Re: Harold Simmons
I imagine there are many on the categories mailing list who would want to know this sad news. I've known Harold ever since the first meeting of the Peripatetic Seminar (May 1976): he was one of the select few who attended both the first and the 100th meeting. Peter Johnstone ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Andrea Schalk <A.Schalk@manchester.ac.uk> Sent: 10 October 2018 16:22:22 To: Nicola Gambino Subject: Harold Dear all, you have recently visited Harold, or expressed an interest in visiting him. I'm afraid I have to tell you that he died this afternoon. I had no idea that this might happen so soon. For the moment I don't know what else to say. Andrea [For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]
Thank you for the very sad news, Peter. Harry will be much missed! A good friend, a no nonsense way of doing mathematics and a great joy in doing it. a sad day. best, Valeria On Thu, Oct 11, 2018 at 6:36 PM <ptj@maths.cam.ac.uk> wrote:
I imagine there are many on the categories mailing list who would want to know this sad news. I've known Harold ever since the first meeting of the Peripatetic Seminar (May 1976): he was one of the select few who attended both the first and the 100th meeting.
Peter Johnstone
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Andrea Schalk <A.Schalk@manchester.ac.uk> Sent: 10 October 2018 16:22:22 To: Nicola Gambino Subject: Harold
Dear all,
you have recently visited Harold, or expressed an interest in visiting him.
I'm afraid I have to tell you that he died this afternoon. I had no idea that this might happen so soon.
For the moment I don't know what else to say.
Andrea
[For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]
Harold Simmons was around at most of the PSSLs I started to attend in the second half of the 80s. As a middle European person I was deeply impressed by his sense of humour and having a sarcastic attitude to everything without being cynical. Only later I learned that he set some trends like provability logic or locale theory well before my time. One would have heard this from him directly. I think he was a paradigm in not following fashions and sticking to his interests. How different from what is predominant nowadays. It's sad that one can't meet him again (and go for a `snifter' as he would have put it). Thomas [For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]
I had heard from Manchester people that Harold was very ill, but the news of his death was still unexpected. I knew Harold from the many valuable conversations that I had with him when I was writing "Topology via Logic". He was always encouraging and helped me with quite a few technical issues of locale theory. I say "locale theory", but it's perhaps more accurate to describe his particular approach as that of a frame theorist. I remember him as someone enthusiastic for the intrinsic algebraic interest of frames, a part of which was about using the lattice theory to get a better understanding of point-set topology, and with no patience for the dual language of locales - that would be obfuscation, failure to call a spade a spade. Steve Vickers
On 11 Oct 2018, at 21:10, ptj@maths.cam.ac.uk wrote:
I imagine there are many on the categories mailing list who would want to know this sad news. I've known Harold ever since the first meeting of the Peripatetic Seminar (May 1976): he was one of the select few who attended both the first and the 100th meeting.
Peter Johnstone
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Andrea Schalk <A.Schalk@manchester.ac.uk> Sent: 10 October 2018 16:22:22 To: Nicola Gambino Subject: Harold
Dear all,
you have recently visited Harold, or expressed an interest in visiting him.
I'm afraid I have to tell you that he died this afternoon. I had no idea that this might happen so soon.
For the moment I don't know what else to say.
Andrea
[For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]
[For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]
I first met Harold Simmons at a PSSL in Cambridge (1999?) where my accommodation was a nice bed&breakfast where Peter Johnstone had placed both him and me. We spent the breakfasts talking about things that (of course) included frames and quantales, along with funny anecdotes about other ‘framers’ and ‘quantalers’. Since then I keep an indelible memory of a sharp, very kind and good humoured man. Pedro
On Oct 11, 2018, at 9:10 PM, ptj@maths.cam.ac.uk wrote:
I imagine there are many on the categories mailing list who would want to know this sad news. I've known Harold ever since the first meeting of the Peripatetic Seminar (May 1976): he was one of the select few who attended both the first and the 100th meeting.
Peter Johnstone
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Andrea Schalk <A.Schalk@manchester.ac.uk> Sent: 10 October 2018 16:22:22 To: Nicola Gambino Subject: Harold
Dear all,
you have recently visited Harold, or expressed an interest in visiting him.
I'm afraid I have to tell you that he died this afternoon. I had no idea that this might happen so soon.
For the moment I don't know what else to say.
Andrea
[For admin and other information see: http://www.mta.ca/~cat-dist/ ]
participants (5)
-
Pedro Resende -
ptj＠maths.cam.ac.uk -
Steve Vickers -
Thomas Streicher -
Valeria de Paiva