Posted on 08/22/2006 7:48:41 PM PDT by SJackson
A RECLUSIVE Russian has won the mathematical world's highest honour for solving a problem that has stumped some of the discipline's greatest minds for a century - but refused the award.
Grigory Perelman, 40, from St Petersburg, won a Fields Medal - often described as mathematics' equivalent of the Nobel prize - for a breakthrough that experts say might help scientists work out the shape of the universe.
Besides shunning the award, colleagues say he also seems uninterested in a separate $1 million prize for which he is eligible for his feat of apparently proving the Poincaré conjecture, a theorem about the nature of multi- dimensional space.
The award, given only every four years, was announced at the International Congress of Mathematicians.
Three other men - Russian Andrei Okounkov, Frenchman Wendelin Werner and Australian Terence Tao - also won Fields medals in other areas of mathematics. They received their awards from King Juan Carlos. But Dr Perelman was not present.
"I regret that Dr Perelman has declined to accept the medal," said John Ball, the president of the International Mathematical Union, which is holding the convention, in Madrid.
Professor Ball said later that he had met Dr Perelman in St Petersburg in June, told him he had won a Fields medal and urged him to accept it.
But Dr Perelman said he felt isolated from the mathematics community and refused the medal because "he does not want to be seen as its figurehead", Prof Ball said.
The $1 million prize in the Poincaré case is separate, and will be announced in about two years by a private foundation called the Clay Mathematics Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts . If his proof stands the test of time, Dr Perelman - whose work is still under review - will win all or part of the money.
Academics have been studying Dr Perelman's proof ever since he left the first of three papers of it on an internet maths archive in November 2002 - itself an odd gesture, because normal procedure would have been to seek publication in a peer-approved journal.
Three separate teams have now presented papers or books explaining the details of Perelman's work, and two weeks ago the two-year countdown set by the Clay institute began. During it academics have a final chance to challenge the proof.
The Poincaré conjecture essentially says that in three dimensions you cannot transform a doughnut shape into a sphere without ripping it, although any shape without a hole can be stretched or shrunk into a sphere.
Proving the Poincaré conjecture - an exercise in acrobatics with mindboggling imaginary doughnuts and balls - is anything but trivial.
Colleagues say Dr Perelman's work gives mathematical descriptions of what the universe might look like and promises exciting applications in physics and other fields.
The Poincaré conjecture essentially says that in three dimensions you cannot transform a doughnut shape into a sphere without ripping it, although any shape without a hole can be stretched or shrunk into a sphere.
I knew that. Everyone likes donuts
Just goes to show there are some very "unique" people in this world that can do things and visualize things and certainly process things much differently than 99.999% of the rest of us.
The article itself had me spinning. Would have liked to see an American in that list of winners, too.
I admit putting it in terms of donuts, spheres and balls didn't help much.
You know, that's pretty easy to see. Since a doughnut has the hole, it makes it impossible to bend it into the shape of a shpere. But to explain that mathematically for me would be impossible.
Mathematically, that's the trick
Common sense, before cooking, compress the donut between both hands, roll it about, toss it in oil, you've got a beignet.
$1,000,000 please.
Nope, you've basically torn the doghnut, since you have removed a portion of it's surface area. Where with a cube or oblong you wouldn't have to do that. HAHA, anyway he said I could have the dough, hehe.
International Mathematical Union
Darn can't believe I missed that.... make plans for next one /sarcasm
Perhaps he is out in the woods of Russia writing his manifesto. ;-)
funniest post of the day!
Perhaps the trick is to collapse the inside of the donut forming a 2-dimensional ring with 2 sides.
Now begin stretching the ring into a ball (with 2 holes at the artics) so that 1 side of the ring now becomes the inside of the sphere and the other side of the ring now becomes the outer surface of the sphere, and 2 holes are at either end, which can then be stretched closed.
Both surfaces of the new sphere (inner and outer) are formed from just the one outer surface of the donut. The inner surface of the donut is now essentially sandwiched between the inner and outer surfaces of the sphere.
I'm sure that was not the problem they were trying to solve.
(?)
By stretching the ring (looks like a frisbee with a hole in the middle) into a sphere what is required is that all points around the inner circle be connected with their opposing point at the other end of the diamter.
The points all around the outer rim are joined to their opposing points, creating the seam of the sphere.
No rips, no tears, only a lost surface, and a new surface creqted from the divison of the old outer surface into an inner and outer.
The Brits say "maths", we say "math".
The Brits say "sport", we say "sports".
Why?
Because we drive on the parkway and park on the driveway.
Yeah well the Brits also smoke fags. Here we just watch them parade down the street once or twice a year. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!
Cincinnatus the mathematician. :)
Math ability has little to do with schooling, home-based or otherwise. If you don't have it, you can't learn it, at least at the level of first-rate academic research. If you do have it, it can be encouraged, but I am afraid that it is unlikely that home-schooling parents will know how to encourage real math ability. The best thing is for a gifted child to meet other gifted children led by someone with real mathematical talent, and that is more likely to happen in a school than at home.
LOL!!!!
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