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This document provides excerpts from writings by mathematician Paul Halmos on various topics related to mathematics. It begins with biographical context about Halmos and his impact on mathematics through both his mathematical work and advice on writing, speaking, and professional life as a mathematician. The excerpts themselves discuss Halmos' views on writing mathematics effectively, the importance of having something meaningful to say, and speaking to attract and inform audiences in a simple and accessible manner.

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Liana Martins
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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
313 views9 pages

Halmos PDF

This document provides excerpts from writings by mathematician Paul Halmos on various topics related to mathematics. It begins with biographical context about Halmos and his impact on mathematics through both his mathematical work and advice on writing, speaking, and professional life as a mathematician. The excerpts themselves discuss Halmos' views on writing mathematics effectively, the importance of having something meaningful to say, and speaking to attract and inform audiences in a simple and accessible manner.

Uploaded by

Liana Martins
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 9

Paul Halmos:

In His Own Words


John Ewing

Paul Halmos died on October 2, 2006, at the age of 90. After his death, many people wrote about his
career and praised both his mathematical and his expository skills. Paul would have complained about
that: He often said he could smell great mathematicians, and he himself was not one of them.
But he was wrong. He was a master of mathematics in multiple ways, and he influenced math-
ematicians and mathematical culture throughout his career. Unlike most other master mathemati-
cians, Pauls legacy was not merely mathematics but rather advice and opinion about mathematical
lifewriting, publishing, speaking, research, or even thinking about mathematics. Paul wrote about
each of these topics with an extraordinary mixture of conviction and humility. Mathematicians paid
attention to what he wrote, and they often quoted it (and still doevery talk ought to have one
proof). They disagreed and frequently wrote rebuttals. They passed along his wisdom to their stu-
dents, who passed it along to theirs. Paul Halmoss writing affected the professional lives of nearly
every mathematician in the latter half of the twentieth century, and it will continue to influence the
profession for years to come.
How does one write about great writing? Explanations of great exposition always fall flat, like
analyses of great poems or elucidations of famous paintings. Art is best exhibited, not explained.
And so here is a collection of excerpts from the writing of Paul Halmos, giving advice, offering
opinions, or merely contemplating life as a mathematicianall in his own words.
J. E.

On Writing born with it are not usually born with full knowl-
edge of all the tricks of the trade. A few essays
Excerpts from:
such as this may serve to remind (in the sense of
How to write mathematics, Enseign. Math. (2)
Plato) the ones who want to be and are destined to
16 (1970), 123152.
be the expositors of the future of the techniques
I think I can tell someone how to write, but I
found useful by the expositors of the past.
cant think who would want to listen. The ability
The basic problem in writing mathematics is
to communicate effectively, the power to be intel-
the same as in writing biology, writing a novel, or
ligible, is congenital, I believe, or, in any event,
writing directions for assembling a harpsichord:
it is so early acquired that by the time someone
the problem is to communicate an idea. To do
reads my wisdom on the subject he is likely to be
so, and to do it clearly, you must have something
invariant under it. To understand a syllogism is
to say, and you must have someone to say it to,
not something you can learn; you are either born
you must organize what you want to say, and you
with the ability or you are not. In the same way,
must arrange it in the order you want it said in,
effective exposition is not a teachable art; some can
you must write it, rewrite it, and re-rewrite it sev-
do it and some cannot. There is no usable recipe
eral times, and you must be willing to think hard
for good writing.
about and work hard on mechanical details such
Then why go on? A small reason is the hope that
as diction, notation, and punctuation. Thats all
what I said isnt quite right; and, anyway, Id like a
there is to it.
chance to try to do what perhaps cannot be done. A
It might seem unnecessary to insist that in order
more practical reason is that in the other arts that
to say something well you must have something to
require innate talent, even the gifted ones who are
say, but its no joke. Much bad writing, mathemati-
This article was prepared and edited by John Ewing, cal and otherwise, is caused by a violation of that
executive director of the AMS. His email address is jhe@ first principle. Just as there are two ways for a
ams.org. sequence not to have a limit (no cluster points or

