Temporalité & Husserl

0:00 You know, on the one hand, groups and groupoids, and on the other, monoids and categories, supposed to be telling us about the general notion of space, or particularly about the notion of covariance, that I didn't understand at all, what the claim was. I mean, probably simply because I didn't follow what he was saying, that was... OK. Well, I thought that was the subject of the... But it's got something to do with his understanding of the notion of space in general. There's something, as I understand it, he thinks that... What he claims is the so-called mathematical structuralist notion of structure, which they never bother to define anyway, which I think is, frankly, is philosophically worthless. But his point is that it's too restrictive because it focuses entirely on isomorphisms and on bijective correspondence and on reversible mappings, and that in order to do what they want to do, With their kind of all-encompassing notion of structure, you have to take account of much richer kinds of mappings, which would include obviously partial morphisms of various kinds, and therefore a category-theoretic framework for that, which I understand the claim, but… Yeah, I mean, I understand the claim. The problem with those people, like, that we were listening to yesterday, like French and these other guys, are nothing personal, they're very nice people, but... The problem is they don't really know any serious mathematics. And the other problem, which I think is to some extent caused by the first, they, each of them, whenever they speak about objects and structures, clearly has a different, and in almost every case undefined, notion of structure or object in mind. Because, precisely because they won't learn category theory, they won't specify the maps in the category they're dealing with, they won't say what the domains and co-domains of the maps are, and therefore they can't obviously talk about any conditions on the mappings, sections or fibers of the mappings, in any controlled general way that will fit into a unifying framework. And this point is so obvious that frankly it's something which you would think you could get across to a, you know, to a first year student. So I'm afraid I've rather lost patience with their structuralist endeavours because as I say they have absolutely no clear, clearly defined general notion of structure to offer and they refuse to learn the one part of mathematics which does, yes this one, which does, no it's this one, they also refuse to learn the one.

2:30 You know, a body of mathematics which does arguably provide a good general notion of structure. So, you know, I think they're wasting their time. But I couldn't quite see what the criticism of them has to do with what we were discussing about the notion of covariance. I'm afraid I was lost in Andre's talk. It seemed to be a mishmash. But I thought what Mark had to say was very interesting. I only wish my French was better so I could really follow it at every point. Now you were telling me last time we talked that you're you're living here in Paris aren't you that's right yes in there and not far from the um that's right that's right i'm teaching uh philosophy department that's right that's right yes i remember he's teaching I must come out to Nanterre sometime. I'm sure there are some interesting things going on. Well, there was. We had the best... Are you saying we used to have a lot of very good people in Nanterre? We had the best for some years. It's no more the case now. Probably I will leave next year already. So, no... Can you choose at what age to take retirement in the French system? No, in principle not, but I have children, I have young children, and then we have young children in Europe. If you had some military obligations, which is not my case, but... No, I think at our age... You know, someone who has... you have lost some years... Yes, I understand, because you had to do military obligations, then they postpone, you're given more years before you retire. Which is, no, minus the 89. But if this is suitable for you, just say... No, no, I'm taking the... Oh, well, don't let me keep you, I mean... No, no, that's okay. Sure. I guess I spoke, I asked you because I had... If you have a paper, it would be interesting to put it in a... Logical, categorical, fray. And this I'm not able to.

5:00 And what is the paper on? It's on... OK, this is my bus. What a nuisance! It comes along just when you were going to say, well look, send me an email, that would be great. Yes, could you write it again? Yes. Why don't I... Hang on. Very quickly, hang on. I'm so sorry. I hope you can read my... I do hope you can read my score. That's a W. M-P-B-W. M-P-B-W. 1879 yahoo.co.uk. I'm sorry for such a score. Igor, thank you very much indeed. Good journey to Athens. Thank you very much. And you. Good journey back to Nanterre. Thanks. Au revoir. A bientot. Excuse me. A bientot? Oui, s'il vous plaît. Ah, sorry. D'accord. Un moment, un moment. C'est ok. Je vais l'ouvrir. Thank you for your patience. Thank you very much.