shing tung yau
Some mathematicians have strong value judgments on various fields and topics, assert the advantages and disadvantages, and belittle the disadvantages without scruple. Some mathematicians have made brilliant achievements, while others have accomplished nothing.
Hironaka Heisuke
Mathematicians in Japan and America. Born in Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan. 1950 admitted to Kyoto university. 1954 entered the graduate school. From 65438 to 0956, Riski, an American mathematician, went to Japan to give lectures, which brought Hironaka Heisuke into contact with the cutting-edge discipline at that time-algebraic geometry, and had a decisive influence on his life. 65438-0957 studied at Harvard University, USA, and received his doctorate from 65438-0959. He taught at brandeis University in Massachusetts and Columbia University successively, and was a professor at Harvard University from 65438 to 0968. He directly inherited and developed ZaRiski's achievements in algebraic geometry. 1975 won the medal of Japanese culture. From 65438 to 0976, he returned to Japan and served as a professor at Kyoto University, director of the Institute of Mathematical Analysis of Kyoto University and president of Yamaguchi University.
When Hironaka Heisuke went to middle school, it was at a time when the war of aggression launched by Japanese militarism gradually failed and the national life was very difficult. He entered the factory in the second year of middle school, went to high school after the war and went to college at the age of nearly 20. As Hironaka Heisuke is the eldest son and has many brothers and sisters in his family, he still has to find time to be a tutor or do odd jobs to earn money to support his family during his graduate studies in Beijing. However, due to hard work and persistent pursuit of mathematics, he finally became a famous contemporary algebraic geometer.
Hironaka Heisuke's entry into the hall of algebraic geometry was mainly influenced by three contemporary masters of algebraic geometry, French A.Weil and J.-P.Serre and American O.Zariski, because these three masters visited Japan on 1955 and 1956 respectively during their graduate studies at Kyoto University in Japan, and their reports made Hironaka Heisuke understand algebraic geometry and aroused his interest.
1992, Hironaka Heisuke proposed to establish an Olympic Mathematics Competition, which will be held once a year, with the aim of discovering pupils with mathematical talents. He is one of the founders of the Japanese Mathematical Olympiad.
Hironaka Heisuke once described the character of Kobayashi, a famous Japanese mathematician and winner of Fields Prize and Wolff Prize, with "free play like running water, deep study and independent insight into the truth", which may be his own life pursuit.