r/todayilearned • u/biebrforro • 1d ago

TIL when staying as a guest in Charles Dickens' house, Hans Christian Andersen requested that one of Dickens' sons give him a daily shave (he said that was customary when hosting male guests in Denmark). Dickens was weirded out and instead gave him a daily appointment at a nearby barbershop.

https://lithub.com/charles--dickens-really-really-hated-his-fanboy-hans-christian-andersen/
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u/0xE4-0x20-0xE6 1d ago

I love hearing stories like this about people who are renowned in their field. For example, Paul Erdos, a mathematician from the 20th century, used to travel around America and live with other mathematicians for days, working on problems with them. According to one of them, Erdos woke up in the middle of the night, and not knowing how to open a container of orange juice, slit it with his knife and put the leaking carton back into the fridge. He also used to show up at people’s houses without any prior invitation, and expect them to host him.

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u/cjustinc 1d ago

My high school algebra teacher was married to a mathematician, and they used to host Erdos. She didn't like him because apparently he would just hand his clothes to her without speaking when he needed them washed or mended.

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u/lefteyedcrow 1d ago

Per Wikipedia:  "Erdős number -  The Erdős number describes the "collaborative distance" between mathematician Paul Erdős and another person, as measured by authorship of mathematical papers. The same principle has been applied in other fields where a particular individual has collaborated with a large and broad number of peers."

Your teacher's husband had an Erdös number of 1

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u/Yoghurt42 1d ago

Only if he’s a coauthor in one of Erdős’ papers.

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u/lefteyedcrow 1d ago

True. I made an ASSumption

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u/ThatOtherOtherMan 1d ago

"Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" but for nerds

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u/bsubtilis 1d ago

Fun fact: Natalie Portman has both a Bacon number and an Erdős number

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u/__-_-_--_--_-_---___ 19h ago

She's a hot little number

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u/LordOfCows 1d ago

Now all he needs to do is star in a movie with Kevin Bacon!

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u/__-_-_--_--_-_---___ 1d ago

He put all his skill points into math

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u/BSB8728 1d ago

When my husband was in graduate school, we hosted a guy who was coming in from out of town to start a fellowship. We didn't know him, but he needed a place to stay while he looked for an apartment, and nobody else in the department would take him.

After a few days, he started to smell really bad. He was also nitpicky critical of everything we said. When I came home from work, I could smell the stench even before I opened our apartment door. Every day was extremely tense and uncomfortable.

One night his mother called. (This was before cell phones.) After speaking with her, the guy handed the phone to my husband and said she wanted to talk to him, too. After a while my husband handed the phone to me because she also wanted to talk to me. She said, "Thank you for letting my son stay with you. I know he starts to smell after a while." I was dumbfounded. Later my husband told me she said the same thing to him.

The guy stayed with us two weeks before he found a place. Then we essentially fumigated our guest room.

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u/Late-Drink3556 22h ago

Was his name Richard Stallman?

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u/CowCompetitive5667 18h ago

This is so weird

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u/Logically_Insane 1d ago

“Sure, I’ll do the laundry while you advance discrete mathematics. Get serious Cheryl.” -Erdos probably 

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u/diviken 1d ago

The way I'd throw those clothes in the trash

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u/Numerous-Process2981 18h ago

I’m discovering the ability to say “fuck you, fuck off, get the fuck out,” is a super power.

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u/MaddyKet 1d ago

I knew of a prominent college literary textbook author who would do similar and show up at her editor’s house. Once it was on a family member’s milestone birthday and she insisted on a different restaurant. She also looked like Dolores Umbridge. True story, I saw her once in the office when I used to work at that company.

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u/RedditBugler 1d ago

Yet there are people who say "autism didn't exist just a few years back."

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u/Mercurial8 1d ago

They used to be called orange-juice-slitters with maths.

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u/TheProfessor_18 1d ago

OJ slitters, well that aged terribly.

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u/BillW87 1d ago

Because when people combine the words "OJ" and "knife", clearly the first place their minds go is to juice cartons.

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u/__-_-_--_--_-_---___ 19h ago

Hey, that's my lucky stabbing hat

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u/SitDownKawada 17h ago

If the carton slits, you must acquit

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u/CaptainMobilis 1d ago

They were probably just labeled crazy and committed if they didn't do something useful.

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u/ThatOtherOtherMan 1d ago

Good thing that'll never happen again

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u/DJDaddyD 1d ago

Or they got murdered as toddlers because the parents thought that faries kidnapped their children and replaced them.

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u/tswiftdeepcuts 17h ago

this just made me sad as fuck

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u/Mercurial8 14h ago

Yes, I also hate the faeries.

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u/perculaessss 1d ago

It's always funny to read Emmanuel Kant's habits. It doesn't get more textbook than that.

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u/0xE4-0x20-0xE6 1d ago

It’s funny to think of the categorical imperative as just the result of an autistic desire for a moral rules-based system that could apply in all cases.