1136 Notices of the AMS Volume 54, Number 9


too many), there are two ways for a piece of writing the use of a complicated alphabetic apparatus,
not to have a subject (no ideas or too many). avoid it. A good attitude to the preparation of writ-
The first disease is the harder one to catch. It is ten mathematical exposition is to pretend that it is
hard to write many words about nothing, especially spoken. Pretend that you are explaining the subject
in mathematics, but it can be done, and the result to a friend on a long walk in the woods, with no
is bound to be hard to read. There is a classic crank paper available; fall back on symbolism only when
book by Carl Theodore Heisel [The Circle Squared it is really necessary.
Beyond Refutation, Heisel, Cleveland, 1934] that
serves as an example. It is full of correctly spelled On Speaking
words strung together in grammatical sentences, Excerpts from:
but after three decades of looking at it every now How to talk mathematics, Notices of AMS 21
and then I still cannot read two consecutive pages (1974), 155158.
and make a one-paragraph abstract of what they What is the purpose of a public lecture? Answer:
say; the reason is, I think, that they dont say to attract and to inform. We like what we do, and
anything. we should like for others to like it too; and we
The second disease is very common: there are believe that the subjects intrinsic qualities are
many books that violate the principle of having good enough so that anyone who knows what they
something to say by trying to say too many things. are cannot help being attracted to them. Hence,
better answer: the purpose of a public lecture is
The second principle of good writing is to write to inform, but to do so in a manner that makes it
for someone. When you decide to write something, possible for the audience to absorb the informa-
ask yourself who it is that you want to reach. Are tion. An attractive presentation with no content is
you writing a diary note to be read by yourself only, worthless, to be sure, but a lump of indigestible
a letter to a friend, a research announcement for information is worth no more.
specialists, or a textbook for undergraduates? The Less is more, said the great architect Mies van
problems are much the same in any case; what var- der Rohe, and if all lecturers remember that adage,
ies is the amount of motivation you need to put in, all audiences would be both wiser and happier.
the extent of informality you may allow yourself, Have you ever disliked a lecture because it was
the fussiness of the detail that is necessary, and too elementary? I am sure that there are people
the number of times things have to be repeated. All who would answer yes to that question, but not
writing is influenced by the audience, but, given the many. Every time I have asked the question, the
audience, the authors problem is to communicate person who answered said no, and then looked
with it as best he can. a little surprised at hearing the answer. A public
Everything Ive said so far has to do with writing lecture should be simple and elementary; it should
in the large, global sense; it is time to turn to the not be complicated and technical. If you believe
local aspects of the subject. and can act on this injunction (be simple), you
The English language can be a beautiful and can stop reading here; the rest of what I have to say
powerful instrument for interesting, clear, and is, in comparison, just a matter of minor detail.
completely precise information, and I have faith To begin a public lecture to 500 people with
that the same is true for French or Japanese or Consider a sheaf of germs of holomorphic func-
Russian. It is just as important for an expositor to tions (I have heard it happen) loses people and
familiarize himself with that instrument as for a antagonizes them. If you mention the Knneth
surgeon to know his tools. Euclid can be explained formula, it does no harm to say that, at least as far
in bad grammar and bad diction, and a vermiform as Betti numbers go, it is just what happens when
appendix can be removed with a rusty pocket you multiply polynomials. If you mention functors,
knife, but the victim, even if he is unconscious of say that a typical example is the formation of the
the reason for his discomfort, would surely prefer duals of vector spaces and the adjoints of linear
better treatment than that. transformations.
My advice about the use of words can be Be simple by being concrete. Listeners are
summed up as follows. (1) Avoid technical terms, prepared to accept unstated (but hinted) gener-
and especially the creation of new ones, whenever alizations much more than they are able, on the
possible. (2) Think hard about the new ones that spur of the moment, to decode a precisely stated
you must create; consult Roget; and make them abstraction and to re-invent the special cases
as appropriate as possible. (3) Use the old ones that motivated it in the first place. Caution: being
correctly and consistently, but with a minimum concrete should not lead to concentrating on the
of obtrusive pedantry. trees and missing the woods. In many parts of
Everything said about words, applies, mutatis mathematics a generalization is simpler and more
mutandis, to the even smaller units of mathemati- incisive than its special parent. (Examples: Artins
cal writing, the mathematical symbols. The best solution of Hilberts 17th problem about definite
notation is no notation; whenever possible to avoid forms via formally real fields; Gelfands proof of

