In Memoriam Armando Martin Haeberer

摘要

The sudden death of Arrmando in February devastated his many friends and colleagues around the world. I had known him for almost twenty years and I cannot but remember him in very personal terms. Hence, this brief account of his life and work will be written in the first person singular and represents mainly my own impressions of him as a man and as a scientist/academic. Armando was a true exemplar of the phrase a force of nature! He was a polymath in the tradition of Babbage. Whatever subject was being discussed, it appeared that not only did he know about the topic, but he had read extensively about it! His knowledge of world literature, world history, music, philosophy, epistemology, physics and chemistry, etc was unsurpassed by anyone I knew (other than a few professionals specializing in just one of these topics). Perhaps this depth of knowledge is best illustrated by an example: Armando recently found himself explaining the underlying musical patterns in Swan Lake and their meaning to a prima ballerina who had danced the main part(s) many times in one of the best companies in the world! He was particularly fond of Byron and Oscar Wilde, and had an extensive collection of works by them and about them. Whenever he was in London, the first thing he did (after buying the champagne, more on this below) was look to see if one of Wilde's plays was on. He admired enormously Wilde's wit and his talent for a bon mot. I think he also admired both Byron's and Wilde's abilities to live life to the full. Armando certainly attempted to mimic them in this regard. He loved food, wine and travel and engaged in all of them fully and extensively. He was apparently known as el gordo by close friends from his days in Argentina, and with good reason! (However, he was extremely thin when in his teens and close friends from those days apparently called him el flaco (the thin one)!) He was a very large man indeed and lost 35 kilos on a diet he undertook 3 years ago! The diet also illustrated one of his other characteristics, namely his ability to focus on some target and not stop until he achieved it, or it was completely clear that it was impossible to do so. Besides being a close collaborator, especially over the past 10 years, Armando was a very close personal and family friend. Over the past decade, he fell into the habit of buying champagne whenever there was an excuse for celebration. This turned eventually into any visit to our house being an excuse for a celebration. (I suspect that visits to our house were not the only visits used as excuses for a celebration.) Indeed, on one of his last visits to us, my daughter arrived home and noticed two cases of champagne (Laurent Perrier was one of his favourites) on the counter in the kitchen and commented: Ah, Armando must be here! On the other hand, Armando was a workaholic. He seemed to exist on hardly any sleep. (This became less true over the past few years. His daughter Ana writes: "Recently, I am pretty sure it was last year [2002], Pablo, my fiancee, and I were preparing a special sauce for dinner. It was around 9:30pm in Argentina and my father was still living in Lisbon, so it was around 12:30am for him. We were not being very successful with the sauce so we decided to e-mail him asking for help since he used to stay up working late. One hour, 6 e-mails and no answer later, we finally decided to eat whatever it was we had made. The following morning, when I got online, I received a message from my dad that said: "Dulcinea, sometimes at one o'clock in the morning I'm sleeping".) Armando worked all hours of the day and night on his various projects and writings. He was able to cut himself off from work when appropriate, e.g., family holidays, social occasions, etc. But, when he was in work mode, it was 24 hours a day. Woe betide those of us who could not keep up! On the other hand, he had many colleagues and friends who were under his 'spell' and would perform superhuman efforts on his beh