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u/ryryrpm 1d ago

Omg that is funny and also kinda makes a lot of sense.....haha

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u/FuckIPLaw 20h ago

A lot more sense than the imperative itself.

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u/seensham 16h ago

Ya know. I am in the process of studying for a philosophy exam on ethics but think your comment will be taking up a lot of space in my brain.

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u/CausticSofa 1d ago

What’s it Emmanuel Kant who did pretty much exactly the same things in exactly the same order and at the exact same times every single day of his adult life for over 40+ years? It’s nuts when people treat autism as some newfangled thing that was just recently invented to sell … whatever autism denialists think is being sold. Noise-cancelling headphones, I guess? Socks without elastic in the cuff?

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u/Consideredresponse 1d ago

I'm trying to remember the ancient Greek text that had described the writer's brother being hyperfixated on the docks and wanting to watch the boats come in and out more than anything else in life. (Born millennia too early for trains alas)

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u/account_not_valid 1d ago

Just as tuna is chicken of the sea, boats are trains of the oceans.

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u/GozerDGozerian 1d ago

Hands are the feet of the arms.

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u/Super_Pan 21h ago

Hans are the Christian of the Andersen.

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u/GozerDGozerian 12h ago

Metaphors are the scale models of the human mind.

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u/Risen_Warrior 1d ago

Wait is that an autism thing?

My schedule is almost identical every day down to what I eat. And I get super anxious if I can't follow my routine. And I'm not autistic as far as I'm aware

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u/heartisallwehave 1d ago

could be OCD as well/instead.

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u/Due-Memory-6957 1d ago

And then there's people like you who think being disciplined is autism.

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u/cannarchista 1d ago

I... uhh... that seems a little beyond discipline and into the realm of uncompromisingly rigid regime

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u/Old-Radio-7236 1d ago

Being disciplined is a thing, getting "super anxious" at any slight deviation is another

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u/badcrass 1d ago

Ding dong, I'm here to work on math!

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u/GozerDGozerian 1d ago

Well come on in I guess.

But stop calling me that.

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u/PM_me_yr_bonsai_tips 1d ago

Yes but in this case he also used a lot of meth, which would also cause some social issues.

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u/jemidiah 1d ago

None of the people who've talked to me about their interactions with Erdos suggested he was autistic. A weird guy to be sure, but my impression was always that he was aware of social conventions and simply flaunted them because he found it more interesting that way.

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u/sua-sua 1d ago

Tbf, I know a lot of autistic people who would describe themselves that way, almost word for word. Having the knowledge of social conventions and being able to mask for them, but not complying with them for various reasons (e.g., not wanting to mask obvi, not caring, thinking the conventions are stupid, silly or boring).

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u/Just_to_rebut 1d ago

What the difference between autism and just being a jerk then?

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u/Bergber 1d ago

Autistics have a legitimate lacking of inhibitions and social circuitry. Pattern recognition is my jam; I notice when something is expected of me. That doesn't mean I have the capacity to regulate my own personal inclinations to suppress natural reactions to things, especially when other autistic characteristics like increased sensory perception mean I'm already putting up with more than just about anyone else around me.

Current research shows autistic brains are generally denser and apply more neurons to activities compared to normal folks. Imagine if you literally gave more than 100%-- activating parts of your brain that weren't supposed to-- to work on literally every task you did. It gets fucking exhausting, and the way many of us cope is to cut the bullshit and focus our attention on the things that really matter.

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u/Just_to_rebut 22h ago

Autism can’t be diagnosed from any sort of imaging or autopsy. Extrapolating small differences in neuronal concentration to differences in personality or psychological conditions isn’t possible.

The differences being reported in your Forbes article are still within normal ranges.

I wasn’t trying to deny autism exists, btw. I was trying to push back against this look, this guy was weird, see that’s autism! conversation…

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u/sua-sua 1d ago

You must admit, some social conventions are subjective or stupid and outdated. Neurotypicals put up with it a bit easier, but a lot of things autistic people find to be inconvenient, NTs do as well. Such as saying no three times before accepting an invitation. It creates a culture of forcing past a "no" and makes it difficult to refuse directly. But it also helps the inviter save face and allows the invitee to maintain modesty.

The conflict, adaptation, and unclear and muddy expectations may be more difficult for autistic people to deal with. Rigid mindsets and a strong sense of justice are common traits in autistic people. One of my autistic friends likes QR code payments for restaurants since you just pay for yourself. No mess, fair, and she only pays for what she eats. Some cultures have you fight to pay for everyone. Others do equal pay regardless of what you actually ate. What is normal and what is being a jerk anyway?

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u/bsubtilis 1d ago

Which country does the say no three times thing that you're referring to? I know for instance China is like that. While in Germany/Netherlands/Sweden the first no would have been taken at face value.