October 2007 Notices of the AMS 1137


Wieners theorem about absolutely convergent Make It Simple, and You Wont Go Wrong.
Fourier series via Banach algebras.) In such cases Excerpt from:
there is always a concrete special case that is I Want to Be a Mathematician, p. 401, Springer-
simpler than the seminal one and that illustrates Verlag, New York (1985).
the generalization with less fuss; the lecturer who As for working hard, I got my first hint of
knows his subject will explain the complicated what that means when Carmichael told me how
special case, and the generalization, by discussing long it took him to prepare a fifty-minute invited
the simple cousin. address. Fifty hours, he said: an hour of work
Some lecturers defend complications and tech- for each minute of the final presentation. When
nicalities by saying that thats what their subject is many years later, six of us wrote our history
like, and there is nothing they can do about it. I am paper (American mathematics from 1940), I
skeptical, and I am willing to go so far as to say that calculated that my share of the work took about
such statements indicate incomplete understand- 150 hours; I shudder to think how many man-
ing of the subject and of its place in mathematics. hours the whole group put in. A few of my hours
Every subject, and even every small part of a sub- went toward preparing the lecture (as opposed to
ject, if it is identifiable, if it is big enough to give the paper). I talked it, the whole thing, out loud,
an hour talk on, has its simple aspects, and they, and then, I talked it again, the whole thing, into a
the simple aspects, the roots of the subject, the dictaphone. Then I listened to it, from beginning to
connections with more widely known and older end, six timesthree times for spots that needed
parts of mathematics, are what a non-specialized polishing (and which I polished before the next
audience needs to be told. time), and three more times to get the timing right
Many lecturers, especially those near the foot of (and, in particular, to get the feel for the timing
the academic ladder, anxious to climb rapidly, feel of each part.) Once all that was behind me, and
under pressure to say something brand newto I had prepared the transparencies, I talked the
impress their elders with their brilliance and pro- whole thing through one final rehearsal time (by
fundity. Two comments: (1) the best way to do that myselfno audience). Thats work.
is to make the talk simple, and (2) it doesnt really
have to be done. It may be entirely appropriate to On Exposition
make the lecturers recent research the focal point
Excerpt from:
of the lecture, but it may also be entirely appropri-
ate not to do so. An audiences evaluation of the Response from Paul Halmos on winning the
merits of a talk is not proportional to the amount Steele Prize for Exposition (1983).
of original material included; the explanation of Not long ago I ran across a reference to a pub-
the speakers latest theorem may fail to improve lication titled A Method of Taking Votes on More
his chance of creating a good impression. Than Two Issues. Do you know, or could you guess,
An oft-quoted compromise between trying who the author is? What about an article titled On
to be intelligible and trying to seem deep is this automorphisms of compact groups? Who wrote
advice: address the first quarter of your talk to that one? The answer to the first question is C. L.
your high-school chemistry teacher, the second Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll, and the
to a graduate student, the third to an educated answer to the second question is Paul Halmos.
mathematician whose interests are different from Lewis Carroll and I have in common that we both
yours, and the last to the specialists. I have done called ourselves mathematicians, that we both
my duty by reporting the formula, but Id fail in my strove to do research, and that we both took
duty if I didnt warn that there are many who very seriously our attempts to enlarge
do not agree with it. A good public the known body of mathematical
lecture should be a work truths. To earn his liv-
of art. It should be ing, Lewis Carroll was
an architectural a teacher, and, just for
unit whose parts fun, because he loved
reinforce each to tell stories, he wrote
other in convey- Alices Adventures in Won-
ing the maximum derland. To earn my liv-
possible amount of ing, Ive been a teacher for
informationnot a almost fifty years, and, just
campaign speech that for fun, because I love to orga-
offers something to ev- nize and clarify, I wrote Finite
erybody, and more likely Dimensional Vector Spaces. And
than not, ends by pleas- whats the outcome? I doubt if as
ing nobody. many as a dozen readers of these
words have ever looked at either A
Method of Taking Votes or On

