Fitzgerald M., James I. the Mind of the Mathematician (Johns Hopkins

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Fitzgerald M., James I. the Mind of the Mathematician (Johns Hopkins The Mind of the Mathematician THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY PRESS } BALTIMORE Michael Fitzgerald and Ioan James T H E M I N D O F T H E M A N AT H E M AT I C I ∫ 2007 Michael Fitzgerald and Ioan James All rights reserved. Published 2007 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 987654321 The Johns Hopkins University Press 2715 North Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland 21218-4363 www.press.jhu.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Fitzgerald, Michael, 1946– The mind of the mathematician / Michael Fitzgerald and Ioan James. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn-13: 978-0-8018-8587-7 (hardcover : acid-free paper) isbn-10: 0-8018-8587-6 (hardcover : acid-free paper) 1. Mathematicians—Psychology. 2. Mathematics—Psychological aspects. 3. Mathematical ability. 4. Mathematical ability—Sex di√erences. I. James, I. M. (Ioan Mackenzie), 1928– II. Title. bf456.n7f58 2007 510.1%9—dc22 2006025988 A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. Contents Preface vii Introduction ix PART I } TOUR OF THE LITERATURE Chapter 1. Mathematicians and Their World 3 Chapter 2. Mathematical Ability 24 Chapter 3. The Dynamics of Mathematical Creation 42 PART II } TWENTY MATHEMATICAL PERSONALITIES Chapter 4. Lagrange, Gauss, Cauchy, and Dirichlet 67 Chapter 5. Hamilton, Galois, Byron, and Riemann 88 Chapter 6. Cantor, Kovalevskaya, Poincaré, and Hilbert 105 Chapter 7. Hadamard, Hardy, Noether, and Ramanujan 131 Chapter 8. Fisher, Wiener, Dirac, and Gödel 149 References 163 Index 175 This page intentionally left blank Preface Psychologists have long been fascinated by mathematicians and their world. In this book we start with a tour of the extensive literature on the psychol- ogy of mathematicians and related matters, such as the source of mathe- matical creativity. By limiting both mathematical and psychological techni- calities, or explaining them when necessary, we seek to make our review of research in this field easily readable by both mathematicians and psycholo- gists. In the belief that they might also wish to learn about some of the human beings who helped to create modern mathematics, we go on to profile twenty well-known mathematicians of the past whose personalities we find particularly interesting. These profiles serve to illustrate our tour of the literature. Among the many people we have consulted in the course of writing this book we would particularly like to thank Ann Dowker, Jean Mawhin, Allan Muir, Daniel Nettle, Brendan O’Brien, Susan Lantz, and Mikhail Treisman. We also wish to thank Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio (www.ohio .edu/oupress), for granting permission to reprint an excerpt from Don H. Kennedy’s biography of Sonya Kovalevskaya, Little Sparrow: A Portrait of Sonya Kovalevskaya. vii This page intentionally left blank Introduction Mathematics, according to the Marquis de Condorcet, is the science that yields the most opportunity to observe the workings of the mind. Its study, he wrote, is the best training for our abilities, as it develops both the power and the precision of our thinking. Henri Poincaré, in his famous 1908 lecture to the Société de Psychologie in Paris, observed that mathematics is the activity in which the human mind seems to take least from the outside world, in which it seems to act only of itself and on itself. He went on to describe the feeling of the mathematical beauty of the harmony of numbers and forms, of geometric elegance—the true aesthetic feeling that all real mathematicians know. According to the British mathematical philosopher Bertrand Russell (1910), mathematics possesses ‘‘not only truth but supreme beauty—a beauty cold and austere . yet sublimely pure, and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show.’’ In the words of Courant and Robbins (1941): ‘‘Mathematics as an expression of the human mind reflects the active will, the contemplative reason, and the desire for aesthetic perfection. Its basic elements are logic and intuition, analysis and construction, generality and individuality. Though di√erent traditions may emphasize di√erent aspects, it is only the interplay of these aesthetic forces and the struggle for their syntheses that constitute the life, usefulness, and supreme value of mathematical science.’’ The modern French mathemati- cian Alain Connes, in Changeux and Connes (1995), tells us that ‘‘exploring the geography of mathematics, little by little the mathematician perceives the contours and structures of an incredibly rich world. Gradually he de- velops a sensitivity to the notion of simplicity that opens up access to new, wholly unsuspected regions of the mathematical landscape.’’ ix x Introduction Nearly seventy years, ago the Scottish-American mathematician Eric Temple Bell set out to write about mathematicians in a way that would grip the imagination. In the introduction to his immensely readable Men of Mathematics, first published in 1937, he begins by emphasizing, ‘‘The lives of mathematicians presented here are addressed to the general reader and to others who might wish to see what sort of human beings the men were who created modern mathematics.’’ Unfortunately, it leaves the impression that many of the more notable mathematicians of the past were self-serving and quarrelsome. This is partly because Bell selected his subjects accordingly, but also because he was not above distorting the facts to make a good story. He was a man of strong opinions, not simply reflecting the prejudices of a bygone age. While the history of mathematics goes back thousands of years, psychol- ogy, in the modern sense, only originated in the nineteenth century. A special interest in mathematicians was present from the early years of the subject. The Leipzig neurologist Paul Julius Möbius (grandson of the math- ematician August Ferdinand Möbius), sought evidence of diagnostic cate- gories that might be related to the creative behavior of mathematicians in his Uber die Anlage zur Mathematik (‘‘on the gift for mathematics’’) of 1900. A little later the Swiss psychologists Edouarde Claparède and Théodore Flournoy organized an inquiry into mathematicians’ working methods, while in 1906 Poincaré gave the seminal lecture on mathematical invention mentioned earlier. Psychoanalysts have displayed relatively little interest in mathematicians, although they have a lot to say about creativity in general, with illustrations mainly from the arts. As Storr points out in his well- known book The Dynamics of Creation (1972), psychologists are primarily concerned with the causes that lie behind creativity, rather than the reasons that drive those who enjoy creative gifts to make full and e√ective use of them. The word genius often occurs in the literature, usually meaning much the same as ‘‘exceptionally able.’’ Some Reflections on Genius, by Lord Russell Brain (1960), provides a good introduction; other works are listed in the bibliography. The term has gradually changed in meaning over a long pe- riod, stretching back to classical times. Today the meaning seems rather uncertain, and we avoid using it ourselves. The material in the tour of the literature that forms the first part of this book is of necessity somewhat miscellaneous in character, but we have arranged the di√erent topics under three broad chapter headings. In the Introduction xi first chapter we describe the special attraction of mathematics and its dis- tinctive culture. To counter the popular impression that mathematicians are not interested in anything else, we give some examples of mathemati- cians who contributed to music and the other arts. For the second part of this book, we are dependent on reliable biographical information. For- tunately some excellent biographies of mathematicians have been written, and we mention some of these. Another popular misconception is that mathematicians spend their time making calculations. While this is not the case in general, there are some exceptional individuals, including a few mathematicians, who have an ex- traordinary ability to do so. These ‘‘lightning calculators,’’ who are known as savants, have intrigued psychologists for many years. Alfred Binet’s classic account of his investigations of two lightning calculators and others with savant skills, Psychologie des grands calculateurs et joueurs d’échecs (‘‘psy- chology of the great calculators and chess-players’’) of 1894, is still worth reading. We summarize what is known about them and then go on to discuss various other phenomena that have led some investigators to believe that there may be modules in the brain that specialize in calculation. In chapter two we present a summary of the vast literature on mathe- matical education, and we also discuss the vexed question of gender di√er- ence. Child prodigies sometimes emerge in mathematics, as they do in music and languages, although they do not always develop into full-fledged mathematicians. We give some striking examples. Finally we review the literature on the decline of productivity with age. This is well established across a wide range of activities; we present evidence to support the general belief that mathematics is no exception. In the last chapter of the first part of this book, we turn to the fascinating problem of mathematical creativity and the role of intuition: intuition is perception via the unconscious, according to Carl Jung. There is no better place to start than the well-known memoir, The Psychology of Invention in the Mathematical Field (1945), by Poincaré’s disciple Jacques Hadamard, which takes up many of the interesting questions raised by Poincaré in his famous lecture. At the same time that this book appeared, the Viennese psychiatrist Hans Asperger published a thesis in which he gave a clinical description of the mild form of autism to which his name has been at- tached, and this has turned out to have an important bearing on the study of creativity, especially in mathematics. xii Introduction Asperger syndrome, as the disorder is called, is much more common than classical autism.