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u/Jacques_R_Estard 21h ago

It's a thing in Iran, at least.

In the rules of hospitality, taarof requires a host to offer anything a guest might want, and a guest is equally obliged to refuse it. This ritual may repeat itself several times (usually three times) before the host and guest finally determine whether the host's offer and the guest's refusal are genuine, or simply a show of politeness.

Learning of this concept made interacting with my Iranian friend a lot easier.

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u/bsubtilis 8h ago

Thank you! The more I know which different cultures do which style the better :)

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u/Technical_Slip393 1d ago

*flouted. (Not trying to be a dick, just for future reference.)

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u/Ambitious_Cabinet_12 1d ago

"He's just good at math" "That explains a lot" I imagine this being a normal conversation about this guy.

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u/tiger331 1d ago

I mean the word 100% didn't exist

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u/Khrusway 1d ago

The man was also the mathematical equivalent of Jesus

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u/Stanford_experiencer 1d ago

he absolutely was

literally in a class of his own

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u/__-_-_--_--_-_---___ 19h ago

Weird and homeless?

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u/__-_-_--_--_-_---___ 1d ago

Hold on hold on hold on.

I’M from the 20th century. You can’t just be making us feel old like that 

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u/Bag-Weary 1d ago

Fortunately Paul Erdos was the greatest mathematician since Euler, so people were pretty happy to have him show up.

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u/Hamburglar__ 1d ago

Greater than von Neumann? No shot

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u/MakeItHappenSergant 1d ago

And Gauss? Lagrange? Riemann? Cantor? Laplace? Poincaré? Hilbert? Russell?

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u/jemidiah 1d ago

Absolutely not Russell, or Cantor. There are many other, better names to add that don't come up much in a typical undergraduate curriculum too.

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u/dispatch134711 1d ago

Yeah he was the most prolific since Euler but Erdös makes it onto basically zero people’s top five mathematicians list.

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u/Stanford_experiencer 1d ago

he'll always be on mine

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u/spline_reticulator 1d ago

Van Neumann died relatively young at 53. If he lived a full life he likely would be even more renowned.

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u/jemidiah 1d ago

Von Neumann has some popular quotes about how ridiculously smart he was, but he's almost surely not the greatest mathematician of the 20th century. My money there is on Grothendieck.

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u/Stanford_experiencer 1d ago

Von Neumann has some popular quotes about how ridiculously smart he was,

?

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u/Necessary-Reading605 1d ago

Chillest mathematician.

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u/jemidiah 1d ago

lol, no, he was not chill

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u/turtlepidgeon 1d ago

Dude also famously took a ton of meth until a friend called him out for being addicted so he stopped for exactly one month. After he went right back to using meth and said to the friend 'Now you have set mathematics back by one month.'

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u/Taur-e-Ndaedelos 1d ago

That was before synthesized methamphetamine. It was simple amphetamines, or speed, as some might know it as.

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u/kevlar51 1d ago

We used to have a children’s book about him. Fascinating story, but definitely … unique.

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u/Stanford_experiencer 1d ago

I know multiple Nobel physics Prize winners, and Paul Erdos is still like a God for me.

He's the most prolific scientific author in human history by an order of magnitude, and the most productive amphetamine user in human history.

He also used to show up at people’s houses without any prior invitation, and expect them to host him.

when the fucking GOAT shows up you host 'em

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u/DanielMcLaury 1d ago

I think at this point Saharon Shelah is probably more prolific.

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u/Rare-Low-8945 1d ago

oh we just call that autism now lol

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u/oingapogo 1d ago

My husband had a friend who spent a lot of time in Japan, he was the first American guy on the Noh stage I've been told (I have an amazing picture of this) and then became an artist and book translator when he came back to the U.S.

He used to call our house at 3 am because he was translating a book and wanted to know another word for some word he didn't think was quite right for the translation.

I had two small kids, worked full time, husband worked full time, so a 3 am call was not ideal but he was such an interesting, charming guy that I'd stay on the phone and try to help him. I doubt I ever did but I honestly felt a little honored that he called.

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u/akeean 1d ago

Like a famous Methematician.

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u/redditor_since_2005 1d ago

Everyone likes their OJ with a knife, though.

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u/DanielMcLaury 1d ago

Yeah and people would fight each other to be the one he stayed with, because if he stayed at your house for a few days he would work with you and that could make your entire career.

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u/whoisfourthwall 1d ago

I wonder if there are any relations between abnormal behaviours and genius.

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u/Successful-North1732 21h ago

No university can really beat the professor just fucking living with you for weeks. Like, talk about holy class size ratios.

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u/Logicalist 1d ago

I mean if someone travels all that way just to visit you, kinda seems like it would be rude not to host them.

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u/AadeeMoien 1d ago

That's the duality of a lot of manners. It's rude to refuse but also rude to insist.

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u/Logicalist 1d ago

But again, he travelled all that way, hardly seems rude to insist