Timeline for What are some examples of interesting uses of the theory of combinatorial species?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
11 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 16, 2018 at 17:57 | history | edited | Igor Pak | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
link updated
|
| Jul 24, 2015 at 5:03 | history | edited | Igor Pak | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
link updated
|
| Apr 26, 2010 at 11:57 | comment | added | Jacques Carette | Some chapters of Flajolet-Sedgewick were already available in 1994 (as they were writing them, I know Philippe would put them up on his web page, even back then.) [I was hosted in Flajolet's group 1993-1996] | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 23:56 | comment | added | Michael Lugo | Igor, you're right; I was being deliberately provocative. And I'm pretty sure I've seen citations to Flajolet-Sedgewick back in the late 90s. | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 19:28 | comment | added | Igor Pak | @Michael Right, this is actually another very good "competitor"... But "15 moths ago" is a bit misleading, I think. Versions of the book have been available on the web for maybe 10 years. Speaking of citations and to follow up on my CS comparisons, Garey & Johnson's 1979 book has been cited over 35,000 times! | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 19:19 | comment | added | Igor Pak | @Pietro No, I don't mean a close analogy with complexity - just on the level of heuristic and occasional formal application. I wanted to make this comparison since I think CS ideas are by far much better known now, and often taken for granted. When you realize that many CS ideas are less than 30 years old, you can see a profound but often very informal influence they had over our thinking. I think comb-sp influence is often just as informal, but on a much smaller scale, of course. | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 13:38 | comment | added | Michael Lugo | If we're counting Google Scholar citations, Flajolet and Sedgewick's Analytic Combinatorics, published fifteen months ago, has 526. | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 7:27 | comment | added | Pietro | Also, I read Rota's intro before asking the question. I plan to look at this book on Monday. I must say I don't find this kind of generality terribly convincing. Defenses of "new mathematics", without caveats, fail to take into account the limitless possibilities mathematics, and our finite lifetimes. Of course one can't expect Rota to go into examples in a one-page introduction! Coming to MO, I was half-expecting someone to post a concrete, pretty application that made a lot of categorical ideas. Anyway, thanks again for your great answer! | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 7:20 | comment | added | Pietro | Igor, this is very informative, thank you! I plan to accept your answer, unless someone comes along in the next day or so, and in the space of a MO answer solves P=NP using comb-sp. Your analogy to #P-completeness is particularly helpful, because I know what that is about, and have used this heuristic myself in the past. But do you mean the analogy to be very close (there being a comb-sp heuristic for problems being too hard) or looser (comb-sp gives you a different perspective)? | |
| Apr 25, 2010 at 3:04 | history | edited | Igor Pak | CC BY-SA 2.5 |
minor edit
|
| Apr 25, 2010 at 1:00 | history | answered | Igor Pak | CC BY-SA 2.5 |