Communicated by David Spivak.
I invited Edmund Harriss to visit Topos Institute last October, because his work on mathematical art so beautifully exemplified the sort of “working language” I’ve been exploring. Mathematical forms (such as a “perfect circle”) can be conceptually overlaid onto a real-world condition (such as an actual piece of paper) and constrain our behavior enough that the form is efficiently materialized (such as by a computer program hooked up to a mill). I found that Edmund has a deep, tangible understanding of this phenomenon—of how to efficiently materialize forms—and we learned a lot from each other by discussing it. So I asked Edmund to write a blog post about what he took away from our meeting, and the following is his response.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://topos.institute/blog/2025-04-30-wiring-euclid-for-manufacturing/