In other words: is it that some mathematical fields contain dangerous knowledge, or that they can only be truly explored by certain kinds of minds?
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If these famously infohazardous branches of mathematics did exist, and *cause* neurodivergence, it'd reassure mathematicians (who are overwhelmingly neurotypical).
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But if it turned out that you can't really be both neurotypical and do groundbreaking math in that field, that's less reassuring.
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And it offers an interesting theory about what kinds of societies can do really groundbreaking maths. For one thing, capitalist societies tend to kill the neurodivergent.
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A disturbingly large number of groundbreaking set theorists died of starvation.
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Perhaps places not hostile toward neurodivergent people, have better odds of not killing off people working in these famously infohazardous fields.
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"why do set theorists die of starvation and also act strange?" Well, your society also starves tons of strange people who aren't set theorists
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Basically: the infohazardous nature of some fields of mathematics, says a lot more about society than it does about mathematics.
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And to the degree it says anything about mathematics, it's not very reassuring to hard-working, intelligent neurotypicals.
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Cantor, Boltzmann, Gödel, Turing: all very likely had clinical depression. In fact, the incidence of depression is higher in mathematicians, of any field, than it is in the general population.
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Let's not even get started on Erdős...
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