The story of a mathematician

● During the Cultural Revolution, critics of Chen Jingrun announced: Go to hell with Goldbach's conjecture! 1+2 is nothing! Isn't 1+2 equal to 3? Eating food grown by farmers, living in houses built by workers, protected by PLA soldiers and receiving state wages, what are you studying? 1+2=3, what are you doing? Pseudoscience! Chen Teng jumped on the table, walked to the open window and jumped down! Life should not be predestined. He jumped from the third floor window, and the protruding edge of the house blocked him. This is a rare miracle! Chen Jingrun, who jumped off the building, was safe and sound, except for a little bruised thigh, which was stained with blood. A rebel leader, seeing that Chen Jingrun was safe after jumping off a building, said, "What a famous mathematician! Even jumping off a building knows how to choose an angle! "

Once, mathematician Oquili taught a student to learn a theorem. After that, the young man asked O 'Keerid what benefits he could get from his study. Once, O 'Keeled called a slave and said to him, "Give him three Apos. He said he would benefit from what he learned." In ancient Greece, where mathematics was still very philosophical, it was understandable to be despised for exploring the origin of the world and the way of all things and obtaining what "benefits".

● In a topology class, Minkowski proudly declared to the students: "The most important reason why this theorem has not been proved is that only some third-rate mathematicians have spent time on it so far. Let me prove it below. " ..... At the end of this class, I didn't complete the certificate. In the next class, Minkowski continued to prove that several weeks had passed ... One cloudy morning, Minkowski walked into the classroom. At that time, it happened that a flash of lightning flashed across the sky and the thunder was deafening. Inkowski said very seriously, "God was angered by my pride, and my proof was incomplete." ....

Hilbert once had a student who gave him a paper to prove Riemann's conjecture. Although there was an irreparable mistake, Hilbert was deeply attracted. The next year, the student died somehow, and Hilbert asked to give a speech at the funeral. That day, the wind and rain were rustling, and the students' families were full of grief. Hilbert began his speech, first pointing out that it is a pity that such a genius left us so early. Everyone felt the same way and cried more and more fiercely. Then Hilbert said that although this person's proof is wrong, if we follow this road, we should be able to prove Riemann's conjecture. Then, Hilbert continued to preach enthusiastically in the rain: "Actually, let's consider a univariate complex variable function …" Everyone fell down.

Beisecker S. Besicovich (1891-1970) is a geometric analyst with extraordinary creativity. He was born in Russia and studied at Cambridge University in England during World War I. He learned English quickly, but his level was not very good. His pronunciation is not accurate, and according to the habit of learning Russian, there is no article before nouns. One day, he was giving a class to the students, who were whispering and complaining about the teacher's clumsy English. Beisecker looked at the audience and said solemnly, "Gentlemen, there are 50 million people in the world who speak your English, but 200 million Russians speak my English." The classroom suddenly became quiet.

Amy Nord, a German mathematician, has obtained a doctorate, but she is not qualified to start a class because she needs to write another paper before the professor will discuss whether to grant her the qualification as a lecturer. Hilbert, a famous mathematician at that time, appreciated Amy's talent very much. He ran around asking for permission to be the first female lecturer at the University of G? ttingen, but there was still controversy at the professor meeting. A professor said excitedly, "How can a woman be a lecturer?" If she is allowed to be a lecturer, she will become a professor in the future and even enter the university Council. Can women be allowed to enter the highest academic institutions of universities? "Another professor said," When our soldiers came back from the battlefield and found themselves prostrating themselves at the feet of women, how did they feel? "Hilbert stood up and resolutely refuted:" Gentlemen, the gender of the candidate should never be an argument against her becoming a lecturer. After all, the university Council is not a bathhouse! "

● After leaving Poland, Stefan Bergman (1898- 1977) worked in Brown University, Harvard University and Stanford University successively. He doesn't give many lectures, and his living expenses are mainly maintained by various subject fees. Because he seldom gives lectures, his foreign language can't be exercised, and his spoken and written language is very obscure. But Bergman himself never thought so. He said: "I can speak 12 languages, and English is the best." In fact, he stutters a little, and it is difficult for others to understand what he says. Once he talked with another Polish analyst in his native language, and he was soon reminded: "Let's speak English, maybe it's better."

During the 1950 International Mathematical Congress, an Italian mathematician Cicella accidentally mentioned that a paper by Bergman might add "differentiability hypothesis". Bergman said confidently, "No, it's not necessary. You don't understand my paper." As he spoke, he pulled the other person to make gestures on the blackboard, and his colleagues waited patiently. After a while, Cicero felt that the differentiability hypothesis was still needed. Bergman is more determined, so be sure to explain it carefully. Colleagues echoed: "well, forget it, we are going to have lunch." Bergman shouted, "Don't be stingy-don't eat." (Without differentiability, there would be no lunch) Finally Cecella stayed to listen to his argument step by step.

