New Yorker on Perelman and Poincaré Controversy

b4stard writes "The New Yorker has an interesting article on the recent proof of the Poincaré conjecture and the controversy surrounding it. This is a very nice read, which, among other things, sheds some light on what may have motivated Perelman in refusing to accept the Fields medal." From the article: "The Fields Medal, like the Nobel Prize, grew, in part, out of a desire to elevate science above national animosities. German mathematicians were excluded from the first I.M.U. congress, in 1924, and, though the ban was lifted before the next one, the trauma it caused led, in 1936, to the establishment of the Fields, a prize intended to be 'as purely international and impersonal as possible.'"

Some people don't want to be famous

Is it so hard to understand that some people do things just because they love to, and don't like the burdens that come with fame?

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So tell us you really think he's LESS famous as a result of this than he would have been had he just accepted the award.

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

My favorite quote from the article:

"There are a lot of students of high ability who speak before thinking," Burago said. "Grisha was different. He thought deeply. His answers were always correct. He always checked very, very carefully." Burago added, "He was not fast. Speed means nothing. Math doesn't depend on speed. It is about deep."

The Academy (not to mention Slashdot!) could use a few more people like this.

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Refusing the prize made him so much more famous than accepting it would have. Anyone with a bit of common sense would know this. Either he has some sort of social problem (very likely) or he *wanted* attention (not likely)

That is understandable.

The situation here, though, is more complex I believe. Shing-Tung Yau seems to have deliberately turned mathematics from a relatively peaceful subject into a pieceful one, and Perelman seems utterly uninterested in having his emotions mauled for the sole purpose of gratifying a glory-seeker.

I would consider Yau's attitude, if the New Yorker piece is accurate, to be academic fraud, plagarism and the wilfull falsifying of results - any of which are severe enough in academia to warrant the nullification of previous awards, even if these took place afterwards. There have, in fact, been cases where doctorates have been revoked by the awarding University in England as a result of later scholarly abuses. They are certainly sufficiently serious that any professional mathematical society to which Yau belongs should investigate matters for possible disciplinary action should they be true.

(Sure, you can't do much. The military can court-martial, the Government can haul you off to Gitmo, but the mathematician's union is a little more limited. They could probably ban him from conferences they specifically held, and they could probably lean on journals to be more careful in refereeing his work, but that's about it. Well, actually, given his ego, they could probably take out an ad in a major Chinese newspaper, satirizing him. That could probably do him more damage than any official action.)

Personally, I think the Fields medal should have been awarded to Perelman specifically BECAUSE he refused it. They can't make him accept it - but that's what Swiss bank safety deposit boxes are for. On the other hand, they need to make it clear - to him and to everyone else - that mathematics is about truth, and truth has nothing to do with who accepts what. If a proof is correct, then it is correct and that is the end of the matter. Neither politics nor personalities have any say in it.

Furthermore, yes, it does turn him somewhat into a figurehead. And which would YOU prefer to be the role-model for all future mathematicians - the egomaniac or the gentleman? I'd argue that the sciences (and I include maths as a science) need to emphasise honesty, integrity and quality. Most here are computer programmers, or at least familiar with programming, so it would perhaps make sense to liken this to code. Would you rather a program work right (even if it's hard to understand), or be broken and/or stolen (even if it's made easy)? (I'll let you pick which OS' I am referring to, and which one I believe to be inherently superior.)

Perelman's proofs might be "high magic" in the coder's sense of being so hard very few (to none) can understand it, but I fail to see why that should be a problem. If anything, it is proof of the quality of his intellect and instinct. Those who reject that which they cannot understand are superstitious peasents. (Ok, that's a bit of a troll, but it's also true. You cannot learn that which you already understand, so it is only by not understanding that you are capable of learning. Thus, only the intelligent admit ignorance and only the ignorant claim certainty.)

Yau has claimed that he does not understand the proof. So where does the problem lie - with pto proof or Yau? Well, obviously Yau. If the problem was the proof, then Yau could establish where the error was that resulted in the proof being nonsense. The inability to establish such a proof does not mean that Perelman's work is perfect, only that it is beyond Yau to make any claims about it whatsoever. Were I to write a flawless program in raw assembly, would flaws magically apear if someone who could not read assembly state that it was incomprehensible to them? That would be stupid.

