A post ranging from the comic to the criminal!....
Tuesday is Tom Lehrer’s 91st birthday! YES, he’s still alive! (any rumors to the contrary are greatly exaggerated). But will get back to him in a moment…
Awhile back on Twitter I mentioned that a local retired math professor had been giving free talks on “modern math” topics for a couple of years, and over time, sitting in on those talks, I realized he’d had direct experience with Tom Lehrer, Alexandre Grothendieck, and Ted Kaczynski (the ’Unabomber’)… a rather motley, and surely interesting (even bizarre), mix of mathematical minds!
The math prof is Mike Schlessinger (of “Schlessinger's theorem”), long retired from the University of North Carolina. His math PhD. came from Harvard (1964) under John Tate. Before North Carolina he taught at Berkeley, and his main area of interest is algebraic geometry.
Anyway, I inquired a bit about these past acquaintances and got some brief answers.
But first, asking him about his own pathway to mathematics Mike told me it started with his 9th grade teacher saying that some infinities were larger than others, and that intrigued him. And then another teacher told him, also intriguingly, that “the dimension of a point was zero.” …and so the path begins.
[...This made me remember my own experience in 10th grade of being told there were different sizes of infinities and thinking to myself ‘this is nuts!’ Another kid in the class (more brave than I) squandered time arguing with the teacher back-and-forth, until, in all likelihood someone probably ended the ‘debate’ by asking, “Is this gonna be on the test?” ;) ]
Anyway, moving on, Tom Lehrer was a friend of Mike’s at Harvard where they were both working on PhDs. in the early 60s -- Lehrer originally entered Harvard, as a prodigy at age 15 receiving his math B.A. degree in 1946, only returning many years later for the PhD. program that he never completed. I asked Mike if Tom’s humor was already well established then or if he was surprised by Tom’s later widespread success. The answer was yes and no… Tom was a very funny guy in college, already with some notoriety, and so no surprise he succeeded with that for a wider audience.
You can listen to this rare, 40-year old NPR interview with Lehrer if you wish:
And my personal Lehrer favorite (never gets old) probably has to be “Lobachevsky”:
It was Alexandre Grothendieck that personally gave Mike the question for his dissertation (again, at Harvard). He says that like many others, he regards Grothendieck as the greatest mathematical thinker of the 20th century… but also notes that AG was very eccentric and so he wasn’t surprised when he “went off the deep end.”
An odd, old interview segment with Grothendieck (audio a little weak) from YouTube:
I just discovered myself that, according to Wikipedia, Grothendieck had 5 children who I've never heard anything about... any involved in mathematics? Or, if anyone knows anything worth passing along about them feel free to mention in comments. (Mike said that during his time at Harvard he never saw Grothendieck's wife or any family members, and his anti-social tendencies were already apparent.)
As far as Ted Kaczynski (who graduated high school at 15, and entered Harvard at 16, where he got his B.A. in math), Mike knew of him back when they were both instructors at Berkeley with offices down the hall from one another, but didn’t really interact with him, nor note any peculiarity in him at the time, although he wasn’t overly shocked later upon learning Ted turned out to be the Unabomber. I won’t publicize Kaczynski with any further tribute here, but IF you don’t know of his deadly anarchistic exploits you should probably look him up.
As far as Ted Kaczynski (who graduated high school at 15, and entered Harvard at 16, where he got his B.A. in math), Mike knew of him back when they were both instructors at Berkeley with offices down the hall from one another, but didn’t really interact with him, nor note any peculiarity in him at the time, although he wasn’t overly shocked later upon learning Ted turned out to be the Unabomber. I won’t publicize Kaczynski with any further tribute here, but IF you don’t know of his deadly anarchistic exploits you should probably look him up.
What’s odd is simply that each of these 3 deep mathematical thinkers all somewhat divorced themselves from society, but in such hugely different ways and outcomes. How difficult can it sometimes be to straddle both the abstract world of higher mathematics and cope with the in-your-face, day-to-day world of human society? Choosing humor/satire, isolation/reclusiveness, or violence as a coping mechanism?… the enormous diversity of humans.
As far as any other noted mathematicians Mike was personally familiar with, he mentioned Dennis Sullivan, and Fields Medalists Bill Thurston and Jean-Pierre Serre.
Finally, I asked Mike which current mathematician’s work he most enjoyed following and the answer was again topologist Dennis Sullivan.
[On a side note, for anyone wanting a good, but not too technical or equation-heavy, introduction to topology Mike highly recommends Jeffrey Weeks' "The Shape of Space."]
[On a side note, for anyone wanting a good, but not too technical or equation-heavy, introduction to topology Mike highly recommends Jeffrey Weeks' "The Shape of Space."]
And lastly when asked which mathematician, dead or alive, that he’s never met, he would most like to sit down with a cup of coffee and discuss math, “Bernhard Riemann” was Mike's prompt response… wouldn’t mind munching on a scone and coffee at that table myself!
[Hey, just a heads-up that for next Sunday I have scheduled another 'definitive' profile of a current mathematician you all know... but who, unlike Matt Parker, has no "R" or "E" in their surname.]
