University Of Cambridge Alumni

"... The is best known for his reporting of the national disasters that struck England while he was keeping it: the , the , the . The record of these and other public events is used by historians and read with enjoyment by schoolchildren, because his reporter's eye was as keenly trained on them as it was on his private experience. What he was doing in such reporting was more significant than may appear at first glance, because the censorship imposed by the government of ensured that there no newspapers at this period except for a single government-controlled information sheet, the '. It meant that no proper record of public events was being kept, and even parliamentary debates were not allowed to be reported. ... As well as being a diarist, Pepys is regarded as one of the most important naval administrators in England's history. He rose to a position of eminence and power and was proud of his work in organizing, disciplining and developing the navy, and in insisting that shipbuilding must be properly funded. Those who most admire the administrator are sometimes ambivalent about the Diary."

"... There was a great demand for engravings of his portrait, and his head was being modeled by an admiring sculptor. This was Dickens nearly halfway through his life: he was twenty-eight in February 1840, and had another thirty years ahead of him. He was living in a country that had been at peace for a quarter of a century. There had been no foreign wars, and no revolution at home, partly thanks to the , passed under the old King, , in which parliamentary constituencies were redrawn and the electorate widened, cautiously. But the courts and alleys of London remained squalid with poverty, overcrowding and disease, and the rich in their great houses were unshaken Railways were changing the habits of the nation more than votes, and railway stations at and already connected London to the north and the ."

"Tomalin herself examines the with the confident judgments of a , not the hedged and sometimes overawed appraisals of a scholar. Appreciative of Hardy’s genius, she still finds his body of fiction “exceptionally uneven.” “,” the novel that made him rich, remains by Tomalin’s measure an awkward production in spots, and yet it “glows with the intensity” of Hardy’s imagination."

"With an English degree I found literary work, in publishing, mostly reading manuscripts, then in reviewing, occasional broadcasting and literary editing. Only in the early 1970s, as I approached forty, did I start working on my first , but I still had to earn my living by working as a literary editor. It was 1986 and I was in my mid-fifties before I could concentrate on full-time research and writing. I found great happiness in this work, and for the next twenty-five years I researched and wrote steadily. So at last I found my true vocation."

"The palaeoanthropologists of the early twentieth century were thus able to put together a view of human evolution which can be seen as an extension of the cyclic or rhythmic theory of progress advocated throughout the Victorian era. Despite its emphasis on struggle as the means by which higher types displaced their primitive antecedents, this was no product of Darwinian gradualism. Most of its supporters rejected natural selection as the motor of progressive evolution, preferring to invoke some vaguely defined creative force in the central Asian heartland. The fact that both the concept of progress through cycles and the fascination with Asia as the centre of development survived well into the twentieth century reveals the power these Victorian ages had to shape the imagination. The echoes of Max Muller's account of Aryan migrations can still be heard in the theories of human origins by archaeologists and anthropologists committed to the idea of continuous evolution. But once the faith in continuous progress was undermined by growing militarism in the age of imperial rivalries, the model of progress through conquest emerged from the wings to extend its influence over ideas on human origins. The early twentieth century merely extended the sense of racial destiny that had been growing throughout the Victorian era."

"I nothing know but that I nothing know, And therefore I sing merrily. I sit and watch the thronging moments go, Each taking life from me."

"of an event is unlikely to be interesting after it and this may be the reason why my prophetic utterances regarding the Great War took the form of Satire."

"Bad art has always been used as an escape from life; good art admits of no escape and forces a man to see himself in a glass clearly."

"In February 1911 Gilbert had joined the , proposed by , the playwright, and seconded by and Reginald Geard."

"By its truth and absolute integrity — since Tolstoy I know of no writing so crystal clear — "Jean-Christophe" is the first great book of the twentieth century. In a sense it begins the twenties century. It bridges transition, and shows us where we stand. It reveals the past and the present, and leaves the future open to us ..."

"A thing is no sooner out of fashion than it begins to appear antique; and the literary movements of the are already discounted as a curiosity by the rising generation. The attitude is natural enough; and yet, if the truth be realized, the despised were actually the seed-time of the most characteristic literary harvest of to-day. The apostolic succession of literature is indeed always developing new phases. Without Mr. Kipling there would have been no Mr. Masefield; and it is undoubtedly to the faded audacities of Mr. Arthur Symons and Mr. Richard Le Gallienne that we owe the mor strenuous frankness of Mr. Gilbert Cannan and Rupert Brooke."

