CartesianSeminar

The Potsdam Cartesian Seminar is an open topic weekly seminar that was started in 2000 by Rupert Klein and Cezar Ionescu at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and is located at the Institute of Computer Science of the University of Potsdam since 2014. Guided by the rules René Descartes formulated in his “Discours de la méthode” we aim for a thorough understanding of the texts we read.

Participants

Present

Nikolas Bertrand, Sebastian Böhne, Nicola Botta, Nuria Brede, Georg Duchrau, Christoph Glinzer, Jan Heuer, Cezar Ionescu, David Linkiewicz, Tim Richter, Max Wiedenhöft

Past

Marc Beilcke, Frederick Brumm, Margrit Dittmann, Ingram Jaccard, Henrik Jürges, Manuel Keilmann, Thomas Kern, Christoph Kreitz, Eva Richter, Juliane Scherlitzki, Carla Schreiber, Matthias Seidel, Jessica Trebst, Luise Werner, Axel Wiepke

Guests are always welcome!

Place and time

Tuesdays, 10-12 am
Institute of Computer Science, University of Potsdam
Campus Griebnitzsee (August-Bebel-Str. 89)
Building 4, Room 2.01

Current reading (winter term 2019)

starting February 25th: on Lawvere’s ETCS

• Leinster - 2012 - Rethinking Set Theory

January 21st to February 10th: Christoph on Random Walks and Electric Networks

Selection from

• Doyle, Snell - 1984(2000) - Random Walks and Electric Networks

January 7th and 14th: Nico on Graphical Languages

We read the first half of

• Coecke - 2016 - From quantum foundations via natural language meaning to a theory of everything and selected material from
• Coecke, Kissinger - 2017 - Picturing Quantum Processes

starting November 19th: Dynamical Systems

• Kuznetsov - Elements of Applied Bifurcation Theory - we read the introductory chapter 1

starting October 8th: Sebastian on Manfred Spitzer’s “Digitale Demenz” - continuation

• Spitzer - 2012 - Digitale Demenz
• Appel, Schreiner - 2014 - Digitale Demenz? Mythen und wissenschaftliche Befundlage zur Auswirkung von Internetnutzung
• Spitzer - 2015 - Über vermeintliche neue Erkenntnisse zu den Risiken und Nebenwirkungen digitaler Informationstechnik
• Appel, Schreiner - Leben in einer digitalen Welt: Wissenschaftliche Befundlage und problematische Fehlschlüsse - Stellungnahme zur Erwiderung von Spitzer

Archive

Summer term 2019

September 17th, 24th, October 1st: Blockchain technology

• Nakamoto - 2008 - Bitcoin - A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System
• Mazières - 2015 - The Stellar Consensus Protocol - A Federated Model for Internet-level Consensus

starting July 23rd: Jan on Answer set programming

• Janhunen, Niemelä - 2016 - The Answer Set Programming Paradigm
• Lifschitz - 2016 - Answer Sets and the Language of Answer Set Programming
• Gebser, Schaub - 2016 - Modeling and Language Extension

July 2nd, 9th, 16th: Nicola on responsibility and blame

• Chockler, Halpern - 2004 - Responsibility and Blame: A Structural Model Approach

starting June 4th: Sebastian on Manfred Spitzer’s “Digitale Demenz”

• Spitzer - 2012 - Digitale Demenz
• Appel, Schreiner - 2014 - Digitale Demenz? Mythen und wissenschaftliche Befundlage zur Auswirkung von Internetnutzung
• Spitzer - 2015 - Über vermeintliche neue Erkenntnisse zu den Risiken und Nebenwirkungen digitaler Informationstechnik

May 21st, 28th : Nicola on thermodynamics

• Straumann - 1986 - Thermodynamik

April 16th - May 14th :

• Hughes - 1989 - Why functional programming matters - see also
  • the Keynote by John Hughes and Mary Sheeran at Lambda Days 2017
  • Haskell implementation of Hughes’ examples (incomplete): hughes.lhs

Winter term 2018/2019

19. and 26.02.2019 : Jessica on DNA computing

• Amos, Paun, Rozenberg, Salomaa - 2002 - Topics in the theory of DNA computing

with sidesteps to

• Adleman - 1994 - Molecular computation of solutions to combinatorial problems
• Salomaa - 1981 - Jewels of formal language theory

starting January 2019: Nicola on thermodynamics

• Straumann - 1986 - Thermodynamik
• Bridgman - 1922 - Dimensional Analysis

11. and 18.12.2018 : Luise on Hans Liebigs “Konrad Zuse - Erfinder des Computers”

• Hans Liebig - 2011 - Konrad Zuse, Erfinder des Computers - im Vergleich mit Alan Turing und John v. Neumann
• online Simulation of Zuse’s Z3