1138 Notices of the AMS Volume 54, Number 9


automorphisms but Lewis Carroll is immortal Adrian Albert used to say that a theory is worth
for the Alice stories, and I got the Steele Prize for studying if it has at least three distinct good hard
exposition. I dont know what the Reverend Mr. C. examples. Do not therefore define and study a new
L. Dodgson thought about his fame, but, as for me, class of functions, the ones that possess left upper
I was brought up with the Puritan ethic: if some- bimeasurably approximate derivatives, unless you
thing is fun, then you shouldnt get recognized and can, at the very least, fulfill the good graduate
rewarded for doing it. As a result, while, to be sure, students immediate request: show me some that
I am proud and happy, at the same time I cant help do and show me some that dont.
feeling just a little worried and guilty. A striking criterion for how to decide not to
I enjoy studying, learning, coming to understand, publish something was offered by my colleague
and then explaining, but it doesnt follow that com- John Conway. Suppose that you have just finished
municating what I know is always easy; it can be typing a paper. Suppose now that I come to you,
devilishly hard. To explain something you must horns, cloven hooves, forked tail and all, and ask: if
know not only what to put in, but also what to leave I gave you $1,000.00, would you tear the paper up
out; you must know when to tell the whole truth and forget it? If you hesitate, your paper is lostdo
and when to get the right idea across by telling a not publish it. Thats part of a more general rule:
little white fib. The difficulty in exposition is not the when in doubt, let the answer be no.
style, the choice of wordsit is the structure, the
organization. The words are important, yes, but the On Research
arrangement of the material, the indication of the Excerpt from:
connections of its parts with each other and with I Want to Be a Mathematician, pp. 321322,
other parts of mathematics, the proper emphasis Springer-Verlag, New York (1985).
that shows whats easy and what deserves to be Can anyone tell anyone else how to do research,
treated with cautionthese things are much more how to be creative, how to discover something
important. new? Almost certainly not. I have been trying for
a long time to learn mathematics, to understand
On Publishing
it, to find the truth, to prove a theorem, to solve
Excerpts from: a problemand now I am going to try to describe
Four panel talks on publishing, American just how I went about it. The important part of the
Mathematical Monthly 82 (1975), 1417. process is mental, and that is indescribablebut I
Let me remind you that most laws (with the can at least take a stab at the physical part.
exception only of the regulatory statutes that gov- Mathematics is not a deductive sciencethats a
ern traffic and taxes) are negative. Consider, as an clich. When you try to prove a theorem, you dont
example, the Ten Commandments. When Moses just list the hypotheses, and then start to reason.
came back from Mount Sinai, he told us what to be What you do is trial and error, experimentation,
by telling us, eight out of ten times, what not to do. guesswork. You want to find out what the facts are,
It may therefore be considered appropriate to say and what you do is in that respect similar to what
what not to publish. I warn you in advance that all a laboratory technician does, but it is different in
the principles that I was able to distill from inter- the degree of precision and information. Possibly
views and from introspection, and that Ill now tell philosophers would look on us mathematicians
you about, are a little false. Counterexamples can the same way we look on the technicians, if they
be found to each onebut as directional guides dared.
the principles still serve a useful purpose. I love to do research, I want to do research, I
First, then, do not publish fruitless speculations: have to do research, and I hate to sit down and
do not publish polemics and diatribes against a begin to do researchI always try to put it off just
friends error. Do not publish the detailed working as long as I can.
out of a known principle. (Gauss discovered exactly It is important to me to have something big
which regular polygons are ruler-and-compass and external, not inside myself, that I can devote
constructible, and he proved, in particular, that my life to. Gauss and Goya and Shakespeare and
the one with 65537 sidesa Fermat primeis Paganini are excellent, their excellence gives me
constructible; please do not publish the details of pleasure, and I admire and envy them. They were
the procedure. Its been tried.) also dedicated human beings. Excellence is for the
Do not publish in 1975 the case of dimension few but dedication is something everybody can
2 of an interesting conjecture in algebraic geom- haveand should haveand without it life is not
etry, one that you dont know how to settle in worth living.
general, and then follow it by dimension 3 in 1976, Despite my great emotional involvement in work,
dimension 4 in 1977, and so on, with dimension I just hate to start doing it; its a battle and a wrench
k 3 in 197k. Do not, more generally, publish your every time. Isnt there something I can (must?) do
failures: I tried to prove so-and-so; I couldnt; here first? Shouldnt I sharpen my pencils, perhaps? In
it issee?! fact I never use pencils, but pencil sharpening has

October 2007 Notices of the AMS 1139


become the code phrase a bad teaching instrument. When given by such
for anything that helps legendary outstanding speakers as Emil Artin
to postpone the pain of and John von Neumann, even a lecture can be a
concentrated creative useful tooltheir charisma and enthusiasm come
attention. It stands for through enough to inspire the listener to go forth
reference searching in and do somethingit looks like such fun. For most
the library, systematiz- ordinary mortals, however, who are not so bad at
ing old notes, or even lecturing as Wiener wasnot so stimulating!and
preparing tomorrows not so good as Artinand not so dramatic!the
class lecture, with the
lecture is an instrument of last resort for good
From the Paul Halmos Collection.