This entire dispute cuts to the heart of ALL theoretical and practical sciences and SHOULD be examined in depth by all official bodies with any degree of say in the matter. Perelman should NOT be permitted to walk away and play victim. If he is a victim of academic fraud, then academia has a responsib

Re:That is understandable.

I would consider Yau's attitude, if the New Yorker piece is accurate, to be academic fraud, plagarism and the wilfull falsifying of results

Your post is full of hyperbole and flamebait. There is no falsifying of results or fraud here. There is no plagiarism - sources are completely referenced and acknowledged. No-one doubts the immense value of Cao-Zhu's (or Morgan/Tian's) work as a exposition, especially given the sketchy nature of the arXiv preprints - the dispute centres around whether their own (and implicitly, Yau's) valuation of their contribution is justified.

Yau has claimed that he does not understand the proof. So where does the problem lie - with pto proof or Yau? Well, obviously Yau. If the problem was the proof, then Yau could establish where the error was that resulted in the proof being nonsense. The inability to establish such a proof does not mean that Perelman's work is perfect, only that it is beyond Yau to make any claims about it whatsoever.

The notion of "correctness" of a proof is not always as clear-cut as you might think, because different things are obvious and taken as granted at different levels. Being able to prove is different to communicating a proof. Yau obviously takes the idea of accessibility of a proof seriously - which is no bad thing.

Yau is without question amongst the greatest geometers alive. He proved Calabi's conjecture about Ricci-flat metrics on kahler manifolds with zero first Chern class. He proved the positive energy theorem in general relativity. He proved Severi's conjecture (the complex projective version of the Poincare conjecture). He pioneered the use of methods from the analysis of elliptic differential equations in differential geometry. To use a programming analogy, what Yau claims happened would be like Andrew Morton submitting a kernel patch which Alan Cox was not able to understand. In these circumstances there is clearly a problem.

This is not to say that Yau has not blown the problem up out of all proportion. This does not negate his flaws of ego and wanting "too much credit". This does not excuse his ridiculous political games. This doesn't have anything to do with the fact that Yau probably isn't a very nice person. But you should realise that now the dust is settling nobody disputes the validity of the actual mathematics.

You can clearly see Yau's dismissive attitude in the slides of his own talk [mcm.ac.cn]. But the dispute here is human, not scientific. Suggesting that the IMU should revoke Yau's Field's medal makes you sound like an idiot.

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

Would he have gotten an article in the New Yorker by quietly accepting?

Probably not, but he would have gotten one in the New York Times. It isn't so easy to "quietly" accept.

And what is the answer for someone who does not wish fame, but does wish to contribute, and so begins to gather fame for eschewing fame? I've you've got the answer, please let me know, I haven't found it in decades of trying. Neither has Salinger. The best you can do is moderate your notoriety; and hide.

If he didn't want the medal he could have just shut the hell up, but then we wouldn't have the solution.

"There are better men than Diogones, but nobody has ever heard of them."

KFG

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

And what is the answer for someone who does not wish fame, but does wish to contribute, and so begins to gather fame for eschewing fame?

I'm not saying he did the wrong thing, or did it cynically, or didn't do it out of love for the work. I'm just saying each year's award winners tend to be a nine-days wonder or less, while this story makes the wonder last longer... probably worth 500 slashdot comments instead of merely 50 :).

If you ask me, Salinger is more famous for being a recluse... hiding in plain sight probably works better.

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

... hiding in plain sight probably works better.

Am I the only geek to doubt this?

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...I haven't found it in decades of trying...

I know what you mean, I can never get away from the paparazzi! But at least here on slahdot I can lurk as "RaftPeople" without anyone realizing my incredible talent and world-wide fame.

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

The article in the New Yorker is more about the dispicable effort that Yau made to get his name on the Hamilton-Perelman proof than actually discussing Perelman's effort to remain fame-free. "The chinese made a 30% contribution and Perelman only a 25% one."

