Specker Article

While preparing for the Set and Logic lecture, I found in a logic book the following article about Specker in the NZZ. Specker is probably best known for the Kochen-Specker theorem, which is also of great interest to a general public as it deals with a fundamental property of quantum mechanics. See Section 218 in my current list of fundamental theorems.

• My Boston Talk of 2015 mentions a story about Specker (also my Lin alg teacher at ETH) and Läuchli (also my analysis I,II (calculus) teacher at ETHZ). (see a list of courses. Specker liked to play with the class or challenge it with riddles. Here is a page on an assignment to write down the definition of the smallest 10 dimensional vector space.
• Goerge G. Szpiro has written a few delightful books ``mathematics on Sunday morning" (2004,2006 and 2010). In the 2004 book, Specker is mentioned a few times. Here are few screenshots (click to see each larger)

Specker has met Goedel but had been a bit disappointed by him as Goedel seemed uninterested in what Specker was doing.