[Vision2020] Tomorrow's storm ...

[Kenneth Marcy]

On Wednesday 30 March 2011 07:04:59 Art Deco wrote:
> Kenneth Marcy writes:
> 
> "So, at present, the biggest danger from being out in the rain is getting
> one's clothing soaked, which, in an unattended worst case, might result in
> a Boolean catastrophe, but not radiation sickness."
> 
> Boolean catastrophe?  How could a swarm of logical errors result solely
> from getting soak?  It can easily happen by going to church or a cult
> gathering, but not usually by going out into the rain.

George Boole was the first professor of mathematics at Queen's College, Cork, 
Ireland. On a December day he walked two miles in a rain storm to arrive at a 
class at which he lectured still wearing his wet clothing. He caught a cold 
and a fever, which worsened to a pleural effusion, that caused his death 8 
December 1864, at age 49.

George Boole was a precocious youth who, after being tutored in Latin by a 
family friend, taught himself Greek. His fluency in French, German and Italian 
won him employment as an assistant teacher at 16 to help alleviate family 
financial difficulties. By age 20, he had opened his own school in Lincolnshire, 
England. He published his first mathematical paper at age 24. In 1849, at age 
34, he was appointed to his professorship at the then new school. He married 
in 1855, and fathered five daughters before his untimely death.


Ken