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Encounters With Infinity: A Meta-mathematical Dissertation

by Michael Van Laanen

256 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #02-0027; ISBN 1-55369-214-4; US$24.50, C$29.95, EUR19.50, £13.50

This thesis is presented in the hope that it will resonate with mathematicians and others who are interested in analysis concepts and pure number theory.

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about the book -- from the author      excerpt      catalogue info

About the Book -- From the Author The original title of this manuscript was Pages - A Voyage to Infinity. It's kinda like Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass; a collection of poems with an underlying mystical theme. My dissertation is a kaleidoscope puzzle of images and thoughts and concepts and ideas taken from mysticism, science, logic, and mathematics. The end result, as the puzzle pieces are linked together, is a new portrait of Number. The reader is challenged to solve a conceptual picture puzzle using the chaotic scattering of puzzle pieces set forth in the thesis. Some of the pieces challenge established ideas. Some of the pieces are decoys leading to dead ends. Some are background. Others are transition pieces. And, there are pieces that give the reader glimpses of me, the writ er of this thesis. So, exact ly what is infinit y? As the pieces of the puzzle are put together a new concept of infinity emerges, a concept that may be of interest to the mystics, the philosopher, the quantum physicist, and mathematicians who are open to a new window through which to view reality.

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Excerpt

Nov. 1993 PUZZLES

PUZZLES: When you were a kid did you ever play the game called, "Take a Trip With Me?" It goes like this: "I'm going on a trip. See if you can come along by telling me what you are planning to bring. I'm bringing apples and carrots but not peaches or pears; root beer and Cheez-its but not biscuits or water; sheep and cattle but not horses or goats. Are you coming with me? What are you planning to bring?" NOTE: The key to this particular trip is words with double letters. I can tell if you're coming along by whether or not the things you want to bring contain double letters. Simple, of course, but the secret to coming along on our journey to innfinity, in this book, is far more complicated than double letters.

In this book we'll be taking a sailing trip of the mind, and I'll tell you up front that the secret lies in bringing NOTHING along. That's right, not anything. This is a trip in consciousness. Consciousness is the light we shine on the outward world of the senses. What we experience with our senses is what our mind records. Like it or not, we are all on this journey of life that ends in death. Or does it? As we travel along, our ego assembles the puzzle pieces into our personal philosophy. This is all we have to chart our course into eternity. However, I should warn you that a philosophy is not what we are seeking here. Our journey begins with the ZEN mind of no abode: Zero. Sunyata. The Void. Innfinity.

Puzzle boxes show a picture of the puzzle and state the number of pieces - say 250, 500 or 1000. We know what the end result will be from the start. After scattering the pieces, our first task is to turn them all right-side up. The second is to find the ones with straight edges so we can set the borders, starting with the four corners. Then we do our best to sort out the remaining pieces by color. Next we find pieces that fit in to the border, or others that fit together in groups.

The puzzle I want you to solve in this journey doesn't have a picture to guide you and it doesn't have a defined border. Your daily thoughts, emotions, and feelings are your puzzle pieces; you are the artist, the canvas, and the picture. And, if "time" finds you ready, you will put the pieces acquired in this life back in to the "void" where they came from. Then you will be free to move on. Climb aboard, and let's start on this conceptual journey from self to Self, from infinity to Infinity and Innfinity.

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Catalogue Information

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