Recommended publications
  • Rice and the Swc
    TION OF RICE ALUMNI VOLUME 40, NUMBER 3 FEBRUARY—MARCH 1984 RICE AND THE SWC ngui lowi INSIDE: Cuthbertson Interviews Hobby The Strange Case of William Sidis 1984 Self Study Preliminary Report FEB.-MAR. 1984, VOL. 40/6 Full-Time Hobby BY GILBERT M. CUTHBERTSON 4 Popular Rice political science pro essor Gilbert "Doc C" Cuthbertson interviews Texas Lieuten- EDITOR ant Governor William P HobbV, Jr. '53 about Rice, Austin, and what the future may hold. Virginia Hines '78 SCIENCE EDITOR The Strange Case of William Sidis 6 B.C. Robison Billed as the "world's youngest professor" when he came to study and teach at Rice in 1915, DESIGN "boy wonder" Sidis died 30 years later in obscurity. Now, as several books by or about Sidis are Carol Edwards about to make a belated appearance, his contributions are finally being reevaluated. PHOTOGRAPHER Pam Morris BY LINDA PHILLIPS DRISKILL '61 STUDENT ASSISTANTS On Being Rice . 8 Grace Marie Brown '84 Every ten years, virFien committees of administration, faculty, staff, students, and alumni sit Joan Hope '84 down to evaluate the university, feedback from the greater Rice community is vital. Here we offer preliminary conclusions and encourage readers to let committee chairmen know how OFFICERS OF THE ASSOCIATION OF RICE ALUMNI they feel about the state of the university in 1984. President, Joseph F. Reilly, Jr. '48 President-Elect, Harvin C. Moore, Love It or Leave It 10 1st Vice-President, Carl Morris '76 etbc Once again the old question is raging: should Rice throw in the towel in the Southwest Confer- 2nd Vice-President, Carolyn Devi ccahuoslae ence? In this issue professors James Castarieda and Harold Rorschach spell out the pros and Treasurer, Jack Williams '34 in his cons of keeping a Division I football team in Rice Stadium.
    [Show full text]
  • Acceleration and Enrichment: Drawing the Base Lines for Further Study
    1 ACCELERATION AND ENRICHMENT: DRAWING THE BASELINES FOR FURTHER STUDY Sanford J. Cohn THE CONTROVERSY IN PERSPECTIVE For nearly forty years prior to 1970, the acceleration versus enrichment argument lay dormant as far as the public was concerned. The Great Depression had eliminated the prerogative for public-interested disagreement for all but a few educational and psychological investigators. Before that time, however, there had been proponents of educational acceleration and others who favored enrich- ment. Each group considered its own a singularly appropriate underlying strategy for educating intellectually gifted youngsters. But with few jobs waiting for graduates after 1929, there seemed to be no reason or purpose even for brilliant students to finish their formal schooling. In the ensuing absence of public debate, the unrivaled assumptions implied, and even voiced, by advocates for enrich- ment became entrenched firmly in the nation’s public consciousness. Some of these assumptions were clear expressions of the mythology that had developed in regard to great intellectual talent and precocity. ‘‘Early ripe, early rot’’ was but one epigram that encouraged educators of the mid-1900s to suppress actively the rapid intellectual development experienced by some youths. Parents of such children were counseled to avoid even considering accelerative educational plans for their children. The price one ‘‘surely’’ would have to pay for moving more rapidly through the educational lock step than did one’s age mates washis or her ‘‘social and emotional adjustment.’’ Counselors predicted lives characterized by loneliness and despair for these children if they chose to skip a grade in school or even to move ahead more quickly in certain subjects.
