Re: What math class to take to catch up on Modulus and DLP?

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Date: Tue, 09 Sep 2003 00:55:00 -0300

On Mon, 08 Sep 2003 03:17:46 GMT, Tom St Denis <tomstdenis@iahu.ca>
wrote:

>M.S. Bob wrote:
>| I do love how you fall back to this defense when someone calls your
>| bluff. "I'm a newbie" -- yet you claimed "safely say I at least am
>| familiar with the field." -- make up your mind.
>
>A newbie can be familiar with something. To me "newbie" is synonymous
>with an amateur. E.g. you don't have a complete mastery of the subject
>matter.

Newbie --
One that is new to something, [...]
<http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=newbie>

Newbie is not synonymous to an amateur, but to being new and thus
unfamiliar with the subject.

>|>Also often in my own defense I'm only offering what I happen to know as
>|>I understand it. If more knowledgeable people would kick in some
>|>information things would improve.
>|
>|
>| Yes, those stupid professors, mathematics, and cryptographers like Bob
>| Silverman, Douglas Gwyn, David Wagner, Greg Rose, Brian Gladman, etc.
>| who all horde their information, and never try to inject knowledge or
>| understanding in sci.crypt. Hell, they never even try to correct your
>| factual mistakes or your misunderstandings. Thank you St Denis, you
>| are our saviour.
>
>doesn't hold a masters or PhD in any math related field at all. I don't
>know about the rest but certainly I don't see what you're point is.

My point was that there are some very knowledgeable people, including
leading experts that *do* post in sci.crypt.

>Anyways, this thread is just a character assassination. If you don't
>like me this is not the place to discuss it. If you actually have
>something useful to contribute to the thread don't cloud it with
>belittling me.

I don't give a toss about you really. I just think your actions and
the method of how you learnt cryptography should not serve as a model
to others who wish to learn more about cryptography, self-taught or
otherwise.

I think your style of prone to disagreement and disrespect towards
others that disagree with you, does not enhance your learning or
understanding. I think you have wasted lots of your time being
stubborn and attempting to defend your position or your experimental
ciphers (the TC series) which could of be focuses on fundamentals with
far great results. So I do not encourage others to model their
learning after your "disruptive style" of learning.

I think my recommendations about several suggested textbooks, and
encouragement towards considering the possibility of further education
was a positive and hopefully useful contribution.

>|> Agreed. However, there is nothing wrong with the self-taught method.
>|>You just have to have more patience and tolerance than I've managed to
>|>muster. I mean for the most part a university class consists of 16
>|>weeks of lectures from a textbook, two or three exams, a few labs and
>|>maybe a project at the end.
>|
>|
>| Nothing is wrong with being self-taught, it is a very hard way to
>| learn in that a) it tends not be well rounded, b) it is hard to
>| develop debating or writing skills just by using books, c) books don't
>| provide postitive reinforcement, and d) they are terrible at guilting
>| you or making due dates to force you to keep motivated when you don't
>| feel motivated.
>
>I would disagree with a). To no offense to Alice Silverberg [who I use
>as an example because I recently talked with her]. As I understand
>she's holds a PhD in Math. However, when I asked her to help dumb
>CEILIDH down a bit so I could implement it she basically told me it
>wasn't worth her time. So being "well rounded" is not something I would
>attribute from what I've seen [that being said maybe she was just
>genuinely busy]. So it's entirely possible to go the academic route and
>still close your mind to the world around you.

I do not see the connection between "well rounded" and with Alice
Silverberg being "busy" or "not interested" in working with you.

>and distinguished person. Likewise you can drop out of university,
>follow the crowd, publish many credible results, form your own business
>and become Niels Ferguson. :-)

Perhaps, what is the success rate of all university dropouts?

>would be a billionaire. To just denounce self-taught individuals is
>very ignorant and highly arrogant.

I have not denounced self-taught individuals in the slightest. I in
fact did say, "[n]othing is wrong with being self-taught, it is a very
hard way to learn ..." and "I don't care if you have an advanced
degree or not ..."

• Previous message: David A. Scott: "Re: Strength of RSA with known plain-text."
• In reply to: Tom St Denis: "Re: What math class to take to catch up on Modulus and DLP?"
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