallor of a measure theorist of my acquaintence, I imagined that we
might be fish, raising disturbing questions about those midautumn
clambakes some of us spoke of, for that is surely no way to treat
one's kin. But then I remembered how much I enjoyed my strolls up out
of the Sonoran Desert, and thought "I must surely not be a fish, or
even an amphibian. Perhaps a reptile?"
But as I remembered climbing higher and higher, I started remembering
how pleasant the crisp air atop the Santa Catalinas felt, and I was
sure that no lizard could possibly find such pleasure at the sight of
snow, no matter how hot he had been hours before. No, I thought, I
must surely be a bird. But then I got one look over the side of the
cliff I had just gotten done hiking along, and about four bowel
loosening minutes later, I was fairly sure that I couldn't fly. Though
I was sure that some of my ex-students, in their scientific zeal,
would have urged me to test that hypothesis by experiment, I decided
to accept my flightless status, and as I am decidely too short to be
an emu or an ostrich, and decidedly too tall to be a penguin, the
whole avian lineage was lost to me and mine.
So as you can see, our entire department, graduate students and
faculty alike, is now left in crisis, with no biological sense of
itself, all hoping that you might help us find resolution. I can only
pray that you can find time in your busy schedule in which to do so.
Your humble servant,
Joseph Dunphy
Joseph Dunphy
To see if I've written any more about this or to return to your ring
http://groups.google.com/group/joseph_dunphy/web/probabilistic-age-redirection