Alan Baker, FRS, 1939–2018

Alan Baker Mathematics , Indispensability and Scientific Progress

Are there good reasons for including mathematical objects such as numbers, sets, and functions as part of our ultimate catalogue of the furniture of the universe? Recent debates within the philosophy of mathematics over this sort of general ontological question have centered on the pros and cons of the so-called Indispensability Argument. The basic idea behind this argument is quite straightfor...

Elected FRS 1976

Description of the FRS domain

An FRS helps in the reservation of facilities (such as tutorial rooms, hotel rooms, lecture theaters) and specific equipment. Different organizations such as academic institutions, hotels, hospitals and companies, have different physical facilities and arrangements for their reservation. Most often, users (individuals or organizations) manage their own reservations with an FRS (e.g., add, delet...

Alan Cowey

theories rigorously. Here are some of my reservations. One generic problem is that Lynch's evidence comes from broad brush comparisons of extremely disparate types of organism. It is true that, on average, bacteria have much large N e values than most eukaryotes for which we currently have data, but they differ in numerous other respects as well, for example lack of regular sexual reproduction....

Alan Baddeley

Alan Baddeley is Professor of Psychology at the University of York and a Fellow of the Royal Society and the British Academy. He studied psychology at University College London and Princeton before doing a PhD at the MRC Applied Psychology Unit in Cambridge, where he spent much of his career as Director. His interests are in human memory, and in particular in working memory, a system for keepin...