Recently I found on my shelves a dissertation on how relativity was received in the Netherlands, and began (at long last!) to read it. One name struck me immediately: Frederik van Eeden. For by coincidence I had just been reading him about lucid dreams, of which he had recorded some 500 in a diary. What is famousContinue reading “Significs: the dreamer”
Author Archives: Bas van Fraassen
You Can’t Fall Off a Mountain
The only philosophical novel about climbing I ever read was Kerouac’s Dharma Bums. The scramble up the Matterhorn in the Sierras is fabulous. Ray, the narrator, is enthusiastic, set on going to the top, but in fact becomes more and more terrified. “This is too high!” he yells to his friend Japhy, he can’t go on. He finds aContinue reading “You Can’t Fall Off a Mountain”
Lost in Pronunciation
At the Lyceum the second morning class was Latin. We had to take turns reading out a passage and give its translation. “Gallia est divisa … Gaul is divided into three parts” and the like. This raised a great puzzle for me. The Romans were formidable. I had learned about them from an early age, for in theContinue reading “Lost in Pronunciation”
A memory of Frederick Fitch (re: Heaven)
When I came to Yale in 1966 I was the most junior of our little logic group there and Frederick Brenton Fitch was the most senior. Fitch was only one of the very unusual people I found at Yale, but he was ‘the’ logician, and I learned some very strange things from him. Fitch wasContinue reading “A memory of Frederick Fitch (re: Heaven)”
1956
The Netherlands, robbed clean during the occupation, was still very poor. But Canada, in need of skilled construction workers, subsidized emigration. Barely able to cover our rent and food with his weekly wage, my father signed up. We were vaccinated. A large wooden container came, for our belongings and household goods. This would travel along with usContinue reading “1956”
Force
No plan survives first contact with the enemy, Field Marshal von Moltke wrote, and the same may be true of first contact with the class you are going to teach. One year, designing a course on philosophy and literature and meaning to favor my own tastes, I chose tales from Borges, William Golding, Eco, Calvino,Continue reading “Force”
Slipping in and out of music
Still hazy, jetlagged, I listened to Danny’s proposal, made somewhat dramatically, that we should all go have brunch next morning at Wijnand Fockink. I wasn’t sure what I heard, but didn’t bother, Dutch was mostly unintelligible in his mouth, despite much practice. Things became clear enough the next day. Having overslept, after only a coffee for breakfast,Continue reading “Slipping in and out of music”
A gentle, lucid spirit …
John Archibald Wheeler was loved and adored throughout physics — especially, naturally, in Princeton. After Wheeler retired he spent ten years in Texas, but returned to Princeton in 1986, and the university welcomed him back to his old office. From time to time his secretary would call and ask me — like others of his more juniorContinue reading “A gentle, lucid spirit …”
Memorie dal Silenzio
On any army base, in the evening, the flag is lowered and the trumpet sounds Retreat. In the Italian army, the moment of lowering the flag is called il silenzio. Nini Rosso chose the name when he composed the trumpet solo now so very well known, Il Silenzio. I play a version when I drive my car down California highways,Continue reading “Memorie dal Silenzio”
When I was nine
When I was nine I had my second tonsillectomy. I remembered the first one well, I had been seven. That had been a poor job. I was an outpatient, just brought in for the job, they must have given me to an intern to practice on. He was nervous, didn’t cut the thing clean off,Continue reading “When I was nine”
Bas van Fraassen's Commonplace Book 