Some of the world’s greatest scientific minds tell us what they love—and hate—about Einstein

Discover ^ | Aug 2004 | various

[Doctor Stochastic]

Will the next era in physics be a turbulent one?

[longshadow]

Not sure what Conway (Horton) is doing these days. He certainly revolutionized mathematics.

He's at Princeton. To say he "revolutionized" mathematics is a bit of a stretch, unless you consider the "game of NIM" to be "revolutionary." He made contributions, like many others, but he's no Euler, Cantor, Gödel, or Hilbert.

[The Scourge of Yazid]

My favorite scientist of the past century, without question, has to be Edward Teller.

I even have a mini-obit of him-along with some of the other notable people who've died recently-on my profile page.

[djf]

Depends on your specialty. His is group theory, and probably no living person knows more about it than he.

[longshadow]

His is group theory, and probably no living person knows more about it than he.

An interesting assertion. On what objective evidence is it based? What year did he win the Fields Medal?

[longshadow]

He has succesfully proved that there are a limited number of problems in math.. I think the number he came up with is 19.

Thats all there is. Every math problem is one of the 19 types.

Do you have a citation available? A link would be even better.

[djf]

I admit to having a passing knowledge of this, I have not delved into it as much as you have.

But it is interesting that in the list of notables you posted above, you left out the name of one who is recognized worldwide as the greatest mathematician who ever lived.

John Carl Frederick Gauss

[microgood]

I find myself frustrated at Einstein’s constant and inappropriate use of the term “God,” when he really meant something else. As a result, he opened the door for generations of individuals to misrepresent his ideas.

A few of his quotes related to religion (not God, although he has many of those as well)

"I have found no better expression than 'religious' for confidence in the rational nature of reality, insofar as it is accessible to human reason. Whenever this feeling is absent, science degenerates into uninspired empiricism."

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."

"I have never imputed to Nature a purpose or a goal, or anything that could be understood as anthropomorphic. What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism."

"I am a deeply religious nonbeliever.... This is a somewhat new kind of religion."

[PatrickHenry]

And then there's Willie Horton.

[longshadow]

But it is interesting that in the list of notables you posted above, you left out the name of one who is recognized worldwide as the greatest mathematician who ever lived.

According to whom?

I seriously doubt there is a consensus among mathematicians as to who is the "greatest" who ever lived, and even if there were, I seriously doubt that Gauss, despite his contributions, would be at the top of the list. The one person's name that I saw cause more professors to genuflect than any other was Hilbert, FWIW.

[Doctor Stochastic]

There's always space for Hilbert.

[longshadow]

But it is interesting that in the list of notables you posted above, you left out the name of one who is recognized worldwide as the greatest mathematician who ever lived.

And I also left out Laplace, Fermat, Alan Turing, Peano, Bertrand Russell, Alfred North Whitehead, Newton, Leibnitz, Cauchy, Euclid, and Snow White & the Seven Dwarves. So what? I offered Euler, Cantor, Gödel, and Hilbert as examples of mathematical luminaries, in contrast to your Horton, whom hardly anyone has ever heard of.

That I didn't mention Gauss (whether or not he is the "greatest" of all time) is irrelevant to the point which was that Horton just isn't in the same league as the rest of the folks I mentioned, and many I didn't.

I sorry, but you were the one who claimed Horton "revolutionized" mathematics (after erroneously attributing the Lucasian Chair at Cambridge to him)-- and I just don't see any evidence that his contributions rise to the level of being "revolutionary."

[longshadow]

There's always space for Hilbert.

It's a complex issue, but I imagine you are right.

;-)

[longshadow]

Not sure what Conway (Horton) is doing these days. He certainly revolutionized mathematics.

Just so you know I'm not blowing smoke, here's a list of the Greatest Mathematicians of the 20th Century that can be found easily on the web:

The Greatest Mathematicians of the 20th Century

When the year 2000 rolled around, we decided to create a "best" list of mathematicians; to look back, at the end of this 20th century, and honor this century's best mathematicians. Since some of the people might not be widely known, we have also set up links to websites at which you may learn something about these amazing mathematicians. At the bottom of this page, you'll also find brief biographies and multiple links for two of these mathematicians; they happened to make TIME magazine's list of greatest people of the century.

Bourbaki
Henri L. Lebesgue
Richard Courant
Benoit Mandelbrot
Darmarkar
Robert L. Moore
Paul Erdös
Emmy Noether
Sir Ronald Fisher
Karl Pearson
Kurt F. Gödel
J. Henri Poincaré
Richard W. Hamming
John W. Tukey
David Hilbert
Alan M. Turing
Fritz John
John von Neumann
John Kemeny
Hermann Weyl
Donald Knuth
Norbert Wiener
Andrei N. Kolomogorov
Andrew J. Wiles

Notice that Horton isn't on the list. That's my point. If the guy "revolutionized" mathematics, he'd be among the top 24 mathematicians of the century, wouldn't he? But he isn't. I'm not saying the guy is a bum; I suspect he's made many contributions during his career. But "revolutionized" is a bridge too far.

[The Scourge of Yazid]

Ahh, Dukakis.

Who would have ever thought-in their wildest dreams-that a pompous, obnoxious, dorky-looking pinko who hailed from the "Bay State" would be the Democratic nominee for president of these United States?

Pfft!

That's just crazy talk, don't ya think?

[Physicist]

I know who John Horton Conway is, although I confess I've never heard him referred to as "Horton". (I wrote a VAXStation implementation of "Life" once, but that's another story.)

But before you all give me too much credit, I was making a Dr. Seuss reference. (Coincidentally, Theodor Seuss Geisel is almost exclusively referred to by his middle name.)

[Physicist]

I notice S. Ramanujan isn't on the list, either.

[djf]

He died quite young, didn't he? I know he is highly praised in Newmans "World of Mathematics"

Another who could have done much more was Dirac. I think I've made it up to about page 24 of his "The Principles of Quantum Mechanics"

But at least he talks about Bra vectors.

Who said nerds don't have a life?
;-)

[dread78645]

HATE: I find myself frustrated at Einstein’s constant and inappropriate use of the term “God,” when he really meant something else.

Einstein: "God does not play dice."
Einstein: "God is not malicious."
Bohr: "Einstein, stop telling God what to do."
Hawkings: "God not only plays dice, but sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen."

[longshadow]

I notice S. Ramanujan isn't on the list, either.

Hey, he's in good company: Robinson (non-standard analysis), Bertrand Russell, Alfred North Whitehead, Alonzo Church, and Peano are all missing. But more to the point, while Ramanujan was brilliant and self-taught, his contributions didn't exactly "revolutionize" mathematics, due in part to his habit of asserting theorems without proof, and also by virtue of the fact that he died in his early 30's.