February 20, 2004

• Finite Relativity

  
  

  Today is the 18th birthday of my note

  
  

  “The Relativity Problem in Finite Geometry.”

  
  

  That note begins with a quotation from Weyl:

  
  

  “This is the relativity problem: to fix objectively a class of equivalent coordinatizations and to ascertain the group of transformations S mediating between them.”

  
  

  – Hermann Weyl, The Classical Groups, Princeton University Press, 1946, p. 16

  
  

  Here is another quotation from Weyl, on the profound branch of mathematics known as Galois theory, which he says

  
  

  “… is nothing else but the relativity theory for the set Sigma, a set which, by its discrete and finite character, is conceptually so much simpler than the infinite set of points in space or space-time dealt with by ordinary relativity theory.”

  
  

  – Weyl, Symmetry, Princeton University Press, 1952, p. 138

  
  

  This second quotation applies equally well to the much less profound, but more accessible, part of mathematics described in Diamond Theory and in my note of Feb. 20, 1986.
  
  

  • 3:24 pm
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