    [Show full text]
  • Remarkable Physicists: from Galileo to Yukawa
    Remarkable Physicists From Galileo to Yukawa The 250 years from the second half of the seventeenth century saw the birth of modern physics and its growth into one of the most successful of the sciences.The reader will find here the lives of fifty of the most remarkable physicists from that era described in brief biographies.All the characters profiled have made important contributions to physics, through their ideas, through their teaching, or in other ways.The emphasis is on their varied life-stories, not on the details of their achievements, but, when read in sequence, the biographies, which are organized chronologically, convey in human terms something of the way in which physics was created.Scientific and mathematical detail is kept to a minimum, so the reader who is interested in physics, but perhaps lacks the background to follow technical accounts, will find this collection an inviting and easy path through the subject’s modern development. Remarkable Physicists From Galileo to Yukawa Ioan James Mathematical Institute, Oxford cambridge university press Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge cb2 2ru, UK Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521816878 © Ioan James 2004 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take
    [Show full text]
  • The History of IQ Author: Alistair Duff
    Perspectives articles The history of IQ Author: Alistair Duff It can be quite difficult to unravel the history of the notion of IQ and its assimilation into our everyday lives. The now ubiquitous IQ test was first used on a large scale to assess the capabilities of candidates for the American military during World War I. The topic quickly became the subject of great interest as it was correlated with everything from business success to life fulfilment. People wanted to know if they were gifted, how they could become gifted, and certainly how to treat their children who were, somewhat subjectively, very likely to be gifted. The sudden need to understand the efficacy of the individual mind took a serious and sinister detour shortly after IQ fever hit. On 11 January 1924, the New York Times published an editorial under the title “Precocity doesn’t wear well”. The subject of the piece was, according to folklore at the time, the most intelligent man in history. Born on 1 April 1898 in New York City, William James Sidis was the prototype child prodigy who was apparently able to read The New York Times with ease at a tender 18 months old. By age eight, William not only had eight languages under his belt, he also demonstrated exceptional mathematical abilities. His parents, overcome with pride, believed much of this was attributable to their philosophy of nurturing “a precocious and fearless love of knowledge”. This was to become an exceedingly unfortunate quote that the New York Times would refer back to in due course.
    [Show full text]
  • William James Sidis Is Recognized As the Person with the Highest IQ Ever
    Smarter Than Einstein? William James Sidis t was a bright January morning in 1910 when hundreds of leading professors and is recognized as Imathematicians from the prestigious Harvard University gathered in the great the person with the lecture hall on their campus in Cambridge, highest IQ ever tested. Massachusetts, to listen to a lecturer named He was acknowledged time speaking in public and his address got offWilliam to a Jamesbad start. Sidis. He For spoke Sidis itrather was hisquietly first as a budding genius and nervously, punctuating his speech with churlish grins, just like a child speaking at the age of two and before a large audience of adults. delivered lectures for In fact, Sidis was a child—he was 11 years old at the time! renowned professors Progressing through his speech, the boy became more self-assured. As the audience at the age of eleven. picked up more of what he was saying, Despite all the their eyes bulged and jaws dropped in amazement. Sidis was lecturing on a highly predictions about only to top mathematicians. Not even all the his bright future professorsdeveloped scientificin this group theme of that chosen was listeners familiar could follow the youth’s complex line of as an academician, reasoning. Sidis confounded As the boy concluded his address, a professor told the reporters who had the pundits when he gathered to cover the lecture that this young man, William James Sidis, would pursued a completely undoubtedly go on to become one of the different course in greatest mathematicians in history. The national headlines the following day life than anyone had screamed about the child sensation.
