Reply #67: related reading

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"What interests me most in this book, other than Dudley's enthusiastic and deft writing, are his catalogues of crank behavior -- for instance, how they can go from enthusiastic amateur to demented conspiracy theorist rather than simply admit nobody's paying attention to them because they're wrong."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0883855070/002-1759993-6960045?v=glance&n=283155

"Unfortunately, some cross that ill-defined line and refuse to consider the evidence contradicting their claims. Many fail to
understand that mathematical truth is incommensurate with physical theory."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0883855070/002-1759993-6960045?v=glance&n=283155

"The true believer is sometimes referred to as a crank, and Underwood Dudley has written an illuminating book, "Mathematical Cranks", which was published by The Mathematical Association of America. People who are described in that book also demonstrate the same mentality of those who started the cults described by Gardner. All have little regard for facts, are egomaniacal in the extreme and consider all of their critics to be insignificant, misguided and perhaps mentally deranged."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0486203948/ref=cm_rev_next/002-1759993-6960045?%5Fencoding=UTF8&customer-reviews.sort%5Fby=-SubmissionDate&n=283155&s=books&customer-reviews.start=11

"A mathematical proof of the impossibility of doing something does not deter some people from claiming that they have done it. Dudley labels such people as cranks, and he describes many of them in this book. While the reading is entertaining, it is also somewhat depressing, in that no amount of logic or reason can convince a crank that their work is flawed."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0883855070/002-1759993-6960045?v=glance&n=283155

P.S. "All of us are gullible to one degree or another-- the secret is to puncture unmerited beliefs as much as possible, before they grow into full-scale dogmas that one ends up hauling around like bags of bricks."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0486203948/ref=cm_rev_next/002-1759993-6960045?%5Fencoding=UTF8&customer-reviews.sort%5Fby=-SubmissionDate&n=283155&s=books&customer-reviews.start=11