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James Harris

Posted: Tue Dec 02, 2003 10:09 am

Guest

Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

Out of curiousity I did a search on the Internet to see if he'd won
any awards from *math* society, and found not one.

I'd be interested to hear if anyone can track down any awards that
Nash's fellow mathematicians gave him, as I haven't found any, and I
don't think they've given him any because math society is weird.

Now consider Andrew Wiles, who received *multiple* math awards for
purportedly proving Fermat's Last Theorem, and he didn't even get what
used to be *the* big math award--the Field's Medal.

If you've never heard of it, that's ok. Mathematicians have a society
that is strangely separate from the rest of the world, which seems to
follow its own rules, like how it has to my knowledge *still* not
given John Nash a single award.

Wiles actually made several hundred thousand dollars just from awards,
but was too old to get the Field's Medal which is awarded for
significant work done I think before the age of 35.

John Nash got an Economics Nobel, which is more presitigious than the
math awards anyway, but I think it telling that mathematicians,
snubbed him.

James Harris

Virgil

Posted: Tue Dec 02, 2003 10:29 pm

Guest

In article <3c65f87.0312020709.19b522e0@posting.google.com>,
jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote:

Quote:

If you've never heard of it, that's ok. Mathematicians have a society
that is strangely separate from the rest of the world, which seems to
follow its own rules, like how it has to my knowledge *still* not
given John Nash a single award.

James Harris is a society of one which is even stranger and more
seprate from the rest of the world.

His society-of-one demands that JSH be given the Fields award and
the Pulitzer prize and the Nobel peace prize, and a whole lot more,
for results that wouldn't get more than a B- in most computer
science courses.

David C. Ullrich

Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003 6:53 am

Guest

On 2 Dec 2003 07:09:16 -0800, jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote:

Quote:

************************

David C. Ullrich

EjP

Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003 11:34 am

Guest

James Harris wrote:

Quote:

Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

A good movie, but only loosely based on facts. You post shows
you didn't bother to read the book.

Quote:

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

That's because there is no Nobel Prize in math, you moron;
nevertheless, the economics prize is often awarded for
math.

Quote:

Well, if you'd taken the time to read the book, you'd know that
the "math society" was "weird" enough to go to great lengths
to support Nash through decades of mental illness, including
positions and various prizes.

Contrary to the impression of the movie, he actually did
useful work at various lucid points throughout his career,
and probably would have won more awards, but it was generally
felt that he wasn't up to notoriety (would you really want
someone you cared about to get up in front of a group
of reporters and start to talk about being "Emporer of
Antarctica"?).

Quote:

Now consider Andrew Wiles, who received *multiple* math awards for
purportedly proving Fermat's Last Theorem, and he didn't even get what
used to be *the* big math award--the Field's Medal.

That's because by the time his proof was finalized, he was over
40, which is the cutoff for the Fields' Medal.

Quote:

He was reportedly a serious contender for the Fields' medal in 1958,
but was beat out late in the deliberations.

I'm trying hard to understand your complaint. Are you upset that
mathemtical prizes are given to one mathematician over another,
rather than just passed out to all mathematicians?

Or are you upset that they didn't give more medals to
Nash based on the fact that Ron Howard made a movie about him?

Quote:

Wiles actually made several hundred thousand dollars just from awards,
but was too old to get the Field's Medal which is awarded for
significant work done I think before the age of 35.

It's 40. Don't you bother to check *any* of your facts.

So in fact, Wiles won a number of mathematical awards, except one
for which he wasn't eligible. Since it would be extremely hard
to work Fermat's Theorem into an Economics Nobel, basically
Wiles won everything he could hope for.

Do you *have* some sort of point?

Quote:

John Nash got an Economics Nobel, which is more presitigious than the
math awards anyway, but I think it telling that mathematicians,
snubbed him.

I guess you're trying to make a parallel with yourself here, but
the only think you have in common with Nash is mental illness.

-E

Quote:

James Harris

Ron Peterson

Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003 2:52 pm

Guest

jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote in message news:<3c65f87.0312020709.19b522e0@posting.google.com>...

Quote:

Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

There is the rumor that there is no Nobel prize in mathematics because
Nobel didn't like Sophus Lie, who would have received the prize if
there were one.

And not everyone that gets a Nobel prize deserves one. (e.g. the
person who invented the lobotomy).

Quote:

John Nash got an Economics Nobel, which is more presitigious than the
math awards anyway, but I think it telling that mathematicians,
snubbed him.