    [Show full text]
  • The Buddha and His Teachings
    TheThe BuddhaBuddha andand HisHis TTeachingseachings Venerable Narada Mahathera HAN DD ET U 'S B B O RY eOK LIBRA E-mail: [email protected] Web site: www.buddhanet.net Buddha Dharma Education Association Inc. The Buddha and His Teachings Venerable Nārada Mahāthera Reprinted for free distribution by The Corporate Body of the Buddha Educational Foundation Taipei, Taiwan. July 1998 Namo Tassa Bhagavato Arahato Sammā-Sambuddhassa Homage to Him, the Exalted, the Worthy, the Fully Enlightened One Contents Introduction ................................................................................... vii The Buddha Chapter 1 From Birth to Renunciation ........................................................... 1 Chapter 2 His Struggle for Enlightenment ................................................. 13 Chapter 3 The Buddhahood ........................................................................... 25 Chapter 4 After the Enlightenment .............................................................. 33 Chapter 5 The Invitation to Expound the Dhamma .................................. 41 Chapter 6 Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta ................................................ 54 Chapter 7 The Teaching of the Dhamma ..................................................... 75 Chapter 8 The Buddha and His Relatives ................................................... 88 Chapter 9 The Buddha and His Relatives ................................................. 103 iii Chapter 10 The Buddha’s Chief Opponents and Supporters .................. 118 Chapter
    [Show full text]
  • Crowds and Speculation: a Study of Crowd Phenomena in the U.S
    COPENHAGEN BUSINESS SCHOOL CROWDS AND SPECULATION: SOLBJERG PLADS 3 DK-2000 FREDERIKSBERG DANMARK WWW.CBS.DK ISSN 0906-6934 A STUDY OF CROWD PHENOMENA IN THE U.S. FINANCIAL MARKETS 1890 TO 1940 Print ISBN: 978-87-93579-24-8 Online ISBN: 978-87-93579-25-5 Kristian Bondo Hansen CROWDS AND SPECULATION: A STUDY OF CROWD PHENOMENA IN THE U.S. FINANCIAL MARKETS 1890 TO 1940 Doctoral School of Organisation and Management Studies PhD Series 26.2017 PhD Series 26-2017 Crowds and Speculation A study of crowd phenomena in the U.S. financial markets 1890 to 1940 Kristian Bondo Hansen Main supervisor: Professor Christian Borch of Copenhagen Business School Second supervisor: Senior Lecturer Peter Knight of The University of Manchester Doctoral school of Organisation and Management Studies Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy Copenhagen Business School Frederiksberg, 2017 Kristian Bondo Hansen Crowds and Speculation: A study of crowd phenomena in the U.S. financial markets 1890 to 1940 1st edition 2017 PhD Series 26-2017 © Kristian Bondo Hansen ISSN 0906-6934 Print ISBN: 978-87-93579-24-8 Online ISBN: 978-87-93579-25-5 The Doctoral School of Organisation and Management Studies (OMS) is an interdisciplinary research environment at Copenhagen Business School for PhD students working on theoretical and empirical themes related to the organisation and management of private, public and voluntary organizations. All rights reserved. No parts of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
    [Show full text]
  • FLYING RECORDS ARE Being Broken Every Few Days, but When
    FLYING RECORDS ARE Being broken every few days, but when we think a temperature record has been broken someone digs up a high or low figure that has, not been surpassed. According to Professor Simpson, who keeps the records at the University of North Dakota, minus 44 degrees is the lowest temperature ever officially recorded at Grand Forks, and he suggests that that low temperature may have been equaled at Grand Forks on an earlier occasion 'before a station was established here, but when records were kept at various army posts in other parts of the state. The New York Times tells us that on January 10, 1875, the thermometer in Manhattan registered 6 degrees below zero. That record stood until December 30, 1917, when a mark of 13 below was reached. That is the low record for New York so far as known. The abnormally high records of this summer were about the same as those of 1872, 1896 and 1898. If one only had the records there is an all-time high and an all-time low for every locality. Those extremes are approached occasionally, and once in a long time one of them is passed. But in spite of all that we may think about weather extremes and changes in climatic conditions, it has at some time been just about as hot and just about as cold at some other time as now, and the temperatures of the present are just as extreme as those of former years. A COPY OF THE BOSTON Transcript just received contains an article by E.
