Welcome
My name is Andreas Rejbrand, I was born in December 1987, and I live in Linköping, Sweden. I have a Master of Science (M.Sc.) degree in physics and I am currently employed full-time as a graduate student in mathematics. I work at the Department of Mathematics at Linköping University, where I previously worked part-time as a teacher for a number of years.
My main interests are – unsurprisingly – mathematics and science. I am particularly interested in mathematics education, especially at the university level. (But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be interested in reworking the entire Swedish school.) I am also very interested in medicine and physiology.
Outside of mathematics and the natural sciences, I am perhaps most interested in language, particularly the written Swedish language. Unfortunately, it appears like the majority of all Swedish texts produced (at least unprofessionally) today is of very poor quality. Frequently, the text is merely a mess of words and other glyphs, in which standard spelling, sentence structure, capitalisation, and punctuation is abandoned; often the text is really very hard to read. I think it is sad to witness how bad the situation actually is on many (perhaps most) Internet ‘blogs’ and similar sites. As an attempt to do something about this, I have written a small article on the most obvious errors in written Swedish.
Turning to computing, I have been developing for the Win32 platform for many years and I am interested in web design and web standards, especially when it comes to semantically rich hypertext documents. In my spare time, I occupy myself with the small things that make life worth living, like studying the Windows API, reading technical specifications from the W3C, browsing the Unicode BMP, and studying the graphical user interfaces of old computer operating systems.
My major personal projects include the mathematical software AlgoSim, my book on classical mechanics, my manifold exhibition TRECS, and – particularly – the rather ambitious mathematics textbook I am currently working on. However, I do wish I had more time for these projects.
When I am not suffering too much from bad mental health, I am amazed by the complexity and beauty of nature. I’m deeply fascinated by the thought of the almost countless places we are still to discover in the universe. In fact, I’m deeply fascinated by things. I love books and films, I love the scent of paper in some books, and music and drama can open hidden doors in my mind. I love rabbits, dogs, rats, and most other (non-human) mammals. Carrots are nice to munch on.
Since my early teens, I have been very engaged by moral questions. I wrote the first version of my essay on the philosophy of life aged 14, and I wrote the most recent version aged 18. Even today I think every word in it is true, and this is not very surprising, given that the ideas are based on ‘obvious’ moral axioms and simple logical reasoning. I’m often saddened by cruel and immoral behaviour in the modern world, and more subtle forms of senselessness often manifest themselves in a variety of every-day situations; for instance, there are a lot of dreadful TV shows out there.
I dream of a world in which all people, in each situation, do the thing that increases the well-being and reduces the suffering for every individual involved (including, of course, non-human animals). This is the precise way of saying it, but perhaps the following statements are more graphic: I dream of a world in which humans always take each other seriously and listen to each other. I dream of a world in which humans never are cruel or lie to each other. I dream of a world in which humans take responsibility and help each other, even when they are not ‘required’ to do so. I dream of a world in which people with power listen to the needs of the individual instead of mechanically treating everyone the same way. I dream of a world without prejudice in which everyone makes an effort not to say anything that isn’t true.
I have been suffering from ‘fragile’ (and occasionally very poor) mental health all my life. Already in kindergarten, I realised that I was different from the other children, and since elementary school, I have felt much older than I actually am. And this isn’t as cool as it may sound. I’ve never been able to identify with people my own age. Since my early teens, I have essentially had no friends at all.
I have always felt misunderstood, invisible, and – more than everything else – very lonely.
I have treated my childhood and my ‘main problem’ rather extensively in my autobiographical book Ändlös längtan, which you can read on-line at this site. I also plan to publish it physically using my own money. Unfortunately, the text is (as of today) only available in Swedish.
Andreas Rejbrand
February 22, 2014