excuse that once those


teaching.
things are out of the
My test for what makes a good teacher is very
way Ill really be able
to concentrate without simple: it is the pragmatic one of judging the per-
interruption. formance by the product. If a teacher of graduate
When Carmichael students consistently produces Ph.D.s who are
complained that as mathematicians and who create high-quality new
dean he didnt have mathematics, he is a good teacher. If a teacher of
more than 20 hours calculus consistently produces seniors who turn
Paul Halmos a week for research I into outstanding graduate students of mathemat-
marveled, and I marvel ics, or into leading engineers, biologists, or econo-
still. During my produc- mists, he is a good teacher. If a teacher of third-
tive years I probably averaged 20 hours of concen- grade new math (or old) consistently produces
trated mathematical thinking a week, but much outstanding calculus students, or grocery store
more than that was extremely rare. The rare excep- check-out clerks, or carpenters, or automobile
tion came, two or three times in my life, when long mechanics, he is a good teacher.
ladders of thought were approaching their climax. For a student of mathematics to hear someone
Even though I never was dean of a graduate school, talk about mathematics does hardly any more good
I seemed to have psychic energy for only three or than for a student of swimming to hear someone
four hours of work, real work, each day; the rest talk about swimming. You cant learn swimming
of the time I wrote, taught, reviewed, conferred,
techniques by having someone tell you where to
refereed, lectured, edited, traveled, and generally
put your arms and legs; and you cant learn to solve
sharpened pencils all the ways I could think of.
problems by having someone tell you to complete
Everybody who does research runs into fallow
periods. During mine the other professional activi- the square or to substitute sin u for y.
ties, down to and including teaching trigonometry, Can one learn mathematics by reading it? I am
served as a sort of excuse for living. Yes, yes. I may inclined to say no. Reading has an edge over listen-
not have proved any new theorems today, but at ing because reading is more activebut not much.
least I explained the law of sines pretty well, and Reading with pencil and paper on the side is very
I have earned my keep. much betterit is a big step in the right direc-
Why do mathematicians do research? There are tion. The very best way to read a book, however,
several answers. The one I like best is that we are with, to be sure, pencil and paper on the side, is
curiouswe need to know. That is almost the same to keep the pencil busy on the paper and throw
as because we want to, and I accept thatthats the book away.
a good answer too. There are, however, more an- Having stated this extreme position, Ill rescind
swers, ones that are more practical. it immediately. I know that it is extreme, and I dont
really mean itbut I wanted to be very emphatic
On Teaching about not going along with the view that learning
Excerpt from: means going to lectures and reading books. If we
had longer lives, and bigger brains, and enough
The problem of learning to teach, American
Mathematical Monthly 82 (1975), 466476. dedicated expert teachers to have a student/
The best way to learn is to do; the worst way to teacher ratio of 1/1, Id stick with the extreme
teach is to talk. viewsbut we dont. Books and lectures dont do a
About the latter: did you ever notice that some good job of transplanting the facts and techniques
of the best teachers of the world are the worst of the past into the bloodstream of the scientist
lecturers? (I can prove that, but Id rather not lose of the futurebut we must put up with a second
quite so many friends.) And, the other way around, best job in order to save time and money. But, and
did you ever notice that good lecturers are not this is the text of my sermon today, if we rely on
necessarily good teachers? A good lecture is usu- lectures and books only, we are doing our students
ally systematic, complete, preciseand dull; it is and their students, a grave disservice. ...

1140 Notices of the AMS Volume 54, Number 9


Excerpt from: Weierstrass M-test is supremely important, and
The heart of mathematics, American that every mathematics student must know that it
Mathematical Monthly 87 (1980), 519524. exists and must understand how to apply iteven
... How can we, the teachers of today, use the then a course on the pertinent branch of analysis
problem literature? Our assigned task is to pass might be better for omitting it. Suppose that there
on the torch of mathematical knowledge to the are 40 such important topics that a student must
technicians, engineers, scientists, humanists, be exposed to in a term. Does it follow that we
teachers, and, not least, research mathematicians must give 40 complete lectures and hope that
of tomorrow: do problems help? they will all sink in? Might it not be better to give
Yes, they do. The major part of every meaning- 20 of the topics just a ten-minute mention (the
ful life is the solution of problems; a considerable name, the statement, and an indication of one of
part of the professional life of technicians, engi- the directions in which it can be applied), and to
neers, scientists, etc., is the solution of mathemati- treat the other 20 in depth, by student-solved prob-
cal problems. It is the duty of all teachers, and of lems, student-constructed counterexamples, and
teachers of mathematics in particular, to expose student-discovered applications? I firmly believe
their students to problems much more than to that the latter method teaches more and teaches
facts. It is, perhaps, more satisfying to stride into better. Some of the material doesnt get covered
a classroom and give a polished lecture on the but a lot of it gets discovered (a telling old pun that
Weierstrass M-test than to conduct a fumble-and- deserves to be kept alive), and the method thereby
blunder session that ends in the question: Is the opens doors whose very existence might never
boundedness assumption of the test necessary for have been suspected behind a solidly built struc-
its conclusion? I maintain, however, that such a ture of settled facts. As for the Weierstrass M-test,
fumble session, intended to motivate the student or whatever was given short shrift in classwell,
to search for a counterexample, is infinitely more books and journals do exist, and students have
valuable. been known to read them in a pinch. ...
I have taught courses whose entire content was
problems solved by students (and then presented
On Mathematics
to the class). The number of theorems that the Excerpt from:
students in such a course were exposed to was ap- Mathematics as a creative art, American
proximately half the number that they could have Scientist 56 (1968), 375389.
been exposed to in a series of lectures. In a problem Do you know any mathematiciansand, if you
course, however, exposure means the acquiring do, do you know anything about what they do with
of an intelligent questioning attitude and of some their time? Most people dont. When I get into a
technique for plugging the leaks that proofs are conversation with the man next to me in a plane,
likely to spring; in a lecture course, exposure and he tells me that he is something respectable
sometimes means not much more than learning like a doctor, lawyer, merchant or dean, I am
the name of a theorem, being intimidated by its tempted to say that I am in roofing and siding. If I
complicated proof, and worrying about whether it tell him that I am a mathematician, his most likely
would appear on the examination. reply will be that he himself could never balance
... Many teachers are concerned about the his check book, and it must be fun to be a whiz at
amount of material they must cover in a course. math. If my neighbor is an astronomer, a biologist,
One cynic suggested a formula; since, he said, stu- a chemist, or any other kind of natural or social
dents on the average remember only about 40% of scientist, I am, if anything, worse offthis man
what you tell them, the thing to do is to cram into thinks he knows what a mathematician is, and he is
each course 250% of what you hope will stick. Glib probably wrong. He thinks that I spend my time (or
as that is, it probably would not work. should) converting different orders of magnitude,
Problem courses do work. Students who have comparing binomial coefficients and powers of 2,
taken my problem courses were often compli- or solving equations involving rates of reactions.
mented by their subsequent teachers. The com- C. P. Snow points to and deplores the existence
pliments were on their alert attitude, on their of two cultures; he worries about the physicist
ability to get to the heart of the matter quickly, whose idea of modern literature is Dickens, and he
and on their intelligently searching questions that chides the poet who cannot state the second law of
showed that they understood what was happening thermodynamics. Mathematicians, in converse with
in class. All this happened on more than one level, well-meaning, intelligent, and educated laymen (do
in calculus, in linear algebra, in set theory, and, of you mind if I refer to all nonmathematicians as
course, in graduate courses on measure theory and laymen?) are much worse off than physicists in
functional analysis. converse with poets. It saddens me that educated
Why must we cover everything that we hope people dont even know that my subject exists.
students will ultimately learn? Even if (to stay with There is something that they call mathematics, but
an example already mentioned) we think that the they neither know how the professionals use the