If the way that he is rejecting the Field's Medal is what he concluded it would take to expose the efforts of Yau and Co. to get recognition for work that they did not do, then he is going about it in a good way. The article itself is more an expose into the workings of credit in the world of mathematics than the rejection itself.

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

Yau said:
50% Hamilton
25% Perelman
30% Yau & Co.
=
105%

Yes, Yau actually said that.

'As for Yau, Perelman said, "I can't say I'm outraged. Other people do worse. Of course, there are many mathematicians who are more or less honest. But almost all of them are conformists. They are more or less honest, but they tolerate those who are not honest."'

Perelman doesn't really want anything to do with the mathematical community as a result of Yau's politiking.

TFA does not paint a very pretty picture of Yau.

Not by Yau

50% Hamilton
25% Perelman
30% Yau & Co.

Yau himself never said this. It's another renown Chinese mathematician (named Yang, Le) that was quoted by a Chinese jornalist. I guess journalists all over the world are just the same: they keep misquoting

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Maybe his sick mother lives with him.

After growing up, children living with parents may be a source of derision in America, but in some countries 2 or 3 generations living under one roof is not unusual. Not that I am saying Russia is one of these since I

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From TFA:

Ultimately, he received several job offers. But he declined them all, and in the summer of 1995 returned to St. Petersburg, to his old job at the Steklov Institute, where he was paid less than a hundred dollars a month. (He told a friend that he h

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

Fame? Would he have gotten an article in the New Yorker by quietly accepting? Not that he's purposefully trying to build a mystique of genius, but if he were, this is the way he'd do it.

Maybe fame of a different sort. He's saying that by accepting the prize and staying in the community, he'd either have to stick up for what he views as his integrity and contribution by calling Yau out on his later proof, or he'd essentially be confirming it through inaction. He did not want to be embroiled in this kind of political mockery of mathematics, so he decided to remove himself from it. In doing so I guess he has called attention to his reasons, but he's removed from the conflict.

Honestly, this guy is not a glory hog, from all accounts I've heard. If you read the article, the New Yorker spent a week leaving him messages only to find out in the end he hadn't left to check his mail in that week. He's not holding press conferences, there aren't any photo ops, he's not going out of his way to get coverage. If he wanted the press he'd have gone to all the publications calling Yau out as a fraud and stirring up a big ruckus. That's the more interesting story.

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

Not that he's purposefully trying to build a mystique of genius, but if he were, this is the way he'd do it.

I agree. A good way to build a mystique of genius WOULD be to solve a very old, nigh-unsolvable, famous math problem. Why didn't I think of that?!

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

No kidding. The real losers here are the students who are going to get shafted when all the topology texts release new editions for a footnote :P

Funny, but you haven't studdied topology

High level math books rarely get updated. My topology book was 16 years old, the differential geometry book 20. There isn't enough volume to justify a new press run, plus they would have to reconsider how much information to include and fix the mistakes. T

Argumentum Ad Homology!

I did just crack open Munkres to check, second edition in 2000, and my Intro to Diff Manifolds book had a new edition in 2005. The old standby Do Carmo is still hovering back in the 80s, though, and if Munkres mentions Poincaré it's only in passing (p

Re:Some people don't want to be famous

Just the pride of solving an open problem like that is enough.

I agree. Perelman knows he's the one who solved it. The world knows Perelman solved it. And all the mathematicians know in their hearts that he solved it, even Yau. Yau may try to deny Perelman's accomplishment, and may even gain some material rewards he does not truly deserve. But those hollow victories and the methods he used to obtain them will be what Yau is remembered for, while Perelman will be known as the man who proved the Poincare conjecture.

How's that for topology.

Dear editor

You have got the wikipedia link wrong. You meant: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grigori_Perelman [wikipedia.org]

I salute Grigory

not necessarily for his typical genius mathematician nutty professor image (from which this behavior seems to stem; see Einstein's quick switch from young stud to crazy haired geek, on purpose), but because of the interest it seems to be reawakening in Mathematics.

