over the course of this past week, i proved a lemma and went to work on a proof of the main theorem and tried to generalise it, through various cases as given by the Sobolev Embedding Theorem(s).
as it happens, it wasn't a proof after all. in fact, the lemma isn't true; the counter-example, embarrassingly enough, is the identity mapping from the unit disc to itself.
(well, you might need a neighborhood of the disc,
but let's let bygones be bygones)
but let's let bygones be bygones)
at any rate, it means that a week's worth of time and energy has effectively been wasted. being a person who doesn't believe in an afterlife and has a 2-year clock running, this pi$$es me off to no end. worse yet, it was a waste of the advisor's time, which is embarrassing and intolerable.
i was a sourpuss from the time i met with my advisor and learned this cruel truth to sometime around midday today, though pietro, a visiting prof, did make me laugh uncontrollably last night, when we were at the brown jug. [1]
it was around midday when i realised that it didn't really matter that this was the second or third idea in a row which failed, nor does it really matter if i ever prove anything about these 2-dimensional harmonic extensions or not.
it stung, because i could add it to "the list."
it reminded me of how i never resolved the isoperimetric problem on the heisenberg group when i worked with my undergraduate mentor, or how i never resolved my hasty conjecture in operator theory during that summer REU in california. on bad days i usually measure my adult life by how many research problems i wanted to solve but couldn't, for reasons of time, willpower, and cleverness;
it's the price for believing that "anything is possible," given the right inclination of mind. if you believe that you are capable of anything, then any failure is always your own fault; otherwise you wouldn't have been capable of it.
anyways, i now deem it the past: it's one more memory of my stupidity and one more problem unsolved, if only for the moment. the advisor had the tact to suggest another approach for extensions of boundary homeomorphisms in two dimensions, and i'll get to it by sunday or monday .. but right now, i really don't care. i don't care about much of anything except one casual realisation:
i don't have a life anymore. i don't have any hobbies or interests or long-term fun projects. my efforts have been unilateral as of late, and as usual i've put my life "on hold" for so long that it's become frayed at the edges and in some danger of tearing apart.
so i'm spending the weekend away from math: away from the thesis work, away from the joint work with my co-author, away from it all. i've gotten over hating myself for the moment, but that doesn't mean that i like myself very much. i need a holiday and since i won't have any apropos vacation time until late june or so, i might as well take the weekend off and try not to worry about anything academic, professional, or even domestic.
..
chri$t. it was such a fu¢king stupid mistake ..
..
and now, back to forgetting about mathematics. \:
[1] the joke is one of the lowest forms of humor: it uses a pun, but i couldn't help but laugh anyway:
A French fry walks into a bar, and says to the barkeep, "Give me a beer."
The barkeep replies, "Sorry. We don't serve fries here."
The barkeep replies, "Sorry. We don't serve fries here."
2 comments:
the variation i heard involved "sandwiches". but if you think about it, how can a sandwich walk into a bar? cmon, thats not even plausible. french fries, yes. sandwich, no.
when you mentioned "sandwich," it immediately reminded me of a simpsons episode where the simpsons join the ranks of the nouveau riche. at one point, homer is golfing and mr. burns is waiting for him to finish up already.
mr. burns: "for god's sake, man! use an open-faced club! a sand wedge!"
homer: "mmm .. open-faced club sand-wedge .."
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