Tag Archives: Taxi-and-other-stories

With Avi at Suzanna

Posted on April 21, 2021 by Gil Kalai

To cheer you up even further a new story that breaks new ground about Avi Wigderson and me (and Laci Lovasz) and a couple more famous Isrealis. For another story about Avi and me see Layish. (I told both stories … Continue reading →

Posted in Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Meeting Michael H. at Rio

Posted on April 16, 2021 by Gil Kalai

After many years, to cheer you up in these difficult times, another story in our corner “taxi and other stories”.  Meeting Michael H. at Rio In my early years I used to guess how people looked by their names. I … Continue reading →

Posted in Taxi-and-other-stories, What is Mathematics | Tagged | 1 Comment

A small update from Israel and memories from Singapore: Partha Dasgupta, Robin Mason, Frank Ramsey, and 007

Posted on April 1, 2020 by Gil Kalai

A small update about the situation here in Israel Eight weeks ago I wrote that my heart goes out to the people of Wuhan and China, and these days my heart goes out to people in Italy, Spain, the US, … Continue reading →

Posted in Algebra, Combinatorics, Conferences, Economics, Taxi-and-other-stories, Updates | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Fix a Horse Race…

Posted on February 20, 2019 by Gil Kalai

GK (2019): Can you base world economy on horse races? Here is an old unpublished draft from 2008 that I did not complete, which was  inspired by the  economic crisis at that time. (It also felt a little over the … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Games, Rationality, Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Layish

Posted on September 27, 2017 by Gil Kalai

This story is implicitly referred to in the 2008 opening post of this blog. ———– It was high time to raise the level of the discussion, I thought. Princeton, Fall 1995. We were a group of mathematicians at the IAS … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Games, Mathematics to the rescue, Philosophy, Rationality, Sport, Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

Michal Linial: No Witches in Portugal

Posted on March 2, 2012 by Gil Kalai

It gives me great pride to present:   Michal Linial:  March 2012 No witches in Portugal Landing in LISBOA, Portugal last night. I need to get to my hotel in Cascais. The nice lady in the tourist information ordered a … Continue reading →

Posted in Guest blogger, Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

The Möbius Undershirt

Posted on February 9, 2010 by Gil Kalai

“Look at this brand new undershirt,” my wife said. “I am shaking it and shaking it but still I have this twist.  Can you see what to do?”  I gave the undershirt a good shake. And another one. And one more. And … Continue reading →

Posted in Mathematics to the rescue, Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

School Bus to Ramle

Posted on August 5, 2009 by Gil Kalai

We had just come back to Israel from Palo Alto after spending a sabbatical year there and my child was starting school. I walked down with him to wait for the school bus. To my great surprise it was a yellow school … Continue reading →

Posted in Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged | 2 Comments

The Intermediate Value Theorem Applied to Football

Posted on April 20, 2009 by Gil Kalai

My idea (in my teenage years) of how to become a professional basketball player was a bit desperate. To cover for my height and my athletic (dis)abilities, I would simply practice how to shoot perfectly from every corner of the … Continue reading →

Posted in Mathematics to the rescue, Sport, Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , , , , | 20 Comments

Coffee, Cigarettes, and Aggression

Posted on April 7, 2009 by Gil Kalai

  Upgrade to hell Getting an upgrade to business class on a flight to Amsterdam en route to NYC seemed splendid. But I soon discovered that I was upgraded to one of the two rows for business smokers. The person on … Continue reading →

Posted in Taxi-and-other-stories | Tagged , , , , | 8 Comments