October 2007 Notices of the AMS 1141


word, nor can they conceive why anybody should exaggerate; when Im done, Ill be glad to rescind
do it. It is, to be sure, possible that an intelligent anything that was inaccurate or that gave offense
and otherwise educated person doesnt know that in any way. ...
egyptology exists, or haematology, but all you have Mathematics is abstract thought, mathematics
to tell him is that it does, and he will immediately is pure logic, mathematics is creative art. All these
understand in a rough general way why it should statements are wrong, but they are all a little right,
and he will have some empathy with the scholar and they are all nearer the mark than mathemat-
of the subject who finds it interesting. ics is numbers or mathematics is geometric
Usually when a mathematician lectures, he is shapes. For the professional pure mathematician,
a missionary. Whether he is talking over a cup of mathematics is the logical dovetailing of a care-
coffee with a collaborator, lecturing to a graduate fully selected sparse set of assumptions with their
class of specialists, teaching a reluctant group of surprising conclusions via a conceptually elegant
freshman engineers, or addressing a general audi- proof. Simplicity, intricacy, and above all, logical
ence of laymenhe is still preaching and seeking analysis are the hallmark of mathematics.
to make converts. He will state theorems and he The mathematician is interested in extreme
will discuss proofs and he will hope that when he casesin this respect he is like the industrial ex-
is done his audience will know more mathematics perimenter who breaks lightbulbs, tears shirts, and
than they did before. My aim today is differentI bounces cars on ruts. How widely does a reasoning
am not here to proselytize but to enlightenI seek apply, he wants to know, and what happens when
not converts but friends. I do not want to teach you it doesnt? What happens when you weaken one
what mathematics is, but only that it is. of the assumptions, or under what conditions can
I call my subject mathematicsthats what all you strengthen one of the conclusions? It is the
my colleagues call it, all over the worldand there, perpetual asking of such questions that makes
quite possibly, is the beginning of confusion. The for broader understanding, better technique, and
word covers two disciplinesmany more, in reality, greater elasticity for future problems.
but two, at least two, in the same sense in which Mathematicsthis may surprise or shock you
Snow speaks of two cultures. In order to have some someis never deductive in its creation. The math-
words with which to refer to the ideas I want to ematician at work makes vague guesses, visualizes
discuss, I offer two temporary and ad hoc neolo- broad generalizations, and jumps to unwarranted
gisms. Mathematics, as the work is customarily conclusions. He arranges and rearranges his ideas,
used, consists of at least two distinct subjects, and and he becomes convinced of their truth long
I propose to call them mathology and mathophys- before he can write down a logical proof. The
ics. Roughly speaking, mathology is what is called conviction is not likely to come earlyit usually
pure mathematics, and mathophysics is called comes after many attempts, many failures, many
applied mathematics, but the qualifiers are not discouragements, many false starts. It often hap-
emotionally strong enough to disguise that they pens that months of work result in the proof that
qualify the same noun. If the concatenation of the method of attack they were based on cannot
syllables I chose here reminds you of other words, possibly work and the process of guessing, visu-
no great harm will be done; the rhymes alluded to alizing, and conclusion-jumping begins again. A
are not completely accidental. I originally planned reformulation is needed andand this too may
to entitle this lecture something like Mathematics surprise youmore experimental work is needed.
is an art, or Mathematics is not a science, and To be sure, by experimental work I do not
Mathematics is useless, but the more I thought mean test tubes and cyclotrons. I mean thought-
about it the more I realized that I mean that Ma- experiments. When a mathematician wants to
thology is an art, Mathology is not a science, and prove a theorem about an infinite-dimensional Hil-
Mathology is useless. When I am through, I hope bert space, he examines its finite-dimensional ana-
you will recognize that most of you have known logue, he looks in detail at the 2-and 3-dimensional
about mathophysics before, only you were prob- cases, he often tries out a particular numerical
ably calling it mathematics; I hope that all of you case, and he hopes that he will gain thereby an in-
will recognize the distinction between mathology sight that pure definition-juggling has not yielded.
and mathophysics; and I hope that some of you will The deductive stage, writing the result down, and
be ready to embrace, or at least applaud, or at the writing down its rigorous proof are relatively trivial
very least, recognize mathology as a respectable once the real insight arrives; it is more like the
human endeavor. draftsmans work, not the architects. ...
In the course of the lecture Ill have to use The mathematical fraternity is a little like a self-
many analogies (literature, chess, painting), each perpetuating priesthood. The mathematicians of
imperfect by itself, but I hope that in their totality today train the mathematicians of tomorrow and,
they will serve to delineate what I want delineated. in effect, decide whom to admit to the priesthood.
Sometimes in the interest of economy of time, Most people do not find it easy to joinmathemati-
and sometimes doubtless unintentionally, Ill cal talent and genius are apparently exactly as rare

