Topology Atlas Document # topc-66.htm | Production Editor: Thomas M. Zachariah

TOPOLOGICAL COMMENTARY

Volume 4, #1, February 20, 1999

Edited by Melvin Henriksen

commentary@mail.mathatlas.yorku.ca

I continue to invite commentary on any article in any issue of TopCom or on any topic of general interest to topologists, including news about topologists or topological activity.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. Editorial by Melvin Henriksen
  2. "Ask a Topologist"
  3. Comments on Reviews of Two Books by Melvin Henriksen
  4. Sabbatical Travels or Letters from Prague by Richard Ball and Joan Winn
  5. Terror and Exile and a Letter About it by Michael Golomb
  6. International Benchmark of Mathematical Research
  7. Mathematicians of African Ancestry
  8. More on Mary Ellen Rudin

1. Editorial

by Melvin Henriksen

"The number of journals that purport to publish papers in all areas of mathematics while rejecting papers in general topology without sending them to a referee is increasing," says the editor.

Being marginalized

2. "Ask a Topologist"

This query from a graduate student was answered by M. Henriksen and is posted in: Ask a Topologist Bulletin Board. The query and its response are also posted below.

Ask a Topologist

3. Comments on Reviews of Two Books on the Life of Paul Erdös (1913-1996)

by Melvin Henriksen

Last Summer, two biographies of Paul Erdös appeared. They are "The Man Who Loved Only Numbers" by Paul Hoffman (Hyperion, New York, 1998) and "My Brain Is Open" by Bruce Schechter (Simon and Shuster, New York 1998; a new edition came out in late 1998). Each book was reviewed not only by most major mathematical and scientific journal, but also in almost every major newspaper in the United States and Europe. ...

... Yes, Erdös relied on others to take care of him, but his mathematical help to so many others was ample repayment. In summary, these two books are well worth reading, but a deeper biography of Erdös needs to be written.

Comments on reviews of two books on the life of Paul Erdös (1913-1996)

4. Sabbatical Travels or Letters from Prague

by Richard Ball and Joan Winn, University of Denver

Richard Ball , a mathematician from the University of Denver and his wife Joan Winn, a professor of business administration at the same institution spent the academic year in Prague in 1997-98. They sent their friends and family a series of letters about their adventures and impressions in Prague and in other places to which they traveled. I hope other readers find the digested version of these letters as interesting as I do. -M. Henriksen

Letters from Prague

5. Terror and Exile and a Letter About it by Michael Golomb


A portion of the program of the International Congress of Mathematicians held in Berlin in August 1998 was devoted to describing the systematic killing or exiling of German mathematicians that were guilty of being Jewish or protesting the persecution of Jewish mathematicians by the Nazi regime the years that began officially in 1933-34. The refugee mathematicians who came to the United States and Canada ended up by changing them from mathematical backwaters to the world centers they are today.

These events are summarized in a 72 page pamphlet called Terror and Exile that may be purchased for 15 Deutsche Marks as described below. This pamphlet describes with words and photographs how Germany, and in particular Berlin, destroyed itself and moved from being a world center of culture to being a world center of hatred and murder in less than a dozen years.

You can find an introduction to this pamphlet written by one of its authors Reinhard Siegmund-Schultze at:
An introduction to "Terror and Exile." Copies of the pamphlet may be obtained by mail at the cost of 15 Deutsche Mark from:
Geschaeftsstelle DMV
Weierstrass Institut,
Mohrenstrasse 39,
D-10117 Berlin, Germany
Additional information on emigration and expulsion for all Germany and Austria may be found in the following German book: Reinhard Siegmund-Schultze: Mathematiker auf der Flucht vor Hitler. Quellen und Studien zur Emigration einer Wissenschaft; Braunschweig/Wiesbaden: Vieweg 1998.

Terror and Exile and a Letter About it by Michael Golomb

6. International Benchmark of Mathematical Research

A Report by the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy

We are grateful to Scott Williams for calling our attention to this important report.

International Benchmark

7. Mathematicians of African Ancestry

Their Development and How it Was Inhibited by Bigotry

Scott Williams did not write this large group of files concerning the history, contributions to mathematics, and trials and tribulations of mathematicians of African ancestry for Topological Commentary, but has given us permission to insert a link to them. Much of what he writes about is positive, but he also exposes racists and racism in the mathematical community. The URL below will take you first to a description of the racism of R. L. Moore and some of the harm done by it.

R. L. Moore

Mathematicians of African Ancestry

8. More on Mary Ellen Rudin

Thanks to Scott Williams for finding a web site telling us more about Mary Ellen Rudin. You can find it at: Mary Ellen Rudin

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