Re: [math-fun] Most influential mathematician?
Henry writes: << Does anyone on this list have a suggestion of who is the most influential mathematician today? I'm looking for someone of the stature of Hilbert; i.e., someone whom most people inside & outside of mathematics would acknowledge as being influential. Of course, this presumes that anyone outside of mathematics knows or cares about mathematicians! . . .
As you suggest, there is little overlap between the most influential mathematicians and the ones most known to the general population. So it may be necessary to narrow down what you're asking for some more. You said most influential *today*, but not that the mathematician need be alive today. I'm not sure what you meant regarding this. Shiing-Shen Chern, the differential geometer (1911-2004) is said to be well-known to the general population of China. Cf. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chern>. Martin Gardner (mostly self-taught in math) and Ian Stewart are widely known as popularizers of math; many mathematicians attribute their choice of profession to Gardner's columns in Sci. Am. Within math per se, I think of John Milnor and Jean-Pierre Serre as probably the most influential mathematicians alive today. (I'd pick Milnor over Serre, because Milnor's scope is probably wider and he's written more math texts, all of which are gems of exposition, and accessible survey articles.) Excluding Euclid, Pythagoras, Archimedes, and Al-Khwarizmi for being in different categories, I'd say that Carl Friedrich Gauss is the clear winner, if the question is which mathematician living or dead, has had the most impact on modern civilization AND within math per se. Cf. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_topics_named_after_Carl_Friedrich_Gauss> for evidence of this. (Full disclosure: I would've said Gauss anyway, but recently learned from the Mathematics Genealogy Project that Gauss is a direct mathematical ancestor of mine, i.e., via a sequence of thesis advisors.) --Dan
Also in support of Gauss, almost everyone, even math dunderheads, has heard of Gauss's Last Theorem. Rich -----Original Message----- From: math-fun-bounces+rschroe=sandia.gov@mailman.xmission.com on behalf of dasimov@earthlink.net Sent: Thu 3/2/2006 10:35 AM To: math-fun Subject: Re: [math-fun] Most influential mathematician? Henry writes: << Does anyone on this list have a suggestion of who is the most influential mathematician today? I'm looking for someone of the stature of Hilbert; i.e., someone whom most people inside & outside of mathematics would acknowledge as being influential. Of course, this presumes that anyone outside of mathematics knows or cares about mathematicians! . . .
As you suggest, there is little overlap between the most influential mathematicians and the ones most known to the general population. So it may be necessary to narrow down what you're asking for some more. You said most influential *today*, but not that the mathematician need be alive today. I'm not sure what you meant regarding this. Shiing-Shen Chern, the differential geometer (1911-2004) is said to be well-known to the general population of China. Cf. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chern>. Martin Gardner (mostly self-taught in math) and Ian Stewart are widely known as popularizers of math; many mathematicians attribute their choice of profession to Gardner's columns in Sci. Am. Within math per se, I think of John Milnor and Jean-Pierre Serre as probably the most influential mathematicians alive today. (I'd pick Milnor over Serre, because Milnor's scope is probably wider and he's written more math texts, all of which are gems of exposition, and accessible survey articles.) Excluding Euclid, Pythagoras, Archimedes, and Al-Khwarizmi for being in different categories, I'd say that Carl Friedrich Gauss is the clear winner, if the question is which mathematician living or dead, has had the most impact on modern civilization AND within math per se. Cf. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_topics_named_after_Carl_Friedrich_Gauss> for evidence of this. (Full disclosure: I would've said Gauss anyway, but recently learned from the Mathematics Genealogy Project that Gauss is a direct mathematical ancestor of mine, i.e., via a sequence of thesis advisors.) --Dan _______________________________________________ math-fun mailing list math-fun@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/math-fun
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Schroeppel, Richard