Another time Bergman went to the west coast to attend an academic conference, and one of his graduate students happened to travel there to get married. They happened to take the same coach. The student knows his problem and discussed it in advance, so he won't talk about math problems in the car. Bergman readily promised. Bergman was sitting in the last row, and the young couple who were going on their honeymoon happened to be sitting in front of him by the window. 10 minutes later, Bergman suddenly got inspiration in his mind, leaned forward unconsciously, leaned back in the student seat and began to discuss mathematics. After a while, the bride had to move to the back seat, and Bergman sat down next to his students. They talked happily about math all the way. Fortunately, the couple are happily married, have a son and become famous mathematicians.

Kurt G?del (1906- 1978) is famous for its novelty and eccentricity. Einstein is his good friend. They are all in Princeton. They often eat together and talk about non-mathematical topics, usually political topics. After General MacArthur returned from the Korean battlefield, he held a grand celebration parade on Madison Avenue. Godel plausibly told Einstein at dinner the next day that the character on the cover of The New York Times was not MacArthur, but a liar. What is the evidence? Godel took out the photo of MacArthur before and took a ruler. He compared the length of the nose with the proportion of the face in the two photos. The result is really different: the certificate is over.

Godel spent his whole life trying to find out whether the continuum hypothesis (CH) is independent of axiom of choice (AC). In the early 1960s, a fledgling young mathematician, Paul J.Cohen, talked with colleagues at Stanford University and threatened that he might become famous by solving a Hilbert problem or proving that CH was independent of AC. To tell the truth, Cohen was only an expert in Fourier analysis at that time, and he only played with logic and recursive functions for a short time. Cohen really went to specialize in logic, and it took him about a year to really prove the independence of CH and AC. This achievement is regarded as one of the greatest intellectual achievements in the 20th century. He won the Fields Medal (more difficult than the Nobel Prize in Natural Science). Cohen's technology is a "forced" method, which has become an important tool of modern logic.

The original situation is: Cohen took the manuscript of the certificate and went to the Institute of Advanced Studies to find Godel and asked him to check whether there were any loopholes in the certificate.

Godel was naturally skeptical at first, because Cohen was not the first person to claim that he had solved the problem. In Godel's eyes, Cohen is not a logician at all. Cohen found Godel's house and knocked on the door. The door opened only 6 inches, a cold hand reached over and took the manuscript, and then the back door slammed. Cohen was embarrassed and left angrily. However, two days later, Godel specially invited Cohen to have tea at home. Cohen's proof is right: the master has approved it.

● Wiener (1894- 1964) was the first great mathematician who won international honor for American mathematics. There are many anecdotes about him. When Weiner was in England in his early years, he met Littlewood, a famous British mathematician, and said, "Oh, there really are people like you. I thought Littlewood was just the pseudonym of Hardy's poorly written article. " Weiner himself was annoyed by the joke and strongly denied it in his autobiography. Another version of this story is about Edmund Lao Dao: Landau doubted the existence of Littlewood, so he made a special trip to England to meet the man himself.

Weiner later spent 25 years at MIT. He is a celebrity on campus, and everyone wants to make friends with him. Once a student asked Weiner how to solve a specific problem. Weiner thought for a moment and wrote down the answer. In fact, students don't want to know the answer, just ask him "how". Wiener said, "But is there no other way?" He thought for a moment, smiled and immediately wrote a solution. Wiener's most famous story is about moving. Once Weiner moved, his wife was familiar with Weiner in all aspects and repeatedly reminded him the night before moving. She also found a note with the address of her new house written on it, and changed the key of the old house into the key of the new house. The next day, Weiner went to work with a note and a key. During the day, someone casually asked him a math problem, and Weiner wrote the answer on the back of the note and handed it to others. In the evening, Wiener habitually returned to his former residence. He was surprised that there was no one at home. Looking through the window, the furniture is gone. Take out the key to open the door and find that it doesn't match the teeth at all. So I knocked on the door a few times and then paced in the yard. Suddenly I found a little girl running in the street. Wiener said to her, "Little girl, I'm really unlucky. I can't find my home and I can't insert the key. " The little girl said, "Dad, that's right. Mom asked me to come to you. "

One of Weiner's students once saw Weiner sending something at the post office and wanted to introduce himself. At MIT, it is very rare to really say a few words to Weiner and shake hands directly. But the student doesn't know how to get close to him. At this moment, I saw Wiener pacing back and forth, lost in thought. The student is even more worried, for fear of interrupting Mr. Wang's train of thought and losing a profound mathematical thought. But in the end, I got up the courage and approached the great man: "Good morning, Professor Weiner!" " "Wiener suddenly raised his head and patted his forehead and said," Yes, Wiener! " "It turned out that Weiner wanted to write the sender's name on the label, but forgot his own name.