    [Show full text]
  • The Role of GH Hardy and the London Mathematical Society
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Elsevier - Publisher Connector Historia Mathematica 30 (2003) 173–194 www.elsevier.com/locate/hm The rise of British analysis in the early 20th century: the role of G.H. Hardy and the London Mathematical Society Adrian C. Rice a and Robin J. Wilson b,∗ a Department of Mathematics, Randolph-Macon College, Ashland, VA 23005-5505, USA b Department of Pure Mathematics, The Open University, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK Abstract It has often been observed that the early years of the 20th century witnessed a significant and noticeable rise in both the quantity and quality of British analysis. Invariably in these accounts, the name of G.H. Hardy (1877–1947) features most prominently as the driving force behind this development. But how accurate is this interpretation? This paper attempts to reevaluate Hardy’s influence on the British mathematical research community and its analysis during the early 20th century, with particular reference to his relationship with the London Mathematical Society. 2003 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Résumé On a souvent remarqué que les premières années du 20ème siècle ont été témoins d’une augmentation significative et perceptible dans la quantité et aussi la qualité des travaux d’analyse en Grande-Bretagne. Dans ce contexte, le nom de G.H. Hardy (1877–1947) est toujours indiqué comme celui de l’instigateur principal qui était derrière ce développement. Mais, est-ce-que cette interprétation est exacte ? Cet article se propose d’analyser à nouveau l’influence d’Hardy sur la communauté britannique sur la communauté des mathématiciens et des analystes britanniques au début du 20ème siècle, en tenant compte en particulier de son rapport avec la Société Mathématique de Londres.
    [Show full text]
  • Alan Turing 1 Alan Turing
    Alan Turing 1 Alan Turing Alan Turing Turing at the time of his election to Fellowship of the Royal Society. Born Alan Mathison Turing 23 June 1912 Maida Vale, London, England, United Kingdom Died 7 June 1954 (aged 41) Wilmslow, Cheshire, England, United Kingdom Residence United Kingdom Nationality British Fields Mathematics, Cryptanalysis, Computer science Institutions University of Cambridge Government Code and Cypher School National Physical Laboratory University of Manchester Alma mater King's College, Cambridge Princeton University Doctoral advisor Alonzo Church Doctoral students Robin Gandy Known for Halting problem Turing machine Cryptanalysis of the Enigma Automatic Computing Engine Turing Award Turing test Turing patterns Notable awards Officer of the Order of the British Empire Fellow of the Royal Society Alan Mathison Turing, OBE, FRS ( /ˈtjʊərɪŋ/ TEWR-ing; 23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954), was a British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst, and computer scientist. He was highly influential in the development of computer science, giving a formalisation of the concepts of "algorithm" and "computation" with the Turing machine, which can be considered a model of a general purpose computer.[1][2][3] Turing is widely considered to be the father of computer science and artificial intelligence.[4] During World War II, Turing worked for the Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS) at Bletchley Park, Britain's codebreaking centre. For a time he was head of Hut 8, the section responsible for German naval cryptanalysis. He devised a number of techniques for breaking German ciphers, including the method of the bombe, an electromechanical machine that could find settings for the Enigma machine.
