Reflections
What is a mathematician?
To be more personal, am I a mathematician? I have a master degree from the faculty of mathematics at the University of Oslo, Norway, but does that make me a mathematician?
In my mind, the answer is easy. “No way!”
A mathematician is someone, regardless of formal education or the lack of it, creates valuable mathematics. If you have a PhD and do mathematical research, but what you produce is of no significance you are not, in my book, a mathematician.
The question came up when I read New York Times this morning.
So imagine the surprise when Juan Manuel Santos, a former defense minister and the architect of some of Mr. Uribe’s crushing blows against leftist guerrillas, found himself trailing in recent national polls to a quirky, unpredictable mathematician who murmurs in French about arcane philosophical concepts and wears a chinstrap beard with the air of a latter-day Thoreau.
Santos, who is four days older than me, has this written about him in Wikipedia.
Aurelijus Rutenis Antanas Mockus Šivickas (born 25 March 1952 in Bogotá), is a Colombian mathematician, philosopher, and politician …
Mockus holds a 1972 Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics from the University of Burgundy in Dijon, France and a 1988 Master of Arts degree in philosophy from the National University of Colombia.
It may be that Santos has created valuable mathematics, but the Wikipedia article doesn’t mention it.
What are you? Do you see yourself as a mathematician? What is your definition?
May 16th, 2010 at 2:17 am
I think this is a good question Jan, but I would respectfully disagree with your definition. You seem to be separating mathematics from the rest of human endeavors. A doctor is someone who practices medicine as a profession. A policeman is someone who practices police work. What is the word for someone who practices mathematics as a profession, if not mathematician?
To my mind, popularizing mathematics the way you do is an indirect form of creating mathematics, and thus no less valuable. Martin Gardner would probably also say he is not a mathematician, but his Scientific American columns fostered interest in mathematics among the public, and inspired countless individuals to study the subject and take up the profession. He is as much of a mathematician as Gauss or Leibniz. So don’t sell yourself short.
P.S. My great-grandparents left Larvik, Norway in the 1880s to settle in Wisconsin, USA.