This collection of reflections by Hermann Weyl is often quirky, controversial, provocative, and perhaps a bit "weird". But it is serious background commentary on a wide range of intellectual endeavours in logic, mathematics, physics, philosophy and other areas. It's really fascinating to read.
Hermann Klaus Hugo Weyl was a prolific innovator in a broad range of physics (particularly general relativity), mathematics and logic. He saw the philosophical significance in everything, which is not surprising for his time because physics used to be called "natural philosophy", and that perhaps is still a more accurate description of the core objectives of physics. (Nowadays many people think that the purpose of physics is to provide discoveries which can be exploited by engineers and entrepreneurs to make new products. The economic benefits of physics are really only a felicitous by-product of philosophical investigations.)
At the moment, I'm using this Dover book,
Levels of Infinity: Selected Writings on Mathematics and Philosophy
, for its insightful background comments on the early development of mathematical logic, particularly regarding the successes and failures of the formalist school of thinking led by Hilbert, and the effects on the formalist research program by Gödel and Gentzen in the 1930s. Weyl seems to have the technical details at his fingertips, for example the significance of Gentzen's transfinite proof of the consistency of number theory, which counteracted the famous negative result by Gödel, which said that number theory could not be proved to be consistent by logical arguments within the number theory framework. Gentzen's contrary theorem is less well known.
You can see the table of contents and other information in the Amazon preview. So I won't attempt to summarize this book. It is too broad in its scope to summarize anyway!
Weyl's ability to make connections between wide-ranging subjects was evident already in his much earlier
Raum · Zeit · Materie: Vorlesungen über allgemeine Relativitätstheorie
, where even the most technical aspects of general relativity are interpreted, as they should be, for their consequences for natural philosophy. In this "Levels of Infinity" collection, Weyl really seems to let loose and say exactly what he thinks. Even if he does seem a bit quirky, and you might not agree with everything he says, he was one of the deep thinkers, perhaps comparable to Ernst Mach in many ways.
Enjoy fast, free delivery, exclusive deals, and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime
and start saving today with fast, free delivery
Loading your book clubs
There was a problem loading your book clubs. Please try again.
Not in a club? Learn more
Join or create book clubs
Choose books together
Track your books
Bring your club to Amazon Book Clubs, start a new book club and invite your friends to join, or find a club that’s right for you for free.
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.
Frequently bought together
$15.71
Get it as soon as Tuesday, May 14
Only 12 left in stock - order soon.
+
Total price:
To see our price, add these items to your cart.
Choose items to buy together.
Customers who viewed this item also viewed
Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1
