Clipping Board » Remarkable Writings ─ A good writing is worth savoring again and again...
*Scientific American*, September 2003
Author: Tseng Chih-Lang (Vice President of Academia Sinica)
A Dr. Yang, who was pursuing his Ph.D. at Harvard Medical School in Boston, walked into my office with great energy. At first glance, I felt a sense of déjà vu. He approached me eagerly, pulling out reprints of several papers he had published in prominent physics journals from his bag, along with an article from the *Boston Globe*. The newspaper praised his work highly, as a program he developed for detecting heart disease through electrocardiograms had unexpectedly influenced contemporary literature, resolving centuries-old debates about the authenticity of certain Shakespearean works.
Intrigued, I looked up and said, "Please, tell me more!" Dr. Yang immediately set up his laptop on my desk and delivered a stunning presentation with vibrant charts and graphs. First, he displayed a series of electrocardiograms, showing the beautiful, dynamic waveforms generated by our physiological changes. Dr. Yang explained that between every two heartbeats, a set of waves appears. If the waveform is regular, the correlation between waves is high, and the uncertainty is low. However, if irregular waves occur, the correlation between different waves disappears, and uncertainty increases, serving as a warning sign for heart attacks. Using this concept, he wrote a computer program to calculate the correlations between various waveforms and compare the electrocardiogram patterns before and after heart attacks, aiming to understand the physiological changes that trigger these different waveforms. Dr. Yang and his colleagues tested this program on patients and found that the simulated results closely matched the actual outcomes.
Because this program could calculate correlations between different combinations, it had broad applications beyond just heartbeats. For example, in Western literature, there has been long-standing debate over whether the 16th-century play *Edward III* was truly written by Shakespeare. Could this formula solve a literary mystery that had persisted for four or five centuries?
Dr. Yang applied his formula to analyze the vocabulary in literary works, such as the usage patterns of common English words like "the," "of," "to," and "as." The regularity of these words reflects an author's mastery of language and personal preferences. His results showed that *Edward III* had very low correlation with Shakespeare's other plays but was highly similar to the works of another contemporary writer, Christopher Marlowe. This confirmed suspicions raised by many literary critics years ago: *Edward III* was likely written by Marlowe, not Shakespeare.
Encouraged by this initial success, Dr. Yang further analyzed other literary controversies. He and his colleagues collected 50 plays from the 16th century, written by four authors: Shakespeare, Marlowe, Fletcher, and Ben Jonson. They randomly fed these texts into the computer for analysis, which produced a correlation tree diagram. Remarkably, the diagram accurately clustered the works into four groups, each corresponding to one of the four authors. Every play was correctly assigned to its respective author's cluster. Upon closer inspection, the tree diagram showed smaller branches within each major cluster, grouping works from the same time period together. This made perfect sense, as vocabulary reflects the changes of the times and the concerns of writers during those periods. This analytical method was both scientific and precise, providing clear and intuitive results. Notably, *The Two Noble Kinsmen*, previously attributed to Shakespeare, was excluded from his cluster in this analysis and instead classified as Fletcher's work. Once again, the program accurately depicted a fact long suspected by many scholars: the play was likely a collaborative effort between the two authors.This program has yielded such remarkable results; could it also be used to verify the dual authorship of "Dream of the Red Chamber"? Dr. Yang analyzed "Dream of the Red Chamber" chapter by chapter, and the results similarly confirmed that the first 80 chapters and the last 40 chapters were indeed written by different individuals. It's not just about heartbeats or literary works; Dr. Yang and his colleagues also analyzed some documents from the founding period of the United States. They accurately attributed the authorship of 12 highly debated articles to James Madison, a conclusion now shared by many experts in document archaeology. Dr. Yang's computer program has repeatedly confirmed archaeological findings.
The laws of nature are truly omnipresent! A program designed to detect heart rhythms through electrocardiograms can be so extensively applied to the analysis of literary works, making us stand in awe of the common rules of the human world. I was genuinely moved by this doctor's passion, and upon closer inspection, I realized he was a medical student during my tenure as the president of Yangming University. His achievements fill me with pride. Education is about hoping to see a potentially developed mind truly realize its potential! Perhaps, for those of us engaged in research and teaching, the most satisfying and comforting thing is the constant dialogue with infinitely creative minds.
Isn't education about continuously creating more miracles?!
