Some of my favorite things* v2

I wrote this almost exactly a year ago. It's one of the posts I had the most fun writing, and recently reread it for the first time in a while. Most of the preferences haven't changed (particularly in the miscellaneous section), but a few other things have changed quite a bit. So I'm going to write a slightly updated version.

The main things I'd remove from the first version are:

• The entries on Russian non-fiction except Kvant books
• Quite a few of the math books (Artin, Axler, Chen, Nielsen, Talagrand, Stillwell, Woit)
• From the math/physics section, all the group theory/representation theory stuff, Lie groups, braid groups, abstract algebra. I definitely still appreciate these ideas but I don't find them as exciting anymore
• From the people I look up to, Grothendieck
• From things I want to learn, Langlands program
• Remove a lot of abstract math.

The rest is largely unchanged, but there are quite a few things I want to add. Without any explicit ordering or categorisation, they are as follows:

• Tennis (this is a huge one). Perfectly beautiful, elegant, graceful game of geometry and physics.[1] Roland Garros posters (1990) Infinite Jest (I finished it), String Theory. Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass.
• Marguerite Yourcenar, Memoires d'Hadrien
• The path integral (also a huge one; this has become one of my favorite ideas). Operator calculus, breaking the standard notion of what mathematics is. A very 'hacker'-like approach to math, which feels super playful and fun. One of the best things I discovered this year.
• Infinite series. For a while I really didn't get the hype around this, but I definitely do now. Infinite series are surprisingly versatile tools which encode a huge amount of information in a very simple way.
• Number theory, particularly partitions, mock theta functions, modular forms; number theory was actually the first branch of math I ever got interested in, but I quickly got bored and dropped it. I feel like I've started seeing this subject in a completely different light, and have a much deeper appreciation for it now - about five years later.
• Overall, in line with the above: Ramanujan's notebooks, completely mind-blowing. Umbral moonshine: one of the most striking connections I've ever seen, bridging number theory, group theory, and physics.
• Overall, a very important one to add: the ability to solve problems through physical intuition, first principles, visualisation… emphasising seeing and feeling over just thinking, basically[2]. This is much more in the vein of theoretical physics than mathematics, and I've started realising it's much more appealing and fun to me than a lot of the math I was focusing on. Feynman is, of course, the master of this. In general I would say that Feynman is the person I've learnt the most from since last writing about favorite things, and in general his approach to problem-solving and physics has made me basically switch from math and mathematical physics to theoretical physics.
• However, in terms of math books I would add Gian-Carlo Rota's book on umbral calculus as a wonderful piece of work, because it is playful. In general, I'd add Rota to the list of people I admire.
• A few papers in particular: Feynman's papers on Yang-Mills, operator methods in QED, paper on path integral; Dyson's paper on divergence of perturbation series, symmetries of partitions, Cartier's tribute paper to Feynman and Euler (probably the best technical paper I've read in the last year, it was and still is a huge source of joy for me, and showed me a completely different way of thinking about math and physics than what I was used to; specifically, it's a way of doing math which feels much more like intuitive magic than rigorous logic). The defining feature of this approach is in stretching methods and formulas to their to their extreme, while 'resorting to some internal feeling of coherence and harmony'. Overall the method is much more heuristic, intuitive than rigorous. I love that and it resonates with me on some kind of fundamental level. I guess this is the 'symbolic' method, or more generally operational calculus.
• Dyson collected works, Feynman collected works, Arnold's Gift to Young Mathematician
• Nice paper to add as well is Valiant's paper on approximate learning as an alternative framework to evolution; in general, I'd add applied complexity theory as an idea I've found very appealing. E.g. how can we use complexity theory in the problem of other minds, or evolutionary biology? Scott Aaronson himself once dubbed complexity theory as 'quantitative epistemology', and seeing the applications is quite striking.
• Something I've also gained a newfound appreciation for is mathematical biology, biophysics and molecular biology - particularly this paper by Turing, which explains how patterns in nature (stripes, spirals) arise.
• To the people I admire I'd also add Vladimir Arnold.
• Approximation and Fermi problems are very fun!
• The principle of least action, a beautiful piece of philosophy.
• Also a big one: The Witness, a piece of art that struck me in a way no other videogame ever has. The Talos Principle is close, though.
• Paul Graham's essays, also one of the sources that's influenced me the most this year.
• A big one: The Legend of Zelda in many different incarnations, but particularly The Breath of The Wild and Tears of The Kingdom, although Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Skyward Sword, and Twilight Princess are all masterpieces in their own way. The soundtrack hasn't ever changed for a reason - it's perfect.

To things I don't like the main thing I'd add is French mathematics.

Just like last time, writing this reveals more than I expect.

*For some reason last time I wrote this as favourite instead of favorite.