1142 Notices of the AMS Volume 54, Number 9


as talent and genius in paint and musicbut any- mathematicians feel about the rift, and whats
one can join, everyone is welcome. The rules are likely to happen to it in the centuries to come. ...
nowhere explicitly formulated, but they are intui- The pure and applied distinction is visible in
tively felt by everyone in the profession. Mistakes the arts and in the humanities almost as clearly
are forgiven and so is obscure expositionthe as in the sciences: witness Mozart versus military
indispensable requisite is mathematical insight. marches, Rubens versus medical illustrations, or
Sloppy thinking, verbosity without content, and Virgils Aeneid versus Ciceros Philippics. Pure lit-
polemic have no role, andthis is to me one of the erature deals with abstractions such as love and
most wonderful aspects of mathematicsthey are war, and it tells about imaginary examples of them
much easier to spot than in the nonmathematical in emotionally stirring language. Pure mathematics
fields of human endeavor (much easier than, for deals with abstractions such as the multiplication
instance, in literature among the arts, in art criti- of numbers and the congruence of triangles, and
cism among the humanities, and in your favorite it reasons about Platonically idealized examples of
abomination among the social sciences). them with intellectually convincing logic.
Although most of mathematical creation is done There is, to be sure, one sense of the word in
by one man at a desk, at a blackboard, or taking a which all literature is applied. Shakespeares son-
walk, or, sometimes, by two men in conversation, nets have to do with the everyday world, and so
mathematics is nevertheless a sociable science. does Tolstoys War and Peace, and so do Caesars
The creator needs stimulation while he is creating commentaries on the wars he fought; all start from
and he needs an audience after he has created. what human beings see and hear, and all speak of
Mathematics is a sociable science in the sense that how human beings move and feel. In that same
I dont think it can be done by one man on a desert somewhat shallow sense all mathematics is ap-
island (except for a very short time), but it is not a plied. It all starts from sizes and shapes (whose
mob science, it is not a team science. A theorem is study leads ultimately to algebra and geometry),
not a pyramid; inspiration has never been known to and it reasons about how sizes and shapes change
descend on a committee. A great theorem can no and interact (and such reasoning leads ultimately
more be obtained by a project approach than a to the part of the subject that the professionals
great painting: I dont think a team of little Gausses call analysis).
could have obtained the theorem about regular There can be no doubt that the fountainhead,
polygons under the leadership of a rear admiral the inspiration, of all literature is the physical and
anymore than a team of little Shakespeares could social universe we live in, and the same is true
have written Hamlet under such conditions. ... about mathematics. There is no doubt that the
physical and social universe daily affects each mu-
On Pure and Applied sician, and painter, and writer, and mathematician,
and that therefore a part at least of the raw mate-
Excerpt from:
rial of the artist is the work of facts and motions,
Applied mathematics is bad mathematics, sights and sounds. Continual contact between the
pp. 920, appearing in Mathematics Tomorrow, work and art is bound to change the latter, and
edited by Lynn Steen, Springer-Verlag, New York perhaps even to improve it.
(1981). The ultimate goal of applied literature, and
It isnt really (applied mathematics, that is, isnt of applied mathematics, is action. A campaign
really bad mathematics), but its different. speech is made so as to cause you to pull the third
Does that sound as if I had set out to capture lever on a voting machine rather than the fourth.
your attention, and, having succeeded, decided An aerodynamic equation is solved so as to cause
forthwith to back down and become conciliatory? a plane wing to lift its load fast enough to avoid
Nothing of the sort! The conciliatory sentence is complaints from the home owners near the air-
controversial, believe it or not; lots of people argue, port. These examples are crude and obvious; there
vehemently, that it (meaning applied mathemat- are subtler ones. If the biography of a candidate,
ics) is not different at all, its all the same as pure a factually correct and honest biography, does
mathematics, and anybody who says otherwise not directly mention the forthcoming election,
is probably a reactionary establishmentarian and is it then pure literature? If a discussion of how
certainly wrong. mathematically idealized air flows around moving
If youre not a professional mathematician, you figures of various shapes, a logically rigorous and
may be astonished to learn that (according to some correct discussion, does not mention airplanes or
people) there are different kinds of mathematics, airports, is it then pure mathematics? And what
and that there is anything in the subject for anyone about the in-between cases: the biography that,
to get excited about. There are; and there is; and without telling lies, is heavily prejudiced; and
what follows is a fragment of what might be called the treatise on aerodynamics that, without being
the pertinent sociology of mathematics: whats demonstrably incorrect, uses cost-cutting rough
the difference between pure and applied, how do approximationsare they pure or applied? ...