Note in blog margin from Perelman

I have discovered a truely marvelous demonstration of the Poincaré conjecture that this blog is too narrow to contain.

grand, but not so grand

The Fields Medal, like the Nobel Prize, grew, in part, out of a desire to elevate science above national animosities.

And dynamite. Pretty much the coolest invention ever. I don't know why anyone wouldn't list that first.

That's Grigori?

I thought he was a church pastor living in Ravenholm... huh... learn something new everyday.

So basically....

A Chinese mathematician with a history of "borrowing" or "aggregating" other people's research is trying to take credit for something a Russian mathematician has done. When the Poincare chip is produced, they'll mask over P for Perelman and insert a Y for

Parallels between Wiles and Perelman

I find the parallels between Perelman's proof of Thurston's Conjecture and Wiles proof of Fermat to be compelling:

• Both men benefited from ingenious strategic breakthough made by other men: The Frey Curve proposed by Gerhard Frey linked Fermat with Tanyama-Shimura, and the Ricci Flow idea Hamilton provided the basis for Perelman's deep refinements. Both ideas can be readily understood by laymen.
• Both men dragged the enabling idea over the line virtually alone fighting though unimaginable difficulty. (These are not easily understood by laymen!)

Obviously the standing of Wiles and Perelman in the mathematical community couldn't be more different. Lets hope Perelman accepts an academic position somewhere so he can carry on his work with the honor he deserves.

The attempts by the Chinese to claim proof of Poincare is disgusting.

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I certainly don't. But Ribets Theorem is a whole lot harder to grasp than the idea of a Frey Curve.

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I dunno who you mean by "ethical us," but Perelman actually acknowledges in the story that this kind of thing does happen throughout mathematics. China is pretty central to this story, though; I can't tell you the exact reason without making some big guess

Michael Anderson Quote

The following was a response to the article disseminated through one of Stony Brook's email lists:

The New Yorker article badly distorted my comments and the quote given is very inaccurate and misleading. I've already discussed it with Yau and expressed to him my apologies and disgust at using my name in this respect. I tried to have the quote removed, but was unsuccessful, partly because I was travelling in Europe while all this happened very quickly and I had no time respond.

I spent a good deal of time talking with Sylvia Nasar trying to convince her to avoid discussion of the Tian-Yau fight since it is irrelevant to Perelman, Poincare, etc. But obviously I was not successful. In this particular respect, I feel the New Yorker has done a disservice to mathematicians.

Sincerely, Michael Anderson

Re:Michael Anderson Quote

Translation: Anderson is afraid of Yau.

Biased and Distorted Article

Some mathematitians that were quoted in this New Yorker artcile have expressed anger that the authors distorted their words. Here's a collection of those mathmettians clarification, both English and the Chinese translation:

http://mitbbs.com/mitbbs_article_t.php?board=Mathe matics&gid=10840706&ftype=0 [mitbbs.com]

I'll paste just the English version here so everybody can have a look:

====

From Dan Stroock at MIT:

Clarification

I, like several others whom Sylvia Nasar interviewed, am shocked and angered by the article which she and Gruber wrote for the New Yorker. Havingseen Yau in action during his June conference on string theory, Nasar ledme to believe that she was fascinated by S-T Yau and asked me my opinionabout his activities. I told her that I greatly admire Yau's efforts tosupport young Chinese mathematicians and to break down the ossifiedpower structure in the Chinese academic establishment. I then told her that I sometimes have doubts about his methodology. In particular, I toldher that, at least to my ears, Yau weakens his case and lays himself opento his enemies by sounding too self-promoting. As it appears in her article, she has purposefully distorted my statementand made it unforgivably misleading. Like the rest of us, Yau has hisfaults, but, unlike most of us, his virtues outweigh his faults.Unfortunately, Nasar used my statement to bolster her casethat the opposite is true, and for this I cannot forgive her.

