The other day, my daughter was kind enough to tear herself away from the study of spectral graph theory for the weekly conversation with dear old Dad. As often happens, we spent about an hour talking about Artificial Intelligence. Earlier in these conversations, during the winter, she said of AI, “It’s only as good as …

Continue reading ‘On the Eigenvalues of the Laplacian Matrix (NOT!)’ »

We have a new pope, and he is an American of mixed-race background. If we throw in the fact that he holds dual citizenship (US and Peru), and that he is the first pope to be a member of the Augustinian Order — to which Martin Luther also belonged — we have an impressive number …

Continue reading ‘A New Pope’ »