September 2018

• Jan von Plato: The Development of Proof Theory (SEP)

with sidesteps to

• Gentzen - 1935 - Untersuchungen über das logische Schliessen I und II
• Wadler - 2015 - Propositions as types - see also Video

Summer term 2018

June 2018 - Georg on “Ernst Mach: The Science of Mechanics”

• Mach - 1919 - The Science of Mechanics
• Mach - 1897 - Die Mechanik in ihrer Entwicklung - historisch-kritisch dargestellt (3rd ed)
• Ernst Mach - 1912 - Die Mechanik in ihrer Entwicklung - historisch-kritisch dagestellt
  • see latex copy Introduction and parts of Chpt 2 by Bernd Paysan

March 2018

• Richard von Mises: Wahrscheinlichkeit, Statistik und Wahrheit
• Richard von Mises: Probability, Statistics, and Truth
• see also: Interpretations of Probability (SEP)

Winter term 2017/18

proposals for summer term 2018

• Nicola:
  • Richard von Mises - 1928 - Wahrscheinlichkeit, Statistik und Wahrheit
  • Thomas Kuhn: Black Body Theory and the Quantum Discontinuity 1894-1912 (Chicago & London, 1978)
• Tim:
  • McBride - Turing-Completeness Totally Free

January 2018

• Ulrike Herrmann - Kein Kapitalismus ist auch keine Lösung - Kapitel 3 on Adam Smith
• see also: Adam Smith’s Moral and Political Theory (SEP)

October 2017 : Pavlović, Escardó - 2001 - Calculus in Coinductive Form

• we’ll read the version with notes by Favio Miranda from the Seminar “Recursion for Coalgebras” 2001
• published paper: Pavlović, Escardó - 1998 - Calculus in Coinductive Form (IEEE Symposium Logic in Computer Science)
• see also: Continuity and Infinitesimals (SEP)
• Nicola’s Idris formalization: CoinductiveCalculus.lidr

Summer term 2017

• Ross - Game Theory (SEP)
  • see also: 2bridges.txt

Winter term 2016/17

• presented by Axel: The Turing Test (SEP)
• Paul Lorenzen - 1965 - Methodisches Denken

Summer term 2016

• Noam Chomsky - 1956 - Three Models for the Description of Language
• Hans Wäsche - 1959 - Eine Bemerkung zur Paradoxie des Zeno von Elea über “Achilles und die Schildkröte”

Winter term 2015/16

• Korb - 1977 - Einführung in die Spieltheorie mit Beispielen aus der Wirtschaftspraxis
• Brown, Priest - 2004 - Chunk and permeate, a paraconsistent inference strategy. part I - the infinitesimal calculus
• presented by Carla and Thomas: Dirk Hoffmann - 2011 - Grenzen der Mathematik - Kapitel 4 : Beweistheorie
• Ingeborg Brettschneider-Clasen - 1967 - Das Antinomieproblem

Summer term 2015

• Einstein - 1921 - Über die spezielle und allgemeine Relativitätstheorie
• presented by Frederick:
  • Turing - 1950 - The Word Problem in Semi-Groups with Cancellation
  • Boone - 1958 - An Analysis of Turing’s “The Word Problem in Semi-Groups with Cancellation”

Winter term 2014/15

• Abel, Pientka, Thibodeau, Setzer: Copatterns - Programming Infinite Structures by Observations
• presented by Tim: Ihringer - 2003 - Allgemeine Algebra
  • see also: Hyland, Power - 2007 - The Category Theoretic Understanding of Universal Algebra - Lawvere Theories and Monads

Summer term 2014

• Planck - 1932 - Der Kausalbegriff in der Physik
• Planck - 1908 - Die Einheit des physikalischen Weltbildes
• Turner - 2004 - Total functional programming
• Wells - 1995 - Communicating Mathematics - Unseful Ideas from Computer Science

Winter term 2013/14

• Tarski - 1986(1966) - What are logical notions?
• Tarski - 1935 - Der Wahrheitsbegriff in den formalisierten Sprachen

Summer term 2013

• continued: Frege - Begriffsschrift
• Hilbert - 1918 - Axiomatisches Denken
• Frege - 1891 - Function und Begriff

Winter term 2012/13

• Turing - 1936 - On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem
• Sebastian presents Frege - 1879 - Begriffsschrift

Summer term 2012

• Tarski - 1936 - Grundlegung der wissenschaftlichen Semantik
• Lawvere - 1969 - Diagonal Arguments and Cartesian Closed Categories

Winter term 2011/12

• Kolmogorov - 1931 - Zur Deutung der intuitionistischen Logik
• Church - 1932 - A Set of Postulates for the Foundation of Logic
• Cardone, Hindley - 2009 - Lambda-Calculus and Combinators in the 20th Century