====

From Michael Anderson at Stony Brook:

Dear Yau,

I am furious, and completely shocked, at what Sylvia Nasar wrote. Her quote of me is completely wrong and baseless. There are other factual mistakes in the article, in addition to those you pointed out. I have left her phone and email messages this evening and hope to speakto her tomorrow at the latest to clear this up. I want her to remove this statement completely from the article. It serves no purpose and contains no factual information; I view it as stupid gossip unworthy of a paper like the New Yorker. At the moment, the print version has not appeared and so it might be possible to fix this still. I spent several hours with S. Nasar on the phone talking about Perelman, Poincare , etc but it seems I was too naive and I'm now disgusted in believing this journalist would report factually. I regret very much this quote falsely attributed to me and will do whatever I can to have it removed. I will keep you informed as I know more.

Yours, Michael

====

More clarification from Anderson:

Many of you have probably seen the New Yorker article by Sylvia Nasar and David Gruber on Perelman and the Poincare conjecture. In many respects, its very interesting and a pleasure to read. However,it contains a number of inaccuracies and downright errors. I spent several hours talking with Sylvia Nasar trying to dissuade her from incorporating the Tian-Yau fights into the article, since it was completely irrelevant and I didn't see the point of dragging readers through the mud . Obviously I was not successful. The quote attributed to me on Yau is completely inaccurate and distortedfrom some remarks I made to her in a quite different context; I made itexplicit to her that the remarks I was making in that context were purely speculative and had no basis in fact. I did not give her my permission to quote me on this, even with the qualification of speculation. There are other inaccuracies about Stony Brook. One for instance is theimplication that Tian at MIT was the first to invite Perelman to the USto give talks . This is of course false - we at Stony Brook were the first to do so. I stressed in my talks with her the role Stony Brook played,yet she focusses on the single talk Grisha gave at Princeton, listing a collection of eminent mathematicians, none of whom is a geometer/topologist. I was not given an opportun

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Some people might be skeptical about this, by the way, especially not being able to read the site, but I am able to confirm that at least one of those people was fuming about being misquoted in the article. Reading their quote from the article, it does see

Yet

The article may be biased but you can always discern some truth.

1. Perelman is unconcerned with fame and praise.
2. Yau is concerned with fame and praise.
3. Perelman did most the finishing work on the Poincaire conjecture.
4. Yau and co. released a paper on

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Not that journalists haven't been known to manipulate a few words here and then, but these clarifications just do not sound as a solid rebuttal at all - more like politics. They dispute the attribution of the words, rather then their content and, at that

The article expresses what many of us want to

To many of us involved in the field, this article is right on. Yau has done great work and remains a dynamic force in the field. But as he has advanced from his prime years he has focused more and more on administration rather than mathematics, in an attempt to stay relevant (not unheard of in the sciences and maths). The article accurately portrays him as a man who now finds reward in the political machinations of his field rather than the joy of discovery.

He remains brilliant and is adept at his new focus, which makes him dangerous. The Fields Medal and Harvard platform give him a lot of power to retaliate against people he perceives as enemies to his legacy. And he has a chip on his shoulder...ok he's always had a chip on his shoulder but in the old days he'd satisfy it by the maths, not by this sort of dirty pool.

I for one would never speak up against him with my name signed to it. I don't blame (or envy) Mike or Dan for the damage control they're faced with now that what they thought were private remarks have been made public. But it doesn't change the accuracy of the story. Off the record there are few in the field who would disagree with saying that Yau and his students are making an unwarranted grab for credit that is not theirs. But confronting Yau on the record is not smart unless you've got a Fields and Ivy professorship yourself (fat chance that for me).

I read that the main reason for his hermitage...

Perelman did not leave his position at the Steklov Institute as the article suggests, but rather, he was not allowed to return to his position. I believe that he already had a fairly reclusive and modest personality, and as was pointed out by the Sydney Morning Herald [smh.com.au], the extremity of this nature was prompted when the faculty of the Steklov Institute declined to re-elect him as a member; his peers and close colleagues rejected him, the paper quotes a friend as saying that Perelman was made to feel as an "absolutely ungifted and untalented person". Wikipedia has more, saying that this stemmed "apparently in part out of continuing doubt over his claims regarding the geometrization conjecture" [wikipedia.org].