Mathematicians value proving tautologies more than identifying a
particular aspect of reality with a mathematical construct.

--
Ron

Charlie Johnson

Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003 3:41 pm

Guest

Hi David,

IIRC, in Sylvia Nasser's book, "A beautiful mind", she interviewed several
mathematicians who knew him and/or his work well. Most of them said that he
was seriously considered for the Field's medal, but the board members felt
that he was so prolific for a young mathematician that they held off
awarding the medal to him. Assuming he would do more. But, alas, a year or
two after the awarding of the Field's medal he began to suffer his
delusions. I have heard that some of his proofs were quite astonishing, but
I am not ready to read them yet. I hope soon.

Charlie R. Johnson

"David C. Ullrich" <ullrich@math.okstate.edu> wrote in message
news:okjrsv03sua31ti1lf4d69sa2504shfpng@4ax.com...

Quote:

On 2 Dec 2003 07:09:16 -0800, jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote:

Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

Out of curiousity I did a search on the Internet to see if he'd won
any awards from *math* society, and found not one.

I'd be interested to hear if anyone can track down any awards that
Nash's fellow mathematicians gave him, as I haven't found any, and I
don't think they've given him any because math society is weird.

Now consider Andrew Wiles, who received *multiple* math awards for
purportedly proving Fermat's Last Theorem, and he didn't even get what
used to be *the* big math award--the Field's Medal.

If you've never heard of it, that's ok. Mathematicians have a society
that is strangely separate from the rest of the world, which seems to
follow its own rules, like how it has to my knowledge *still* not
given John Nash a single award.

Wiles actually made several hundred thousand dollars just from awards,
but was too old to get the Field's Medal which is awarded for
significant work done I think before the age of 35.

John Nash got an Economics Nobel, which is more presitigious than the
math awards anyway, but I think it telling that mathematicians,
snubbed him.

James Harris

************************

David C. Ullrich

Charlie Johnson

Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003 3:43 pm

Guest

Whoops!! JSH wrote that.

Nevermind!

Charlie

"David C. Ullrich" <ullrich@math.okstate.edu> wrote in message
news:okjrsv03sua31ti1lf4d69sa2504shfpng@4ax.com...

Quote:

EjP

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 9:55 am

Guest

Ron Peterson wrote:

Quote:

jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote in message news:<3c65f87.0312020709.19b522e0@posting.google.com>...

Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

There is the rumor that there is no Nobel prize in mathematics because
Nobel didn't like Sophus Lie, who would have received the prize if
there were one.

I hadn't heard that one. I've personally repeated the erroneous
myth that Nobel's wife had an affair with a mathematician (before
I found out he was never married).

Snopes took on the subject here
http://www.snopes.com/science/nobel.htm
and was unable to come up with a definitive answer.

Quote:

And not everyone that gets a Nobel prize deserves one. (e.g. the
person who invented the lobotomy).

And not everyone who deserves one, gets one, etc...

-E

Quote:

John Nash got an Economics Nobel, which is more presitigious than the
math awards anyway, but I think it telling that mathematicians,
snubbed him.

Mathematicians value proving tautologies more than identifying a
particular aspect of reality with a mathematical construct.

Alan Morgan

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 10:52 am

Guest

In article <3c65f87.0312041200.2c54eca@posting.google.com>,
James Harris <jstevh@msn.com> wrote:

Quote:

EjP <nospam@hackers.are.bad> wrote in message news:<bql38u$5g1$1@info4.fnal.gov>...
James Harris wrote:
Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

A good movie, but only loosely based on facts. You post shows
you didn't bother to read the book.

What does any of what you said have to do with John Nash not receiving
*any* math awards?

Readers should notice that posters jumping over from sci.math haven't
refuted that essential point.

How is it that mathematicians could so snub John Nash that his only
award is not a math award, but a Nobel in Economics?

And Alfred Hitchcock never won an Academy Award for Best Director.
How wierd is that? Ditto Stanley Kubrick.

He did win the Von Neumann award in 1978 and was awarded the Leroy
P. Steele Prize by the AMS. These are not the Fields Medal, true,
but they are math awards.

Alan
--
Defendit numerus

Arturo Magidin

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 12:46 pm

Guest

In article <bqo6qh$tcr$1@Xenon.Stanford.EDU>,
Alan Morgan <amorgan@Xenon.Stanford.EDU> wrote:

[John Nash and math awards]

Quote:

He did win the Von Neumann award in 1978 and was awarded the Leroy
P. Steele Prize by the AMS. These are not the Fields Medal, true,
but they are math awards.

