Everything about George David Birkhoff totally explained
George David Birkhoff (
21 March 1884,
Overisel, Michigan -
12 November 1944,
Cambridge, Massachusetts) was an
American mathematician, best known for what is now called the
ergodic theorem. Birkhoff was one of the most important leaders in
American mathematics in his generation, and during his prime he was considered by many to be the preeminent American mathematician.
The mathematician
Garrett Birkhoff (1911-1996) was his son.
Career
Birkhoff obtained his A.B. and A.M. from Harvard. He completed his Ph.D. in 1907, on
differential equations, at the
University of Chicago. While
Eliakim Hastings Moore was his supervisor, he was most influenced by the writings of
Henri Poincaré. After teaching at the
University of Wisconsin and
Princeton University, he taught at
Harvard University from 1912 until his death.
Awards and honors
In
1923, he was awarded the inaugural
Bôcher Memorial Prize by the
American Mathematical Society for his paper Birkhoff (1917) containing, among other things, what is now called the Birkhoff curve shortening flow.
He was elected to the
National Academy of Sciences, the
American Philosophical Society, the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the
Académie des Sciences in Paris, the
Pontifical Academy, and the London and Edinburg Mathematical Societies.
Service
Work
In 1913, he proved Poincaré's "Last Geometric Theorem," a special case of the
three-body problem, a result that made him world famous. In 1927, he published his
Dynamical Systems
. He wrote on the foundations of relativity and quantum mechanics, publishing (with R E Langer) the monograph
Relativity and Modern Physics in 1923. In 1923, Birkhoff also proved that the
Schwarzschild geometry is the unique spherically symmetric solution of the
Einstein field equations. A consequence is that
black holes are not merely a mathematical curiosity, but could result from any spherical star having sufficient mass.
Birkhoff's most durable result has been his 1931 discovery of what is now called the
ergodic theorem. Combining insights from
physics on the
ergodic hypothesis with
measure theory, this theorem solved, at least in principle, a fundamental problem of
statistical mechanics. The ergodic theorem has also had repercussions for dynamics,
probability theory,
group theory, and
functional analysis. He also worked on
number theory, the
Riemann-Hilbert problem, and the
four colour problem. He proposed an axiomatization of
Euclidian geometry different from Hilbert's; this work culminated in his text
Basic Geometry (1941).
In his later years, Birkhoff published two curious speculative works. His 1933
Aesthetic Measure proposed a mathematical theory of
aesthetics. While writing this book, he spent a year studying the art, music and poetry of various cultures around the world. His 1938
Electricity as a Fluid combined his ideas on philosophy and science. His 1943 theory of gravitation is also puzzling, since Birkhoff knew (but didn't seem to mind) that his theory allows as sources only matter which is a
perfect fluid in which the
speed of sound must equal the
speed of light (which, needless to say, is quite inconsistent with experiment!).
Influence on hiring practices
Albert Einstein and
Norbert Wiener, among others, accused Birkhoff of advocating
anti-Semitic hiring practices. During the 1930s, when many Jewish mathematicians fled Europe and tried to obtain jobs in the USA, Birkhoff is alleged to have influenced the hiring process at American institutions to exclude Jews. While Birkhoff may have held anti-Semitic views, it was also the case that he'd always been outspoken in his promotion of American mathematics and mathematicians. Until
Hitler's 1933 ascension, Americans often did their Ph.Ds in Europe, and American mathematics wasn't well-regarded by European mathematicians. It has been argued that Birkhoff's actions were in good part motivated by a desire to assure jobs for home-grown American mathematicians.
Saunders Mac Lane (1994), a close friend and collaborator of Birkhoff's son, argued that any anti-Semitic tendencies Birkhoff may have had were not unusual for his time.
Selected publications
1913, "Proof of Poincaré's geometric theorem," Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 14: 14-22.
1917, "Dynamical Systems with Two Degrees of Freedom," Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 18: 199-300.Further Information
Get more info on 'George David Birkhoff'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://george_david_birkhoff.totallyexplained.com">George David Birkhoff Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
