Title: Mathematical Certainties and Operational Doubts: Autobiography of a Renaissance Man
Abstract: I noted the emphasis on the two fundamental questions that constitute the foundation of scientific cognition, 'What do you mean?' and 'How do you - Anatol Rapoport WHEN ANATOL RAPOPORT wrote his life story, Certainties and Doubts; A Philosophy of Life (Montreal: Black Rose Books, 2000), he had already devoted more than 40 years to using humankind's highest expressions (scientific and mathematical methods) to ameliorate the low side of human potential, and perhaps its lowest expression: war. Armed conflict persisted in the world as he wrote this book and it has clearly escalated since. Yet, his lifelong efforts in the study of peacemaking and conflict resolution took hold long ago and the fields continue to develop. In Certainties and Doubts, published when he was eighty-nine years old, Rapoport offers the torch he has carried to new generations, telling anyone interested what he has done and tried to do, what he believes, why he believes it, and what he believes ought to be - within the uncertainty and doubt of his scientific viewpoint. (p. 1) This intimate and readable autobiography intertwines Rapoport's passion for arts, science, pure mathematics, game theory, general systems theory, pacifism, socialism, and humanism with his Russian Jewish roots. His supportive, intellectual family laid foundations for his three masterful careers: one in piano performance, one in mathematical biology and game theory, and yet another in social psychology and peace studies. In Certainties and Doubts Rapoport also discusses the enduring connections, beginning in the 1940s, between his research and the general semantics theory of Alfred Korzybski. Rapoport's life path wound around the world, beginning in Lozovaya, Russia in 1911. His childhood registered the Bolshevik Revolution, the White Russian revolt, escape to Western Europe, and emigration to Chicago in 1922. A prodigy in the late 1920s and early 30s, he studied music in Chicago and Vienna. After performing and lecturing in the U.S. and Mexico, he joined the political left and lost interest in a piano performance career. Rapoport enrolled as a freshman at the University of Chicago in 1937. He earned a Ph.D. in mathematics in four years. When the U.S. entered World War II, Rapoport entered the U. S. Army Air Force and served in Alaska and India. He encountered general semantics while stationed in Alaska. A civilian lent to Rapoport her copy of Alfred Korzybski's Science and Sanity, which he dismissed as pretentious and dull and pompous nonsense. (p.3) However, within a year or two, he happened across S. I. Hayakawa's Language in Action. It clarified some of Science and Sanity's basics for him. Rapoport writes, To be sure, knowledge comes through words but only if there are `non-verbal' experiences behind the words. Knowledge that comes through strings of words alone is illusory. (So this is what Korzybski meant when he insisted that `the word was not the thing.') (p.79) He adds, I noted the emphasis on the two fundamental questions that constitute the foundation of scientific cognition, `What do you mean?' and `How do you know?' These questions relate both meaning and knowledge ultimately to experiences that people have in common. (p.80) He entered the general semantics movement in 1944 by submitting an article to ETC. article, Newtonian Physics and Aviation Cadets, discussed notional and semantically based misconceptions about physics he encountered as he trained future air pilots. (1) Hayakawa, then ETC editor, published the article in 1944. When Rapoport returned to the states, he met Korzybski and Hayakawa at a public seminar in Chicago. He was not impressed by the Structural Differential or with Korzybski's other demonstrations and he was taken aback when Korzybski demanded, You have read Science and Sanity ... how many times? (p.80) Although nonplused by Korzybski, Rapoport writes in Certainties and Doubts, The basic idea of what he called `general semantics' stuck with me. …
Publication Year: 2002
Publication Date: 2002-09-22
Language: en
Type: article
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