October 2007 Notices of the AMS 1143


To confuse the issue still more, pure mathemat- profession with the essential clerical and admin-
ics can be practically useful and applied mathemat- istrative jobs, you must be responsible, conscien-
ics can be artistically elegant. Pure mathemati- tious, careful, and organizedit helps if you also
cians, trying to understand involved logical and have some qualities of leadership and charisma.
geometrical interrelations, discovered the theory You cant be perfect, but if you dont try, you
of convex sets and the algebraic and topological wont be good enough.
study of various classes of functions. Almost as To be a mathematician you must love mathe-
if by luck, convexity has become the main tool matics more than family, religion, money, comfort,
in linear programming (an indispensable part of pleasure, glory. I do not mean that you must love
modern economic and industrial practice), and it to the exclusion of family, religion, and the rest,
functional analysis has become the main tool in and I do not mean that if you do love it, youll never
quantum theory and particle physics. The physicist have any doubts, youll never be discouraged,
regards the applicability of von Neumann algebras youll never be ready to chuck it all and take up
(a part of functional analysis) to elementary par- gardening instead. Doubts and discouragements
ticles as the only justification of the former; the are part of life. Great mathematicians have doubts
mathematician regards the connections as the only and get discouraged, but usually they cant stop
interesting aspect of the latter. De gustibus non doing mathematics anyway, and, when they do,
disputandum est? they miss it very deeply. ...
Just as pure mathematics can be useful, applied
mathematics can be more beautifully useless than
is sometimes recognized. Applied mathematics
is not engineering; the applied mathematician
does not design airplanes or atomic bombs. Ap-
plied mathematics is an intellectual discipline,
not a part of industrial technology. The ultimate
goal of applied mathematics is action, to be sure,
but, before that, applied mathematics is a part
of theoretical science concerned with the general
principles behind what makes planes fly and
bombs explode. ...
The deepest assertion about the relation be-
tween pure and applied mathematics that needs
examination is that it is symbiotic, in the sense that
neither can survive without the other. Not only, as
is universally admitted, does the applied need the
pure, but, in order to keep from becoming inbred,
sterile, meaningless, and dead, the pure needs the
revitalization and the contact with reality that only
the applied can provide. ...

On Being a Mathematician
Excerpt from:
I Want to Be a Mathematician, p. 400, Springer-
Verlag, New York (1985)
It takes a long time to learn to liveby the time
you learn your time is gone. I spent most of a life-
time trying to be a mathematicianand what did I
learn? What does it take to be one? I think I know
the answer: you have to be born right, you must
continually strive to become perfect, you must love
mathematics more than anything else.
Born right? Yes. To be a scholar of mathematics
you must be born with talent, insight, concentra-
tion, taste, luck, drive, and the ability to visualize
and guess. For teaching you must in addition
understand what kinds of obstacles learners are
likely to place before themselves, and you must
have sympathy for your audience, dedicated self-
lessness, verbal ability, clear style, and expository
skill. To be able, finally, to pull your weight in the

1144 Notices of the AMS Volume 54, Number 9

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