Ian Stewart (mathematician)

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Ian Stewart

Ian Stewart (born September 24, 1945 ) is a British mathematician and teaches as a professor at the University of Warwick .

biography

Stewart studied at Cambridge (Bachelor in Mathematics ) and at the University of Warwick, where he received his doctorate in 1969 with Brian Hartley ("Subideals of Lie algebras", published in Mathematische Zeitschrift Vol. 111, 1969, p. 301). He is Professor and Director of the Mathematics Awareness Center at Warwick (MAC @ W) at the University of Warwick and has held guest professorships in Germany (1974), New Zealand (1976) and the USA (University of Connecticut 1977-78, University of Houston 1983-84). He is also a professor at the University of Houston .

Stewart wrote scientific textbooks and monographs such as "Singularities and Groups in Bifurcation Theory" (with Martin Golubitsky and David Schaeffer) and "Catastrophe Theory and Its Applications" (with Tim Poston) on catastrophe theory (and its mathematical context such as singularity theory and bifurcation theory ). He is mainly concerned with Lie algebras and the theory of dynamic systems, especially under the aspect of symmetry. He is particularly interested in the connections to applications in chaos theory (including control of chaos, antichaos ) and biology (animal locomotion mechanisms , pattern formation in biology).

But he is best known for his popular scientific work on mathematics, especially magazine articles for New Scientist and Scientific American and Discover, among others . From 1990 to 2001 he wrote the "Mathematical Recreations' column" in Scientific American (a total of 96 columns to date plus another 57 for the European and Japanese editions). He also performs a lot on radio and television in the UK and USA.

He has also published his journal articles as books. "The Symmetry Perspective" (with Martin Golubitsky) won the 2001 " Ferran Sunyer I Balaguer Prize of the Institut d'Estudis Catalans " in Spain. He also edited the new edition of the well-known Introduction to Mathematics by Richard Courant and Robbins. He is also a science fiction writer. To date, 19 science fiction short stories by him have appeared in Omni , Analog and Interzone . Wheelers, a science fiction novel written with Jack Cohen , has been published by Warner Aspect in the US and Earthlight in the UK.

With the fantasy author Terry Pratchett and Jack Cohen he also wrote "The Science of Discworld" (German: "The scholars of the disc world"), which is bestseller in the top 10 of the English "Sunday Times non-fiction" for 13 weeks in a row list ”and was nominated for a Hugo Award at the World Science Fiction Convention in Chicago. With the sequel "The Science of Discworld II: The Globe" the three achieved a similar success. In German, this book was initially published under the title "The Scholars of Discworld II", later with the name "The Philosophers of the Round World". In the meantime the English edition of the third part "The Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch" ("Darwin and the Gods of the Discworld") has been published. Stewart's book " Flatterland " made it into the top 20 of the "Independent Bestseller List" in the USA.

Stewart gave the famous Christmas Lectures of the Royal Institution in 1997 and received the Royal Society's Michael Faraday Prize in 1995 for his contributions to popularizing the sciences. He has honorary degrees from Westminster, Leuven, the Open University and from Kingston. In 2001 he was elected a "Fellow of the Royal Society". In 2015 he received the Lewis Thomas Prize , for 2017 he was awarded the Euler Book Prize . In 2001 he received the Ferran Sunyer i Balaguer Prize for a book with Golubitsky.

Jeremy Gray is one of his PhD students .

Quotes

"True mathematicians don't juggle numbers, they juggle concepts."

- Ian Stewart (1975)

bibliography

Reference books

  • Lie Algebras , Springer, Lecture Notes in Mathematics Vol. 127, 1970
  • with Tim Poston: Catastrophe theory and its applications , Dover 1996
  • with Martin Golubitsky, David Schaeffer: Singularities and groups in bifurcation theory , 2 volumes, Springer 1985, 1988
  • with Martin Golubitsky: The symmetry perspective: from equilibrium to chaos in phase space and physical space , Birkhäuser, Perspectives in Mathematics 2002
  • with David Tall: Algebraic Number Theory , Chapman and Hall 1979, 3rd edition as Algebraic Number Theory and Fermats Last Theorem at AKPeters 2002
  • with David Tall: Complex Analysis , Cambridge University Press 1997
  • Galois theory , Chapman and Hall 1998, 2004
  • with Ralph Amayo: Infinite dimensional Lie algebras , Leiden, Noordhoff 1974
  • with Robin Jones: The Art of C Programming , Springer, New York 1987
  • with Robin Jones, Clive Maynard: The Art of Lisp Programming , Springer, London 1990

