Robert P. C. de Marrais

Robert P. C. de Marrais (30 November 1948 – 4 April 2011) was an American mathematician known for his studies on hypercomplex numbers.

Quotes

• Let’s expand our horizons to the 32-D and 64-D cases and give them names (since they currently don’t have any!). Following the convention adopted by Tony Smith, who has called the 2⁸-ions Voudons after the 256 deities of the Ifa pantheon of Voodoo or Voudon, we’ll call these Pathions (for the “32 Paths” of Kabbalah) and Chingons (for the 64 Hexagrams of the I Ching or Book of Changes). For completeness’ sake, we name the 2⁷-ions too, dubbing them Routons, after that legendary source of high-tech innovativeness, Route 128 of the “Massachusetts Miracle” that paralleled Silicon Valley’s on the “Left Coast” of this country. From Reals to Voudons, then, we extend the standard shorthand thus: $\mathbb {R}$, $\mathbb {C}$, $\mathbb {H}$, $\mathbb {O}$, $\mathbb {S}$, $\mathbb {P}$, $\mathbb {X}$, $\mathbb {U}$, $\mathbb {V}$.
  • de Marrais, Robert P. C. (2002). Flying Higher Than a Box-Kite: Kite-Chain Middens, Sand Mandalas, and Zero-Divisor Patterns in the 2ⁿ-ions Beyond the Sedenions. DOI:10.48550/arXiv.math/0207003. (p. 7)

See also

• John C. Baez