A quick search through the American Mathematical Society yields:

http://www.ams.org/prizes/steele-prize.html

Leroy P. Steele Prize

"These prizes were established in 1970 in honor of George David
Birkhoff, William Fogg Osgood, and William Caspar Graustein, and are
endowed under the terms of a bequest from Leroy P. Steele. From 1970
to 1976 one or more prizes were awarded each year for outstanding
published mathematical research; most favorable consideration was
given to papers distinguished for their exposition and covering
broad areas of mathematics. In 1977 the Council of the AMS modified
the terms under which the prizes are awarded. Since then, up to
three prizes have been awarded each year in the following
categories: (1) for the cumulative influence of the total
mathematical work of the recipient, high level of research over a
period of time, particular influence on the development of a field,
and influence on mathematics through Ph.D. students; (2) for a book
or substantial survey or expository-research paper; (3) for a paper,
whether recent or not, that has proved to be of fundamental or
lasting importance in its field, or a model of important
research. In 1993, the Council formalized the three categories of
the prize by naming each of them: (1) The Leroy P. Steele Prize for
Lifetime Achievement; (2) The Leroy P. Steele Prize for Mathematical
Exposition; and (3) The Leroy P. Steele Prize for Seminal
Contribution to Research."

John Nash was awarded the January 1999 prize for Seminal Contribution
to Research, for his paper "The embedding problem for Riemannian
maniforls", Ann. of Math. (2) 63 (1956), pp. 20-63.

(Other recipients of the Seminal Contribution to Research prizes,
listed for context, have been Edward Nelson, 1995, for work in
mathematical physics dating to 1966; Daniel Stroock and
S.R.S. Varadhan in 1996 for papers on diffusion processes dating from
1971; Mikhael Gromov in 1997 for his paper from 1985 on
pseudo-holomorphic curves in symplectic manifolds; Herbert Wilf and
Doron Zeilberger in 1998 for their paper on rational functions and
combinatorial identities from 1990; Barry Mazur in 2000 for his famous
paper on the possible torsion subgroups of the rational elliptic
curves from 1978; Leslie Greengard and Vladimir Rokhlin in 2001 for
the 1987 paper on algorithms for particule simulations; Mark Goresky
and Robert MacPherson for papers on intersection homology theory from
1980, in 2002; and Ronald Jensen and Michael Morley in 2003 for
foundational work).

From Nash's autobiography at the nobel site

http://www.nobel.se/economics/laureates/1994/nash-autobio.html

he mentions having received an Alfred P. Sloan grant in 1956-1957
(quite a prestigious achievement, though not named a "prize" per se)

The John Von Neumann Theory Prize he was awarded anteceded his Nobel
Prize, and was awarded in 1978. You can see the citation in

http://www.informs.org/Prizes/vonNeumannDetails.html:

"The theory of games was John von Neumann's most distinctive
historical contribution (1928- 1944) to the fields now known as
Operations Research and Management Science, so it is perhaps fitting
that this year's von Neumann prize should be shared by the two major
contributors to the main extension of von Neumann's original design,
the theory of noncooperative games.

"Further, the distinctive and complementary contributions of John
Forbes Nash, Jr. and Carlton Edward Lemke to this theory have
impacted areas of Operations Research and Management Science and
other sciences, far beyond the formal limits of game theory. And it
is particularly for these contributions among their scientific work
that the prize is jointly awarded.

"The earliest proofs of von Neumann's celebrated minimax theorem
depended on topological arguments (1928, 1937, 1941), but the
prevailing trend among mathematicians for many years was to search
for "elementary" (i.e., algebraic) proofs and extensions of that
result, and, indeed, to treat all of game theory as little more
than a branch of the theory of linear inequalities, which was then
in an exciting period of rapid growth. John Nash, however, adopted
a radically different viewpoint. As a young graduate student at
Princeton, he conceived the idea of noncooperative equilibrium in
multi-person games and went on to prove a general existence theorem
for this solution concept. His proofs (1950, 1951) are beautiful
applications of the topological fixed point theorems of Brouwer and
Kakutani. Indeed, their present-day familiarity among economists
and others can be traced back to Nash's work, since that work was
the acknowledged basis for the seminal papers of Debreu and Arrow
(1952, 1954) on general equilibrium that touched off the remarkable
revitalization and mathematical deepening that transformed economic
theory in the 1950's and 1960's. This revolution was undoubtedly
going to occur in any case, but in the actual train of events a
most decisive role was played by Nash's clear penetration into the
heart of a fundamental process of social interaction.