"I protest, for about the hundredth time, against the slipshod method of quoting a mere author’s name, without any indication of the work of that author in which the alleged quotation may be found. Let us have accurate quotations and exact references, wherever such are to be found. [...] A quotation without a reference is like a geological specimen of unknown locality."

"Superficially, he is a black man. He went to Eton, I think; he went to a very expensive prep school, all the way through, the top schools in the country. If you hear him on the Today programme, you wouldn't know he is black."

"Europe and Asia are not naturally separated; that is, there is no large ocean and no unbroken chain of lofty mountains serving as a barrier to prevent the inhabitants of the one from entering the other. A , not much higher than those of Scotland, and a , are the boundaries that separate them geographically. The two countries of Russia and Turkey, which alone approach the boundary line, possess territory on both sides of it."

"... Owing to the very minute proportion in which gold is often associated with rocks and mineral substances, it does not generally pay the cost of working; and the districts therefore known as auriferous or "gold-producing," in the the commercial sense of the term, are not so numerous ... Nearly all the gold of commerce has for a long time been obtained from , Brazil, Transylvania, Africa, the East Indian islands, and Carolina in the United States; the whole annual supply being estimated at about 80,000 pounds weight, and its value being about five millions . This however must be regarded as only an approximate value of the average of several years, as the supplies have for some time been increasing rapidly from the Russian mines."

"The earth on which we live has too great an influence on ourselves, directly and indirectly, to justify ignorance on the subject of its nature and constitution, or the laws which govern its material existence. The history of the present is too nearly connected with, and too directly derived from, the events of the past to allow us safely to neglect it; and the mode of arrangement of the materials of which the outer film of matter, sometimes called the "," is composed, too deeply involves the question of the daily and yearly change that takes place in what we see about us, to permit with safely any indifference in the comparison of results, often hardly to be distinguished except in degree, and in the probable date of their occurrence. In all these matters the investigations concerning the earth's history, which are most generally understood by the term Geology, are found to be very interesting and important in a general sense, and afford much useful information ..."

"Nature offers many of her books for our study; for every department of knowledge, large or small, may be looked on as a separate volume. Astronomy supplies not a few, Chemistry many more, Zoology and Botany each its quota. Of these a number have been read and studied with more or less success. In a few cases we seem to have learnt something of the general plan of Nature; in others, mere glimpses are made out of local and partial phenomena. Many departments have only lately attracted attention; many, probably, there are which are not yet known to exist. Some, on the other hand, have been in course of development ever since man was an intelligent and observing animal, recording his own experiences for the benefit of future races."

"In the five centuries since Columbus discovered the New World, savagery has been part of American life. There has been the violence of conquest and resistance, the violence of racial difference, the violence of civil war, the violence of bandits and gangsters, the violence of lynch law, all set against the violence of the wilderness and the city."

"Let me start by saying what wouldn’t be a good reply – pointing to the fact that I am based in South Africa, where political power is in the hands of the victims of colonialism. The reason this reply won’t do is that it is a terrible mistake to assume that the event of political decolonisation amounts to epistemic decolonisation. Although the event of political decolonisation is long past, as discussed in section 2, epistemic decolonisation is a dynamic and ongoing process, which has still a long way to go. Hence, individual academic institutions have a long way to go. This means that the larger institution of academia still allows for the bad, un-decolonised institutionalisation of epistemic resources and the systematic favouring of the perspective of the oppressor. The fact that the 2015 Rhodes Must Fall movement started in South Africa bears witness to this."

"A plausible worry with my argument is that the very fact that I am a white person based at an academic institution automatically means that the epistemic injustice tools I am using are likely to fail at least the second and third desiderata on good use of epistemic injustice concepts. They may be thought to violate the second because given my identity and institution-base, whatever version of the epistemic oppression tool I am using is both institutionalised and bound to serve dominant, white, interests. And given my belonging to the oppressor’s social group, the use of this tool is bound to adopt the perspective of the oppressor."

"Although this quick reply doesn’t work, I don’t think that the objector’s worry is warranted at least in the context of the argument of this paper. Suppose that it was indeed inevitable that a white academic perpetuates the institutionalisation of these tools in ways that favour dominant interests and privilege the oppressor’s perspective. (I don’t think that this is the case, but let us suppose it is.) This would still not threaten the present argument, because I am not in fact using these tools. Instead, I am setting constraints – developed by non-dominant knowers – for good ways of using such tools. Whether I can use them myself in these ways is a moot point. (If the objector is right, I can’t.) But I hope to have at least persuaded the reader that they can be used in these ways to advance the project of epistemic decolonisation. I take this as a big win in light of increasing WPS-style doubts about some of the epistemic injustice literature."