Previous topicNext topic
The Enigma of Shakespeare Lies in the Heart
Author: Tseng Chih-Lang (Vice President of Academia Sinica)
A Dr. Yang, who was pursuing his Ph.D. at Harvard Medical School in Boston, walked into my office with great energy. At first glance, I felt a sense of déjà vu. He approached me eagerly, pulling out reprints of several papers he had published in prominent physics journals from his bag, along with an article from the *Boston Globe*. The newspaper praised his work highly, as a program he developed for detecting heart disease through electrocardiograms had unexpectedly influenced contemporary literature, resolving centuries-old debates about the authenticity of certain Shakespearean works.
Intrigued, I looked up and said, "Please, tell me more!" Dr. Yang immediately set up his laptop on my desk and delivered a stunning presentation with vibrant charts and graphs. First, he displayed a series of electrocardiograms, showing the beautiful, dynamic waveforms generated by our physiological changes. Dr. Yang explained that between every two heartbeats, a set of waves appears. If the waveform is regular, the correlation between waves is high, and the uncertainty is low. However, if irregular waves occur, the correlation between different waves disappears, and uncertainty increases, serving as a warning sign for heart attacks. Using this concept, he wrote a computer program to calculate the correlations between various waveforms and compare the electrocardiogram patterns before and after heart attacks, aiming to understand the physiological changes that trigger these different waveforms. Dr. Yang and his colleagues tested this program on patients and found that the simulated results closely matched the actual outcomes.
Because this program could calculate correlations between different combinations, it had broad applications beyond just heartbeats. For example, in Western literature, there has been long-standing debate over whether the 16th-century play *Edward III* was truly written by Shakespeare. Could this formula solve a literary mystery that had persisted for four or five centuries?
Dr. Yang applied his formula to analyze the vocabulary in literary works, such as the usage patterns of common English words like "the," "of," "to," and "as." The regularity of these words reflects an author's mastery of language and personal preferences. His results showed that *Edward III* had very low correlation with Shakespeare's other plays but was highly similar to the works of another contemporary writer, Christopher Marlowe. This confirmed suspicions raised by many literary critics years ago: *Edward III* was likely written by Marlowe, not Shakespeare.
Encouraged by this initial success, Dr. Yang further analyzed other literary controversies. He and his colleagues collected 50 plays from the 16th century, written by four authors: Shakespeare, Marlowe, Fletcher, and Ben Jonson. They randomly fed these texts into the computer for analysis, which produced a correlation tree diagram. Remarkably, the diagram accurately clustered the works into four groups, each corresponding to one of the four authors. Every play was correctly assigned to its respective author's cluster. Upon closer inspection, the tree diagram showed smaller branches within each major cluster, grouping works from the same time period together. This made perfect sense, as vocabulary reflects the changes of the times and the concerns of writers during those periods. This analytical method was both scientific and precise, providing clear and intuitive results. Notably, *The Two Noble Kinsmen*, previously attributed to Shakespeare, was excluded from his cluster in this analysis and instead classified as Fletcher's work. Once again, the program accurately depicted a fact long suspected by many scholars: the play was likely a collaborative effort between the two authors.This program has yielded such remarkable results; could it also be used to verify the dual authorship of "Dream of the Red Chamber"? Dr. Yang analyzed "Dream of the Red Chamber" chapter by chapter, and the results similarly confirmed that the first 80 chapters and the last 40 chapters were indeed written by different individuals. It's not just about heartbeats or literary works; Dr. Yang and his colleagues also analyzed some documents from the founding period of the United States. They accurately attributed the authorship of 12 highly debated articles to James Madison, a conclusion now shared by many experts in document archaeology. Dr. Yang's computer program has repeatedly confirmed archaeological findings.
The laws of nature are truly omnipresent! A program designed to detect heart rhythms through electrocardiograms can be so extensively applied to the analysis of literary works, making us stand in awe of the common rules of the human world. I was genuinely moved by this doctor's passion, and upon closer inspection, I realized he was a medical student during my tenure as the president of Yangming University. His achievements fill me with pride. Education is about hoping to see a potentially developed mind truly realize its potential! Perhaps, for those of us engaged in research and teaching, the most satisfying and comforting thing is the constant dialogue with infinitely creative minds.
Isn't education about continuously creating more miracles?!