Not only was he a mathematician, but Alice is considered partially a commentary on the state of mathematics at the time! [0] It's one of my (irrational) pet peeves that modern audiences often try to explain his books as some kind of Victorian era equivalent to a Cheech and Chong movie about drugs when there's so much more hidden away in the pages. These two books are my favorite books ever, and I'd give an arm and a leg if I could ever get my hands on an original copy, haha.

I highly recommend The Annotated Alice for anyone interested in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, because it makes a couple of fun, curious reads even curiouser! ;)

[0] https://www.npr.org/2010/03/13/124632317/the-mad-hatters-sec...

I second the recommendation for The Annotated Alice, even if many references fly over my head as I'm not much of a mathemagician.

That makes a lot of sense actually. Thanks for sharing this anecdote. Sometimes brilliant people get buried because of their eccentricities and it deters from the meaning of their life's work.

Dodgson/Carroll was a witty writer. This is so good a passage that it has influenced modern English:

- - -

"I'VE been to a day-school, too," said Alice, "you needn't be so proud as all that."

"With extras?" asked the Mock Turtle a little anxiously.

"Yes,' said Alice, "we learned French and music."

"And washing?' said the Mock Turtle.

"Certainly not!" said Alice indignantly.

"Ah! then yours wasn't a really good school," said the Mock Turtle in a tone of great relief. "Now at OURS they had at the end of the bill, 'French, music, AND WASHING--extra.'"

"You couldn't have wanted it much," said Alice, "living at the bottom of the sea."

"I couldn't afford to learn it." said the Mock Turtle with a sigh. "I only took the regular course."

"What was that?" inquired Alice.

"Reeling and Writhing, of course, to begin with," the Mock Turtle replied, "and then the different branches of Arithmetic-- Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision."

"I never heard of 'Uglification'," Alice ventured to say. "What is it?"

The Gryphon lifted up both its paws in surprise. "What! Never heard of uglifying!" it exclaimed. "You know what to beautify is, I suppose?"

"Yes," said Alice doubtfully, "it means--to--make--anything--prettier."

"Well, then," the Gryphon went on, "if you don"t know what to uglify is, you ARE a simpleton."

- - -

How so?

You may be further intrigued to hear that Hedy Lamarr invented frequency-hopping spread spectrum, Felix Hausdorff was a playwright, Neil Young has multiple patents relating to model train control, Isaac Newton is frequently credited with the invention of the catflap, Brian May holds a PhD in astrophysics, and don't even get me started on Leonardo da Vinci.

I'll add to the list: Dolph Lundgren won a Fulbright to MIT and has a masters in chemical engineering.

Da Vinci was a renaissance man?

And Tony Hoare was a "Classics and Philosophy" major.

>Hedy Lamarr invented frequency-hopping spread spectrum

Even after reading her biography, I'm still not convinced that she actually invented, or even worked on the technology. I find it much more likely that she either funded the patenting process, and in this way got her name on the application, or that the "co"-inventor put her name on it out of admiration, thereby securing interest in the patent thanks to Lamarr's fame.

Did you do this research on the other folks mentioned, or just the woman?

It's an interesting enough story, IMO, to try to clarify this to the degree possible (or, at least, degree I can from my understanding):

First, Lamarr very much was an inventor. She was creative and continuously proposed, and in some cases produced, inventions.

Concerning frequency-hopping signals, she is the origin of the idea in the late 1930s in an arc that would produce a working method. She had several key insights and motivations that underlie her significant role in developing the idea into an actual "invention" (something with a practical demonstrated method of implementation):

1) She was aware, from direct interaction with Axis weapons manufacturers in the late 1930s, that they were devoting significant effort to intercepting and jamming Allied signals, including / in particular signals used to control weapons

2) She realized that having a prearranged sequence of frequencies, that a transmitter and receiver hopped between, should be workable / within reach

3) And, as regards motivation and commitment to ideas like this, in general - she was grateful to have been accepted in the US after fleeing Austria ... and not merely accepted, but have the career opportunity in Hollywood that she was building (though she was still angered there by being treated often as a "pretty face" rather than skilled / talented person / actress), and had an extremely strong drive to contribute to the war effort.

Her general knowledge of the practice and mathematics of frequencies, "carriers", signals, etc. contributed to her continued pursuit of the idea. She knew the base of it was solid, and I think she astutely judged that there ought to be some practical way of implementing it with technology available at the time in approximately the relevant footprint for some of the applications of most interest.

As for the basis of the practical device, that idea came from George Antheil. Antheil and an engineer at CIT (Samuel Mackowen) were then able, to create an entirely workable system and submit for and be granted a patent, which did include Lamarr (under her married name, and, actually did not include Mackowen - there's some interest in this as well, but, I guess he served as more of a consultant than originator of anything of enough note). Her key insights formed the basis for the work, although it seems likely she didn't contribute much to the practical implementation.

Finally, it should be noted that, as with many inventions, she was hardly the first person to play around with these sorts of ideas. Several others had experimented with the idea or related ideas, going back even 35+ years. But, she and her co-inventors came up with the abstract implementation (+ practical demonstration) / "blueprint" underlying a vast array of modern communications technologies.

Refs:

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tony-Rothman/publicatio...

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/hedy-lamarr-not-j...

https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201106/physicshisto...

https://scienceandfilm.org/articles/2889/bombshell-interview...

Edit: added / corrected a bit of info on "Samuel Mackowen"

Edit 2: "It's not Hedy, it's Hedley..."

Dexter Holland, the singer in The Offspring, has a PhD in molecular biology. Rowan Atkinson got a MSc in Electrical Engineering and started a doctorate.