"If these thoughts are on the right track, at least three concepts in the post-Fricker literature on epistemic injustice can help us theorise epistemic decolonisation in good ways, i.e. ways that meet the desiderata for just use of epistemic injustice tools. Moreover, these three concepts aren’t lone outliers in a sea of useless and WPS-prone concepts. On the contrary, they are related to many other concepts in the literature that are equally theoretically fruitful and attuned to the desiderata inspired by the WPS challenge.Footnote22 Instead of pursuing this line, which is bound to turn tedious given the size of the literature, I wish to conclude by addressing a concern that the reader may have had throughout the discussion so far."

"My research is in the field of spectral geometry, the study of how the shape of an object affects the modes in which it can resonate. A famous question in the field is, Can one hear the shape of a drum? Spectral geometry bridges different branches of science, including engineering and physics, as well as a number of different fields of mathematics. However, quite different sorts of questions are studied within each discipline. I am a mathematical analyst, which gives me an appreciation for the infinite and the infinitesimal. At the moment, one of the things I am working on understanding is the total wavelength of a surface like a sphere or something of greater complexity, such as the surface of a bagel or a pretzel. What is this total wavelength? If you strike a surface it can resonate at any one of a list of frequencies, and the wavelength of the sound produced by the vibration is inversely proportional to the frequency. In the mathematically idealized model, there are infinitely many possible wavelengths. The total wavelength should be the sum of all of these individual wavelengths except that this infinite sum equals infinity. Fortunately, a finite number can be assigned to it by a slightly elusive process called regularization. (This process is also used in mathematical physics to mysteriously obtain true answers from formulas which do not really make sense!) I first became interested in the total wavelength as a model related to a question which can be roughly stated as, can one hear the shape of the universe? However, the total wavelength shows up in many quite different areas of mathematics and I am finding these connections intriguing."

"I am a mathematical analyst, and most of my research is in the area of spectral geometry. Problems in spectral geometry are also studied by various kinds of geometers, number theorists, applied mathematicians, mathematical physicists, and others. What is Spectral geometry? Spectral geometry most usually means the study of how the geometry of an object is related to the natural frequencies of the object. These are the frequencies at which the object can vibrate. A vibrating object often produces a sound, and the frequencies can be heard as the dominant tone and the overtones of the sound. The well-known question highlighting what spectral geometry is all about is the question "Can one hear the shape of a drum?" I am a mathematical analyst, and most of my research is in the area of spectral geometry. Problems in spectral geometry are also studied by various kinds of geometers, number theorists, applied mathematicians, mathematical physicists, and others. In mathematical terms, the natural frequencies of an object (or rather their squares) are the eigenvalues of a partial differential operator called the Laplacian. This Laplacian takes each function defined on the object and differentiates it twice to give a new function. The eigenvalues of the Laplacian form an infinite sequence of numbers tending to infinity. In spectral geometry we study how these numbers depends on the shape of the object. For people who like to know the full story, I should mention that many spectral geometers (including me) who work on the Laplacian on smooth manifolds study the whole sequence of eigenvalues of the Laplacian. Now the low eigenvalues can give accurate values for the frequencies at which a real-life object vibrates, but the very high eigenvalues do not correspond to genuine physical vibrations of the object because of molecular forces and damping. These effects are not included in the model where the vibration is driven by the Laplacian alone. This means that my research is rather different from that of an engineer who wishes to model precisely the vibrations of a real-life object. In actual fact the questions I work on are more closely related to mathematics arising in quantum physics and string theory. In addition, I don't always study the Laplacian, but also the eigenvalues of other operators, which might represent other physical quantities than the frequencies of vibration. I mostly study spectral geometry for nice smooth objects such as spheres and tori, but some people work on rough objects and even discrete objects like graphs. In the last eight years, I have worked mostly on the spectral zeta function, which is an infinite sum of powers of the eigenvalues. In particular, I have worked on the zeta-regularised determinant, which is used in topology, quantum field theory, and string theory. Recently, I have been very interested in the sum of squares of the wavelength of a surface, which is related to all kinds of different things including vortex theory."

"I went to Cambridge, which represented a second major change in my life. As I learned more mathematics, I saw that it is an entire world of its own which many people choose to live in, a world in many ways more real than the real world: it feels permanent, eternal, and offers a deep sense of security because nearly everyone who understands it agrees on what is truth. By the time I had finished at Cambridge, I was very involved with mathematics and did not consider other careers."

"While I was growing up, the elementary school I attended was extremely ethnically homogeneous. I was unable to escape from heavy issues concerning race, which my mother always explained in a political context."