"Nash's equilibrium proofs were non-constructive, and for many years
it seemed that the nonlinearity of the problem would prevent the
actual numerical solution of any but the simplest noncooperative
games. The breakthrough came in 1964 with an ingenious algorithm
for the bimatrix case (i.e., finite, two-player games) devised by
Carlton Lemke and J. T. Howson, Jr. It provided both a constructive
existence proof and a practical means of calculation.

"The underlying logic, involving motions on the edges of an
appropriate polyhedron, was simple and elegant yet conceptually
daring in an epoch when such motions were typically contemplated in
the context of linear programming. Lemke took the lead in
exploiting the many ramifications and applications of this
procedure, which range from the very basic linear complementarity
problem of mathematical programming to the problem of calculating
fixed points of continuous, nonlinear mappings arising in various
contexts. A new chapter in the theory and practice of mathematical
programming was thereby opened which quickly became a very active
and well-populated area of research. Nor was the game-theory aspect
neglected: the path-following methodology has been a source of many
new insights into the nature of the Nash Equilibria."

(Lemke was awarded the prize jointly with Nash)

So not only was his other mathematical work recognized by the
mathematical community, the work that would eventually lead to his
Memorial Nobel Prize in Economics was also recognized by the
mathematical community ->before<- it was awarded the Memorial Nobel.

--
======================================================================
"It's not denial. I'm just very selective about
what I accept as reality."
--- Calvin ("Calvin and Hobbes")
======================================================================

Arturo Magidin
magidin@math.berkeley.edu

David Canzi

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 2:50 pm

Guest

In article <bql38u$5g1$1@info4.fnal.gov>, EjP <nospam@hackers.are.bad> wrote:

Quote:

James Harris wrote:
Mathematicians have a society
that is strangely separate from the rest of the world, which seems to
follow its own rules, like how it has to my knowledge *still* not
given John Nash a single award.

I'm trying hard to understand your complaint. Are you upset that
mathemtical prizes are given to one mathematician over another,
rather than just passed out to all mathematicians?

Or are you upset that they didn't give more medals to
Nash based on the fact that Ron Howard made a movie about him?

JSH is desparately trying to explain the disinterest of mathematicians
in him and his work without admitting that his belief in his own
greatness could be mistaken. He is *relieved*, not upset, at the idea
that Nash was snubbed by other mathematicians.

--
David Canzi

James Harris

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 3:00 pm

Guest

EjP <nospam@hackers.are.bad> wrote in message news:<bql38u$5g1$1@info4.fnal.gov>...

Quote:

James Harris wrote:
Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

A good movie, but only loosely based on facts. You post shows
you didn't bother to read the book.

What does any of what you said have to do with John Nash not receiving
*any* math awards?

Readers should notice that posters jumping over from sci.math haven't
refuted that essential point.

How is it that mathematicians could so snub John Nash that his only
award is not a math award, but a Nobel in Economics?

They're weird.

Quote:

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

That's because there is no Nobel Prize in math, you moron;
nevertheless, the economics prize is often awarded for
math.

There are *many* math prizes out there. Mathematicians STILL haven't
given John Nash any.

Now I point out a rather straight fact, and this poster insults me,
and acts as if all that matters is that there is no Nobel in
mathematics.

Math society, oddly enough, is not exactly rational.

Math people are rather odd, not just in ways you might have realized
before, but often they just don't make sense logically.

It's like they're in their own little world, with rules they make up
as they go.

Quote:

Out of curiousity I did a search on the Internet to see if he'd won
any awards from *math* society, and found not one.

I'd be interested to hear if anyone can track down any awards that
Nash's fellow mathematicians gave him, as I haven't found any, and I
don't think they've given him any because math society is weird.

Well, if you'd taken the time to read the book, you'd know that
the "math society" was "weird" enough to go to great lengths
to support Nash through decades of mental illness, including
positions and various prizes.

Well now, that's more interesting as I'd like to hear about any one of
these "various prizes" as it seems simpler to refute my point by
giving even one.

Quote:

Contrary to the impression of the movie, he actually did
useful work at various lucid points throughout his career,
and probably would have won more awards, but it was generally
felt that he wasn't up to notoriety (would you really want
someone you cared about to get up in front of a group
of reporters and start to talk about being "Emporer of
Antarctica"?).