There are few things more bitter than being betrayed by one, let alone a majority or all of your associates. I know all too well how that kind of utterly profound pain can easily turn one of your greatest passions in life (be it a pursuit or a person) into a source for nothing other than misery.

There's no controversy

Perelman will be the one that goes down in history as the one that solved the conjecture to a satisfactory degree, no matter who else releases papers that pretend that his work was incomprehensible. That sort of argument doesn't really stand up very well, anyway; if it were easy to understand, it's likely someone would have trivially solved it earlier. The Chinese may very well have an army of extremely competent mathematicians, and two or three of them may have cleaned up Perelman's work to be a little more friendly to the mathematics community at large, but I suspect that Perelman will be the name that everyone remembers.

He's done his bit, people will remember him, and he'll get to work on more mathematics. He doesn't care, so I don't think we should care either. On to the next (apparently) intractable problem!

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if it were easy to understand, it's likely someone would have trivially solved it earlier.

There's a similar story about Feynman when he got the Nobel Prize for his work in quantum electrodynamics. At a lunchen given in his honor, he was asked by his intro

Re:I thought it was because Perelman...

Give it a rest, Yau.

Re:perhaps he has the best reward there is

i know this is probably hard for indoctrinated Americans to understand.

It's probably even harder for indoctrinated non-Americans to understand that the vast majority of Americans aren't particularly narcissistic, or remotely wealthy. At this point, in fact, the bulk of us are starting to get pretty damn sick and tired of both those SUV-driving narcissistic fuckwits that we have to contend with on the way to work every day, and judgmental foreigners that insist upon treating America (of all countries) as a monolithic culture.

But so far as refusing the prize is concerned, you're right, I'm sure he has that satisfaction. But, contrary to popular belief, the academic/scientific world is just as rife with dissent, personalities and politics as any other human endeavor. Consequently it's quite likely he refused the prize because he was pissed off about something or someone.

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But, contrary to popular belief, the academic/scientific world is just as rife with dissent, personalities and politics as any other human endeavor.

It is reassuring to see someone state this every now and again. I must get a T-shirt printed.

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Well, the stereotypical white-lab-coated emotionless scientist is just as ridiculous a cultural icon now as it was in all those 50's B-grades.

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Heh, major moderation abuse - this post is not flamebait at all, but is a very reasonable response to an absurdist generalization about Americans.

Thank you, ScrewMaster, your point is extremely valid.

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Classic. I complain about a particular class of four-wheeled headcases and one of them comes back and demonstrates precisely what I was talking about.

Personally, I drive a full-length mini-van, which I've found is far more pragmatic (certainly I get bet

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What exactly is narcissistic or greedy about a person humbly accepting an honor accorded them by their peers? You don't even have to show up to politely say "Thank you, but I prefer not to be in the spotlight, please donate the award money to $CHARITY or

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The funny part is Perelman will be remembered in the field of mathematics as much for his integrity as for his accomplishment. Whereas Yau will probly be relegated to obscurity...

Honorable Guy.

The article concluded that he refused the Field's Medal because of a lack of ethics surrounding who is credited with the work.

"As long as I was not conspicuous, I had a choice," Perelman explained. "Either to make some ugly thing"--a fuss about the math community's lack of integrity--"or, if I didn't do this kind of thing, to be treated as a pet. Now, when I become a very conspicuous person, I cannot stay a pet and say nothing. That is why I had to quit."

The article, while quite lengthy, describes how some of the Chinese, Yau and those who work for him, have been "fixing" people's proofs and claiming them as original work. Yau tried to do it again with Perelman's proof and got shot down, again. Considering that Yau is still a respected member of the Math community, Perelman does not want to belong to that community. It is nice to see some people in this world still have some integrity. Perelman refuses to make a fuss out of this, he's not in it for his own gain.

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The article says that Perelman earned "more than enough" in America in his early career to last the rest of his life, but he's living with his mother on a diet consisting of "bread, cheese and milk." I doubt a extra cash is ever overlooked by someone that