    [Show full text]
  • The Death of the Public Disclosure Tort: a Historical Perspective
    Articles The Death of the Public Disclosure Tort: A Historical Perspective Samantha Barbas* In 1890, Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis, in their famous Harvard Law Review article The Right to Privacy, called for a new legal right that would allow the victims of truthful but embarrassing press publicity to sue in tort and recover damages for emotional harm.1 Currently, in most states, it constitutes a tort if the disclosure of "matter concerning the private life of another" would be highly offensive to a reasonable person and the matter is not "of legitimate concern to the public." If the disclosed subject matter is of legitimate public concern, the newsworthiness privilege immunizes the disclosure.2 * Ph.D., History, University of California, Berkeley; J.D. Stanford Law School. 1. Samuel Warren & Louis Brandeis, The Right to Priiacy, 4 HARv. L. REV. 193 (1890). This piece is generally regarded as one of the most influential law review articles in American history (it "did nothing less than add a chapter to our law," in the words of Roscoe Pound). Melville B. Nimmer, The Right of Publicity, 19 LAW & CONTEMP. PROBS. 203 (1954). 2. RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF TORTS § 652D (1977). Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities, Vol. 22, Iss. 2 [2010], Art. 1 Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities [Vol. 22:171 However, for all intents and purposes, the public disclosure of private facts tort-one of the four branches of the privacy tort,3 the "mass communication tort of privacy"---is generally regarded as "dead."5 "Stunted," an "anachronism," and "surprisingly weak," at best.6 Scholars have urged that its "remains" be formally "interred."7 The standard response given in the scholarly literature for the "death" is the broad definition of newsworthiness.
    [Show full text]
  • Journal of Media Law & Ethics
    UNIVERSITY OF BALTIMORE SCHOOL OF LAW JOURNAL OF MEDIA LAW & ETHICS Editor ERIC B. EASTON, PROFESSOR OF LAW University of Baltimore School of Law Editorial Assistant Angela Kershner EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS BENJAMIN BENNETT-CARPENTER, Special Lecturer, Oakland Univ. (Michigan) WALTER M. BRASCH, Professor of Mass Comm., Bloomsburg Univ. of Pa. STUART BROTMAN, Distinguished Professor of Media Management & Law, Univ. of Tennessee L. SUSAN CARTER, Professor, Michigan State University LOUIS A. DAY, Alumni Professor, Louisiana State University ANTHONY FARGO, Associate Professor, Indiana University AMY GAJDA, Assistant Professor, University of Illinois STEVEN MICHAEL HALLOCK, Assistant Professor, Point Park University MARTIN E. HALSTUK, Associate Professor, Pennsylvania State University CHRISTOPHER HANSON, Associate Professor, University of Maryland ELLIOT KING, Professor, Loyola University Maryland JANE KIRTLEY, Silha Professor of Media Ethics & Law, University of Minnesota NORMAN P. LEWIS, Assistant Professor, University of Florida PAUL S. LIEBER, Assistant Professor, University of South Carolina KAREN M. MARKIN, Dir. of Research Development, University of Rhode Island KIRSTEN MOGENSEN, Associate Professor, Roskilde University (Denmark) KATHLEEN K. OLSON, Associate Professor, Lehigh University RICHARD J. PELTZ-STEELE, Professor of Law, Univ. of Mass. School of Law KEVIN WALL SAUNDERS, Professor of Law, Michigan State Univ. College of Law JAMES LYNN STEWART, Associate Professor, Nicholls State University DOREEN WEISENHAUS, Associate Professor, University of Hong Kong KYU HO YOUM, Jonathan Marshall First Amend. Chair Prof., Univ. of Oregon Submissions The University of Baltimore Journal of Media Law & Ethics (ISSN1940-9389) is an on- line, peer-reviewed journal published quarterly by the University of Baltimore School of Law. JMLE seeks theoretical and analytical manuscripts that advance the understanding of media law and ethics in society.
    [Show full text]