Paul Gordan
Paul Gordan | |
|---|---|
 Paul Gordan | |
| Born | Paul Albert Gordan 27 April 1837 |
| Died | 21 December 1912(aged 75) |
| Nationality | German |
| Alma mater | University of Breslau |
| Known for | Invariant theory Clebsch–Gordan coefficients Gordan's lemma |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | University of Erlangen-Nuremberg |
| Academic advisors | Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi |
| Doctoral students | Emmy Noether |
Paul Albert Gordan(27 April 1837 – 21 December 1912) was aJewish-German[1]mathematician,a student ofCarl Jacobiat theUniversity of Königsbergbefore obtaining hisPhDat theUniversity of Breslau(1862),[2]and a professor at theUniversity of Erlangen-Nuremberg.
He was born inBreslau,Germany (nowWrocław,Poland), and died inErlangen,Germany.
He was known as "the king ofinvariant theory".[3][4]His most famous result is that the ring ofinvariants of binary formsof fixed degree is finitely generated.[4]Clebsch–Gordan coefficientsare named after him andAlfred Clebsch.Gordan also served as the thesis advisor forEmmy Noether.[2]
A famous quote attributed to Gordan aboutDavid Hilbert's proof ofHilbert's basis theorem,a result which vastly generalized his result on invariants, is "This is notmathematics;this istheology."[3][5]The proof in question was the (non-constructive) existence of a finite basis for invariants. It is not clear if Gordan really said this since the earliest reference to it is 25 years after the events and after his death. Nor is it clear whether the quote was intended as criticism, or praise, or a subtle joke. Gordan himself encouraged Hilbert and used Hilbert's results and methods, and the widespread story that he opposed Hilbert's work on invariant theory is a myth (though he did correctly point out in a referee's report that some of the reasoning in Hilbert's paper was incomplete).[6]
Publications
[edit]- Gordan, Paul (1885).Vorlesungen über Invariantentheorie.Vol. 1. Teubner.Retrieved12 April2014.
- Gordan, Paul (1887).Dr. Paul Gordan's Vorlesungen über Invariantentheorie.Vol. 2. B. G. Teubner.Retrieved12 April2014.
- Gordan, Paul (1987) [1885], Kerschensteiner, Georg (ed.),Vorlesungen über Invariantentheorie(2nd ed.), New York: Chelsea Publishing Co. or American Mathematical Society,ISBN978-0-8284-0328-3,MR0917266
Notes
[edit]- ^Bergmann, Birgit (2012).Transcending Tradition: Jewish Mathematicians in German Speaking Academic Culture.Springer. p. 60.ISBN9783642224645.
- ^abO'Connor, John J.;Robertson, Edmund F.,"Paul Gordan",MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive,University of St Andrews.
- ^abHarm Derksen, Gregor Kemper. (2002), Derkson, Harm; Kemper, Gregor (eds.),Computational Invariant Theory,Invariant theory and algebraic transformation groups, Springer-Verlag, p. 49,ISBN3-540-43476-3,OCLC49493513.
- ^abedited by A. N. Kolmogorov, A. P. Yushkevich; translated from the Russian by A. Shenitzer, H. Grant and O. B. Sheinin. (2001),Kolmogorov, A. N.;Yushkevich, A. P.(eds.),Mathematics of the 19th Century: Mathematical Logic, Algebra, Number Theory, Probability Theory,Springer-Verlag, p. 85,ISBN3-7643-6442-4,OCLC174767718
{{citation}}:|author=has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link). - ^Hermann Weyl,David Hilbert. 1862–1943,Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society (1944).
- ^Mclarty, Colin (2008),Theology and its discontents(PDF),archived fromthe original(PDF)on 16 January 2009
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- Die Redaktion der Mathematische Annalen (1913),"Paul Gordan",Mathematische Annalen(in German),73(3): i–ii,doi:10.1007/BF01456698,ISSN0025-5831,JFM44.0023.06,MR1511736,S2CID177804295,available atDigiZeitschirften.
- Noether, Max(1914),"Paul Gordan",Mathematische Annalen(in German),75(1): 1–41,doi:10.1007/BF01564521,S2CID179178051,available atDigiZeitschirften.
External links
[edit]| International | |
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| National | |
| Academics | |
| People | |
| Other | |
- 1837 births
- 1912 deaths
- 19th-century German mathematicians
- 20th-century German mathematicians
- 19th-century German Jews
- Algebraists
- Scientists from Wrocław
- People from the Province of Silesia
- University of Breslau alumni
- University of Königsberg alumni
- Humboldt University of Berlin alumni
- Academic staff of the University of Giessen
- Academic staff of the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg
- Mathematicians from the Kingdom of Prussia
- Mathematicians from the German Empire