r/Echerdex

(Here is video version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHnrYCqlv9k )

Mathematics is a language that describes reality and the universe. And since the nature of reality is shocking in cosmic horror, the logical conclusion is that studying it can lead to madness. The motif „magic, if it works, is really mathematics and physics, the understanding of which exceeds the human mind” appears in Lovecraft, for example in „Dreams in the Witch House”. This usually works on the principle that the Necromicon and other „books of magic” contain scraps of advanced knowledge obtained from inhuman beings, which superstitious sorcerers then treat as magic. Therefore, it should also work the other way round – a professional scientist should be able to discover dirty and blasphemous secrets through scientific research. Here are some viable candidates for „scholars who looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked into them.”

Kurt Gödel (1906-1978) – Austrian-American mathematician, physicist and philosopher. He dealt with, among others, theory of relativity (which in itself negates the image of the world that „common sense” dictates to us), deriving from it equations intended to prove the possibility of time travel. Towards the end of his life he went crazy, among other things. believing someone was trying to poison him. When his wife was hospitalized for a long time and was unable to taste his meals to prove the lack of poison, Gödel starved himself to death.

Georg Cantor (1845-1918) – German mathematician, creator of set theory. Over time, he delved deeper into mysticism and claimed that mathematics could be used to reach conclusions about metaphysics. Some Christian (Cantor himself considered himself a devout Christian) philosophers of his time claimed that Cantor’s mathematical theories were contrary to religious dogmas (it was something about proving the existence of an infinite being, other than God – I am not a mathematician, I don’t really understand what is going on). Cantor was tormented by bouts of depression, sometimes so severe that they led to hospitalization.

Ludwig Boltzmann (1844-1906) – Austrian physicist, pioneer of the kinetic theory of gases. He theorized the “Boltzmann brain” – a hypothetical self-aware entity that emerges from chaos through random fluctuations. Boltzmann proposed that we and our observed low-entropy world arose from a random fluctuation in a higher-entropy universe. He committed suicide by hanging. „If our current level of organization, having many self-aware entities, is the result of random fluctuation, and it is much less likely to be so than a level of organization that produces only self-aware self-aware entities, then in any universe with the level of organization we see, there should be a huge number of solitary Boltzmann brains floating in unrecognized environments. In an infinite universe, the number of self-aware brains spontaneously, randomly emerging from chaos, along with false memories of life like ours, should far outweigh the number of real brains evolved in the observable universe, arising from unimaginably rare fluctuations”. Did I understand it? Not really, but it sounds quite Lovecraftian – self-aware beings emerging from chaos, our world as a result of random processes taking place in the „higher” universe… it’s easy to spin a cosmic horror out of it. And let's theorize that Boltzmann’s suicide was due to the terrifying conclusions he had reached…

Paul Ehrenfest (1880-1930) – Austrian-Dutch physicist. He researched the theory of relativity (which, as I mentioned, very often leads to „crazy” conclusions about the nature of reality) and laid the foundations for quantum physics (which is even crazier). Towards the end of his life, he fell into severe depression and shot first his son and then himself.

Grigory Perelman (1966) – the only still living member of this group, a Russian mathematician. He had a brilliant career in Russia and the USA. His greatest achievement was presenting evidence for the so-called Poincaré’s hypothesis regarding the shape of the universe. Unexpectedly, in 2005 he left his job and broke off all contacts with the scientific community… And not only that – he stopped leaving his apartment, communicating only by phone or through the door. He consistently rejects all job offers and awards (including the Millennium Award worth one million dollars!).

Each of these gentlemen (except Perelman) lived at the turn of the 20th and 19th centuries. Each of them can be used in the scenario – either as a living and active NPC, as a dead source of knowledge (in the form of unpublished notes containing mythical secrets), or as a background reference („Don’t think about it, Professor X conducted research in this direction… and how did he end up?).

This is just small part of the full, free brochure full of Lovecraftian inspirations from the real life, science, history and culture: https://adeptus7.itch.io/lovecraftian-inspirations-from-real-life-and-beliefs