Hey, I may have been mistaken, so please now, go ahead and name one
award that *mathematicians* gave to John Nash.

That's far simpler I'd think than endless discussion.

Quote:

Now consider Andrew Wiles, who received *multiple* math awards for
purportedly proving Fermat's Last Theorem, and he didn't even get what
used to be *the* big math award--the Field's Medal.

That's because by the time his proof was finalized, he was over
40, which is the cutoff for the Fields' Medal.

If you've never heard of it, that's ok. Mathematicians have a society
that is strangely separate from the rest of the world, which seems to
follow its own rules, like how it has to my knowledge *still* not
given John Nash a single award.

He was reportedly a serious contender for the Fields' medal in 1958,
but was beat out late in the deliberations.

What math prize has John Nash won?

Quote:

I'm trying hard to understand your complaint. Are you upset that
mathemtical prizes are given to one mathematician over another,
rather than just passed out to all mathematicians?

Or are you upset that they didn't give more medals to
Nash based on the fact that Ron Howard made a movie about him?

I did a search on the Internet, and maybe I just missed it, but I
didn't see mention of a *single* math prize awarded to John Nash.

Quote:

Wiles actually made several hundred thousand dollars just from awards,
but was too old to get the Field's Medal which is awarded for
significant work done I think before the age of 35.

It's 40. Don't you bother to check *any* of your facts.

Really? Has it *always* been 40? Do you know?

Quote:

So in fact, Wiles won a number of mathematical awards, except one
for which he wasn't eligible. Since it would be extremely hard
to work Fermat's Theorem into an Economics Nobel, basically
Wiles won everything he could hope for.

Do you *have* some sort of point?

John Nash got an Economics Nobel, which is more presitigious than the
math awards anyway, but I think it telling that mathematicians,
snubbed him.

I guess you're trying to make a parallel with yourself here, but
the only think you have in common with Nash is mental illness.

Well, unless you can name a *single* math prize that John Nash was
awarded by mathematicians you will be the one person who has
demonstrated a bizarre irrationality from your post.

Like, I hope you have a math prize to name that he did get awarded or
you're a very dramatic, and sad demonstration that math people aren't
exactly on the same planet as the rest of us.

James Harris

James Harris

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 7:13 pm

Guest

jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote in message news:<3c65f87.0312020709.19b522e0@posting.google.com>...

Quote:

Oh well, someone posted a couple of awards he won over on the sci.math
newsgroup, so I was wrong with this one.

But I am glad I was wrong. It would have been a shame if he hadn't
been recognized by mathematicians.

Maybe I've been too quick to jump to negative conclusions about math
society.

James Harris

"My math discoveries, found for profit"
http://mathforprofit.blogspot.com/

Min@mygaff0.demon.co.uk

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003 7:59 pm

Guest

In article <3c65f87.0312041613.52f1a572@posting.google.com>, James
Harris <jstevh@msn.com> writes

Quote:

Maybe I've been too quick to jump to negative conclusions about math
society.
***Maybe***?

--
Min
So where are all the buffaloes?

Danny Kodicek

Posted: Fri Dec 05, 2003 4:19 am

Guest

"EjP" <nospam@hackers.are.bad> wrote in message
news:bqnhrc$q1b$1@info4.fnal.gov...

Quote:

Ron Peterson wrote:

jstevh@msn.com (James Harris) wrote in message
news:<3c65f87.0312020709.19b522e0@posting.google.com>...

Remember John Nash, the subject of the movie "A Beautiful Mind"?

Famous mathematician, now, who gets a major prize as he won a Nobel
prize, but remember, it was in Economics.

There is the rumor that there is no Nobel prize in mathematics because
Nobel didn't like Sophus Lie, who would have received the prize if
there were one.

I hadn't heard that one. I've personally repeated the erroneous
myth that Nobel's wife had an affair with a mathematician (before
I found out he was never married).

Snopes took on the subject here
http://www.snopes.com/science/nobel.htm
and was unable to come up with a definitive answer.

And not everyone that gets a Nobel prize deserves one. (e.g. the
person who invented the lobotomy).

And not everyone who deserves one, gets one, etc...

I didn't get one again this year. I was gutted. And the Pulitzer, too.
Snubbed, I was. Academy Award? Huh. What a gyp.

Danny

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