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Robert M. Tufty


Short Informal Biography
Formal Academic Training
Academic Publications and Memberships
Culture and Formality
Current Activities and Interests
Mystical Stuff

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Short Informal Biography

Robert Tufty is The Homeless Mathematician and has wandered around in the realm of computers for almost 30 years before Cyberspace became manifest. The Homeless Mathematician was naturally gifted in Mathematics (an 800 Math SAT), and formally trained with a BA from the University of Virginia College Mathematics Department. While at UVa, he provided programming services to several faculty members and became fascinated with computers as being "physical manifestations of truly interactive, purely mathematical entities". He remembers a time long, long ago, when Slide Rulers were hi-tech.

Over the years, he has worked for several major computer companies and successfully applied his mathematical talents to their problems. He has provided the primary 'gray-matter' capital for three start-up companies. Alas, there was no room in their homes to truly nurture his fascination with Mathematics. He was once told that a proposed solution was "too elegant."

In academic contrast to his professional business career, he continues his reading of scientific and mathematical journals and news. Since 1983, he has dedicated much time and study to the Calculus of Indication, as detailed in the "Laws of Form" by G. Spencer-Brown, a graduate of Bertrand Russell's. The Calculus of Indications is a non-numeric arithemtic, and serves as the gateway to imaginary Boolean values and forms.

As a historic note of irony, Robert Tufty once signed an anti-VietNam War petition, which was circulated under Professor Russell's authority, regarding the possibility of a war crimes tribunal. Needless to say, Professor Russell's works have been out of style with the establishment elite since that time, and his work is given little attention in academic circles anymore.

On a parallel track, The Homeless Mathematician traveled into the mystical realms to understand The Form and Substance of all Objects.  He learned the form of T'ai Chi during the mid-1970s, along with much work in consciousness-raising, meditation, facilitation, and mentoring. Some things were mastered, other weren't. There is always more karma to clean. He has been heard to say:

"If I make it
through this life,
without dying,
I'll be suprised."

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Culture and Formality

During the 1960's, many social conventions were scrutinized to determine whether they either nurtured or discouraged the potential achievement of "We, the people,...", on an individual basis. Hence, civil rights, feminism, human rights, individual rights in general, and "political correctness" in particular, now bestride late-twentieth-century history, even as "Hitler's ghost, ... bestrides mid-twentieth-century history" (Economist).

Manners and formality were kind of "lost in the wash" because so many aspects of classic etiquette and traditional manners were re-understood as being tools of oppression, used by the elite powers to control, manipulate, and exploit the unwashed masses. The cry of "Do your own thing!" had a quite informal, but regettably anti-formal, ring to it.

Now, kind reader of this page, those "times they are a-changing" have changed and now, at last, The Homeless Mathematician can

speak to and display for,
the whole world - or, at least,
to those who can hear and for those who can see.

The Homeless Mathematician promises that as you wander through these pages, "everything will compute" and there will be lots of source references and examples.

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Current Activities and Interests

Make no mistake about it. The Homeless Mathematician is up to his neck with stuff to do on the Home Page front. And just think, in another week or two, it will be time to open the doors to the public.

My, My.

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Updated 96/02/01.