Maths 'Nobel' prize declined by Russian recluse

Nature ^ | 8/22/06 | Jenny Hogan

[Schweinhund]

Me neither...just being the obnoxious German I am :-)

[Waverunner]

Yes i can see the MSM 6:00 ocrock spews explaining the signifigance of a mathematical solution in multidimensional analytic geometry. Unless of course it proves Bush lied.

[sagar]

This guy is too arrogant to realize what he SAYS(not just what he DID) might be important.

[GovernmentShrinker]

Where did you get the $74/month figure?

At any rate, it's not clear that he won't get the money. He just didn't show up to accept the award.

Ball told Nature before the medallists were announced that it was unclear what would happen — to the money or the honour — if someone refused the award.

And there's also the matter of the $1 million prize that's likely to be forthcoming from the Clay Mathematics Institute. I have a feeling the guardians of the math world are not unfamiliar with eccentric geeks and how to handle them, and will make sure the money gets to him somehow. But they may have to deliver a briefcase full of cash, or put the money in his mother's bank account, as I'm not at all sure this guy is sufficiently in touch with the concrete world to deal with things like banks.

[Tanniker Smith]

There is no Nobel Prize for mathematics.
And it's only co-incidental that Alfred Nobel's wife ran off with a mathematician. (true story)

[LibWhacker]

Hmmmm.... Sorry, my mistake, I thought I saw that figure somewhere but can't find it now. article says it's £30-a-month, which is about $57. But I could swear I saw $74... Maybe she has some additional income besides her pension? In any event, surviving on that paltry sum has to be tough even in Russia.

[LibWhacker]

..article says..

This article says....

[Conservababe]

What is it with all this crap because he lives with his mother? Evidently they like each other's company enough to share a home together. Is this something he should be ashamed of, really? Or her?

What is your problem?

[mad puppy]

'Sometimes the ones with the highest intelligences have "low-end" problems all their own.'

I fell of my bike (hard!) a couple months ago. How smart does that make me? My wife thinks I'm an idiot. Of course, to be fair, she thought that before the bike wreck too.

[Dracian]

after a round of applause, president of the International Mathematical Union John Ball said "I regret that Dr Perelman has declined to accept."

Refusing on behalf of Perelman was a Ms. Sacheen Littlefeather ...

[Dracian]

Alfred Nobel's wife ran off with a mathematician.

I guess he had a prime root.

[Romanov]

Adult children living with their mothers is quite common in Russia.

[lepton]

Nobel Price for Persistance

And the Nobel Prize for Spelling goes to... !!

[GovernmentShrinker]

Hey, I was defending him. It's clear that he is extremely focused on his math research. And reasonable to assume that his mother focuses on other aspects of the living arrangement. I have no problem at all with it. Mr. Brightside is the one who opined that Perelman "can't leave his mommy".

I can't see any reason why he would want to leave, or why she would want him to leave. She's presumably been nurturing his pursuit of math since he was a little tyke, and probably quite reasonably doubts that he'd be better off if he moved out and lived on his own. Most lasting family arrangements last because they're working well. Don't fix what ain't broke.

[ASOC]

Cannot afford his own apt in St Peterburg? - it is expensive to live there.

I would venture a guess that he is not gainfully employed as well.

[scrabblehack]

Nobel never married. He did address a letter (maybe more) to his less-than-a-soulmate mistress "Mrs. Alfred Nobel," and after his death, his estate had to pay her hush money....

You may be thinking of this story:

http://almaz.com/nobel/why_no_math.html, from which I draw:

However, Sister Mary Thomas a Kempis discovered a letter by R. C. Archibald in the archives of Brown University and discussed its contents in "The Mathematics Teacher" (1966, pp.667-668). Archibald had visited Mittag-Leffler and, on his report, it would seem that M-L *believed* that the absence of a Nobel Prize in mathematics was due to an estrangement between the two men. (This at least is the natural reading, but not the only possible one.)

---

What I would like to know is -- what is the other possible reading of the statement? As I say, Nobel's mistress was not the soulmate that the author of this document portrayed her.

Another thing that I recall is that in an earlier version of Nobel's will, he left a certain amount of money to the Hogskola undesignated, with which they *COULD* have established a math prize (or done any number of other things) ...the final version of the will left out the Hogskola and established only the Peace, Chemistry, Physics, Physiology/Medicine, and Literature prizes.
I should mention also that Nobel was smitten with Professor of Mathematics Sonya Kovalevskaya of the Hogskola. He did meet her and she didn't like him. Of course mathematicians have also pooh-poohed the idea that Nobel wrote the Hogskola out of his will or that he failed to establish a math prize because she didn't like him.

[SunkenCiv]

additional:

Maths genius declines top prize
Last Updated: Tuesday, 22 August 2006, 10:36 GMT 11:36 UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/5274040.stm
Perelman, ICM
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42000000/jpg/_42000540_perel_icm_203.jpg
Photos of the reclusive genius are rare

Grigory Perelman, the Russian who seems to have solved one of the hardest problems in mathematics, has declined one of the discipline's top awards.

...Manuel de Leon, chairman of the ICM, said: "The reason Perelman gave me is that he feels isolated from the mathematical community and therefore has no wish to appear as one of its leaders."

[Trajan88]

Cool stuff.

I didn't realize the Fields Medal was a real award... first I heard of it was in this flick ("Good Will Hunting"):

[Balata]

"I guess he had a prime root."

LOL! Yea, those primes get big very quickly.