FW: Pauli

Fri Jan 28 15:51:51 UTC 2011

At 10:40 AM -0500 1/28/11, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>I read the same book when I was twelve. And I remember the "googol" thing.
>But he didn't attribute it to his nephew.
>
>BTW, acc. to Google Books the passage doesn't exist.  Like the square root
>of -1.
>
>JL

>From the OED, which I just realized might elucidate the matter, s.v. GOOGOL:

1940 KASNER & NEWMAN Math. & Imagination i. 23
The name 'googol' was invented by a child (Dr.
Kasner's nine-year-old nephew) who was asked to
think up a name for a very big number, namely, 1
with a hundred zeros after it.

I knew there was a young nephew involved, I just forgot whose.

LH

>
>On Fri, Jan 28, 2011 at 10:29 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>wrote:
>
>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>  Subject:      Re: FW: Pauli
>>
>>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>  At 12:49 AM -0500 1/28/11, Seán Fitzpatrick wrote:
>>  >My father, who was a student of George Gamov at George Washington
>>  >University, told me of a time a student answered a query from Gamov in
>>  >class.  When Gamov looked at him silently, he added anxiously " Isn't that
>>  >right?".  To which Gamov replied "Right!?!?  That isn't even wrong."  This
>>  >would have been in the late '40s or early '50s.
>>  >
>>  >
>>
>>  Is that George Gamow of "googol" fame?  At least
>>  I recall first encountering "googol" and
>>  "googolplex" in Gamow's _One, Two, Three,
>>  Infinity_, where I recall he credited his young
>>  nephew for the term.  That was a while ago,
>>  though, so I may well be misremembering.
>>
>>  LH
>>
>>  >
>>  >It is perhaps relevant that though my father was a very honest man, one of
>>  >his favorite quips had to do with "never letting a slavish devotion to the
>>  >truth stand in the way of a good story".
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >Seán Fitzpatrick
>>  >Roses are #FF0000.  Violets are #0000FF.
>>  >
>>  >All of my base are belong to you.
>>  >
>>  >www.logomachon.blogspot.com
>>  >
>>  >  -----Original Message-----
>>  >From: Victor Steinbok [mailto:aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM]
>>  >Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2011 4:52 PM
>>  >Subject: Pauli
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >Wolfgang Pauli usually gets credit for the quit, "That's not right--it's
>>  >
>>  >not even wrong!" (or something similar, depending on source). The common
>>  >
>>  >reference for this is from Rudolph Peierls's 1960 recollections (I can't
>>  >
>>  >really call it an obituary):
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >Rudolph Peierls, "Wolfgang Ernst Pauli, 1900-1958." (Royal Society, GB)
>>  >
>>  >Biographical memoirs of fellows of the Royal Society 5:174-192 (1960)
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >Wiki not only highlights the whole episode in the article on Pauli:
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >>  Das ist nicht nur nicht richtig, es ist nicht einmal falsch! "Not only
>>  >
>>  >>  is it not right, it's not even wrong!"
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >but even has a separate entry for "not even wrong":
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >>  An argument that appears to be scientific is said to be not even wrong
>>  >
>>  >>  if it cannot be falsified (i.e., tested) by experiment or cannot be
>>  >
>>  >>  used to make predictions about the natural world. The phrase was
>>  >
>>  >>  coined by theoretical physicist Wolfgang Pauli, who was known for his
>>  >
>>  >>  colorful objections to incorrect or sloppy thinking. Rudolf Peierls
>>  >
>>  >>  writes that "a friend showed [Pauli] the paper of a young physicist
>>  >
>>  >>  which he suspected was not of great value but on which he wanted
>>  >
>>  >>  Pauli's views. Pauli remarked sadly, 'It is not even wrong.' "
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >It may be impossible to either verify or reject the origin of the
>>  >
>>  >phrase--Pauli died in 1958, leaving a large number of anecdotes about
>>  >
>>  >his life, but not a lot of biographical material, and the quip was
>>  >
>>  >originally supposed to be in German. However, recognizing Pauli's sense
>>  >
>>  >of humor, it is possible that he might have been mocking a religious
>  > >
>>  >argument that relied on a strawman statement that needed a rebuttal, e.g.,
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >http://goo.gl/2yadK
>>  >
>>  >Principles of the faith in relation to sin. By Orby Shipley. 1879
>>  >
>>  >>  Take three strict rules for guidance, in regard to devout jealousy
>>  >
>>  >>  against falling into little sins.
>>  >
>>  >>
>>  >
>>  >>  i. Never to allow self-indulgence in any known fault, however small.
>>  >
>>  >>
>>  >
>>  >>  People, in relation to this rule, may be heard to say, " Yes ; it is
>>  >
>>  >>  not right ; it is even wrong ; but, still, I do allow myself in such
>>  >
>>  >>  and such a liberty."
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >My brief search revealed little useful information and the statement may
>>  >
>>  >well be original with Pauli. I thought I would throw it out into the
>>  >
>>  >ether and see if anyone has the stomach to check it out deeper (and
>>  >
>>  >perhaps check it out in German as well).
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >      VS-)
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >PS: I was wondering about the origin because Pauli's other famous quip,
>>  >
>>  >also cited in Wiki has an alternative origin.
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >>  "Well, I'd say that also our friend Dirac has got a religion and the
>>  >
>>  >>  first commandment of this religion is 'God does not exist and Paul
>>  >
>>  >>  Dirac is his prophet'".
>>  >
>>  >
>>  >
>>   >As Wiki suggests, a similar statement was made much earlier about Robert
>>  >
>>  >Green Ingersoll. Although it's impossible to judge whether Pauli was
>>  >
>>  >familiar with the previous quip, the likelihood of coincidence seems
>>  >
>>  >rather small.
>>  >
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>
>
>
>--
>"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
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