ADINKRA AND THE VISUALISATION OF MATHEMATICAL IDEAS


This observation about Adinkra as symbols that defy simple verbalisation comes from Faux and Gates’s paper “Adinkras: A Graphical Technology for Supersymmetric Representation Theory”[1]. It initiates a research program in theoretical physics which reflects a quote from an other intrepid hungerer after knowledge, Aristotle, in one of the program’s papers that “Thought is impossible without an image”[2]. This research effort represents an instance, in their own words, of “important examples in which theoretical physics incorporates elegant motifs to represent mathematical conceptions that are vastly simplified thereby”.

I had to find out more. I tried reading their papers but of course, since I am still struggling with basic numeracy I did not understand much but the little I understood intrigued and inflamed me further. If I could learn to grasp these ideas in whatever length of time, after any length of years, it would a most wonderful enlargement of my self, of that self in me that is constituted by what I have succeeded in learning, in assimilating to the world that I am.

[1]Michael Faux and S. J. Gates, Jr, “Adinkras: A Graphical Technology for Supersymmetric Representation Theory” arXiv:hep-th/0408004 v1. 2 Aug 2004.1.

[2] C.F.Dorana, M.G. Fauxb, S.J. Gates, Jr.c, T.H¨ubschd, K.M. Igae and G.D. Landweber “A Counter-Example to a Putative Classificationof 1-Dimensional, N-extended Supermultiplets” arXiv:hep-th/0611060v2. 17 Apr 2007.1

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