"My parents separated after my father resigned his university position to focus on his inventions, and my mother then finished her education and became a school mathematics teacher. We moved to a very cosmopolitan area of London, which was like a new birth to me; it was there that my interest in mathematics really began."

"I cannot claim to find it easy to balance my ambitions in mathematical research with the desire to be a good parent, to be an inspiring teacher, or to effect positive social change in the world, I do feel very fortunate to be able to spend my life tackling these challenges, which are extremely interesting and important to me."

"I learned mathematics on my own from textbooks, which is perhaps strange given that both my parents were involved in the subject. At the same time, I spent a good deal of time studying art and wanted to follow a career in that direction until I was eventually convinced by my family that I should first work for a mathematics degree to ensure that I could earn a living."

"My mother is British, from a family with a trade union background and a central interest in class struggle; she met my father, who is Nigerian, while both were students of mathematics in London. My father was a very talented mathematician, and after my parents married, he went on to a position in the mathematics department of the University of East Anglia."

"It has been shown by and others that when bombarded by s of emits a radiation of great penetrating power, which has an absorption coefficient in lead of about 0.3 (cm.)–1. Recently and found, when measuring the ionisation produced by this beryllium radiation in a vessel with a thin window, that the ionisation increased when matter containing hydrogen was placed in front of the window. The effect appeared to be due to the ejection of protons with velocities up to a maximum of nearly 3 × 109 cm. per sec. They suggested that the transference of energy to the proton was by a process similar to the , and estimated that the beryllium radiation had a quantum energy of 50 × 106 s."

"The idea that there might exist small particles with no electrical charge has been put forward several times. , for example, suggested that a neutral particle might be formed by a negative electron and an equal positive charge, and that these "s" might possess many of the properties of the ether; while at one time suggested that the s emitted by radioactive substances consisted of small neutral particles, which, on breaking up, released a negative electron. The first suggestion of a neutral particle with the properties of the neutron we now know, was made by Rutherford in 1920. He thought that a proton and an electron might unite in a much more intimate way than they do in the hydrogen atom, and so form a particle of no nett charge and with a mass nearly the same as that of the hydrogen atom. His view was that with such a particle as the first step in the formation of atomic nuclei from the two elementary units in the structure of matter — the proton and the electron — it would be much easier to picture how heavy complex nuclei can be gradually built up from the simpler ones. He pointed out that this neutral particle would have peculiar and interesting properties."

"The thing that really changed the Vatican's diplomatic position was the war itself. The Entente had to rebuild relations with the Vatican."

"... the Common Prouerb may be applied: the common Courtier’s life is like a golden misery, and the faithfull seruant an Asse perpetuall."

"The common prouerbe sayth, that he which counteth before his hoste, must recken twice."

"The unhappy Baron... that Nyght had Neyther Breade nor Broth, and therefore he fared accordynge to the Prouerbe: He that goeth to bed supperlesse, lyeth in his Bed restlesse."

"Other shot forth theyr Boltes, and wyth theyr Prouerbes proceedyng from their malicious Mouthes thwited the pore Women at their pleasure."

"Crypto proponents complain about 'regulation by enforcement,' but enforcement is necessary when many in the industry will use any colorable claim to avoid or delay compliance."

"The debate about the long-term value and utility of crypto will continue. Better regulation shouldn't turn on that debate, nor on partisan lines."

"He replaced his glasses, which were now smeared with mucus, and manfully assumed what he liked to think was the cautious but enlightened manner of one born to high responsibility which only conscience forbade him abrogate as modesty suggested."

"The highest moral character can procure one no preference among the shades."

"I loved the Army as an institution and loathed every single thing it required me to do."

"Yes, I’m in love, I feel it now, And Caelia has undone me, And yet I’ll swear I can’t tell how The pleasing plague stole on me."

"And so, at the age of thirty, I had successively disgraced myself with three fine institutions, each of which had made me free of its full and rich resources, had trained me with skill and patience, and had shown me nothing but forbearance and charity when I failed in trust."

"Christ asked for everything he got."

"Gentlemen can now only behave as such, or be tolerated as such, in circumstances that are manifestly contrived or unreal."

"Dusk is the time when men whisper of matters about which they remain silent in the full light of the sun."

"Her voice, her touch, might give th’ alarm— ’Twas both perhaps, or neither, In short, ’twas that provoking charm Of Caelia altogether."

"In becoming the universe God abdicated. He destroyed himself as God. He turned what he had been, his true self, into nullity and thereby forfeited the Godlike qualities which pertained to him. The universe which he has become is also his grave. He has no control in it or over it. God, as God, is dead."

"Scholarship was one thing, drudgery another."