Introductions to Mathematics

  • Concepts of modern mathematics , Penguin 1980, Dover 1995
  • Why math? An answer in letters . Spektrum Verlag 2007 (English original: Letters to a young mathematician , Basic Books 2006)
  • From Here to Infinity - a guide to today's mathematics , Oxford University Press 1996 (reprint of The Problems of Mathematics )
  • Mathematics problems, topics, questions , Akademie Verlag, Birkhäuser 1990 (English: The Problems of Mathematics , Penguin)
  • Appendix in the revision by Richard Courant, Herbert Robbins: What is Mathematics? , Springer Verlag 1996

Popular science books

  • Does God Play Roulette? Chaos in Mathematik , Birkhäuser 1990, Insel Verlag 1993 (English: Does God play Dice ?, Penguin 1997)
  • with Martin Golubitsky: Does God think symmetrically? : The symmetry in mathematics and nature , Birkhäuser 1993 (English: Fearful Symmetry. Is God a geometer?, Penguin 1993)
  • with Jack Cohen: Figments of Reality - the evolution of the curious mind , Cambridge University Press 1995
  • with Jack Cohen: Chaos and Anti-Chaos - an outlook on the science of the 21st century , Byblos Verlag 1995, Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1997, ISBN 3-423-33003-1 (English original: The Collapse of Chaos - discovering symmetry in a complex world , Viking 1994, Penguin 1995)
  • Spiel, Satz und Sieg in der Mathematik , Insel Verlag 1997 (English: Game, Set and Math - Enigmas and Conundrums , Blackwell 1989, Penguin 1991)
  • The numbers of nature , Spectrum academic publishing house, 1998, ISBN 3-8274-0242-5 (English original: Nature's Numbers , Weidenfeld and Nicholson 1995)
  • Life's other secret - the new mathematics of the living world , Wiley 1998
  • The Magical Maze - seeing the world through mathematical eyes , Weidenfeld and Nicholson, Wiley 1998
  • The riddle of the snowflake. The mathematics of nature . Spektrum Verlag 2002 (English original: What Shape's a Snowflake )
  • with Jack Cohen Evolving the Alien: The Science of Extraterrestrial Life . 2nd edition published under the title What Does a Martian Look Like? The Science of Extraterrestrial Life . Ebury Press 2002
  • Flat land . Verlag CHBeck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-50179-6 , rororo 2004 (English original: Flatterland , MacMillan, Perseus 2001)
  • Pentagonia, Andromeda and the combed ball - 50 math short stories . Spektrum Verlag 2004 (English original: Another Fine Math You've Got Me Into , Freeman 1992, previously also published individually in German as Das Versteck der Andromeda , Die combed Kugel , Die Reise nach Pentagonien by Spektrum Verlag)
  • The wonderful world of math . Verlag Piper, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-492-04770-X (English original: Math Hysteria- fun and games with mathematics . Oxford University Press 2004)
  • The power of symmetry , Spektrum Verlag 2008 (English original: Why Beauty is truth , Basic Books 2007)
  • Professor Stewart's Cabinet of mathematical curiosities . Profile Books 2008
  • Headache: 30 math puzzles . Piper 2008 (English original: The Mayor of Ugglyville's Dilemma )
  • New wonders from the world of mathematics . Piper 2009 (English original: How to cut a cake , Oxford University Press 2006)
  • World Formulas: 17 Mathematical Equations That Made History . Rowohlt Verlag 2014 (English: Seventeen Equations that Changed the World , Basic Books 2012)
  • The final riddles of mathematics . rororo 2015 (The great mathematical problems, Profile Books 2013)
  • Incredible numbers . Rowohlt, Reinbek 2016, ISBN 978-3-499-63153-5 (English original: Incredible Numbers )
  • The calculation of the cosmos. How mathematics decodes the universe . Rowohlt, Reinbek 2018, ISBN 978-3-499-63249-5
  • Quantities of mathematics. 25 thinkers who made history. Rowohlt, Reinbek 2018, ISBN 978-3-499-63394-2

Science fiction and fantasy

  • Wheelers . Earthlight Books, London 2002, ISBN 0-7434-2902-8 (with Jack Cohen).
  • Heaven . Warner Books, New York 2004, ISBN 0-446-52983-4 (with Jack Cohen).
  • The Scholars of Discworld ("The Science of Discworld"). Piper Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-492-28616-9 (together with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett).
  • The philosophers of the round world. More from the scholars of Discworld ("The Science of Discworld 2 - The Globe"). Piper, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-492-28621-3 (former title Rettet die Rundwelt Heyne, 2003 ISBN 3-453-86174-4 ; together with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett).
  • Darwin and the Gods of Discworld ("The Science of Discworld 3 - Darwin's Watch"). Piper, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-492-26622-2 (together with Jack Cohen and Terry Pratchett).
  • The Last Judgement. The Science of Discworld 4 . Piper Verlag, Munich / Zurich 2013, ISBN 978-3-492-26946-9 (British English: The Science of Discworld IV: Judgment Day . Translated by Andreas Brandhorst and Erik Simon, with Terry Pratchett and Jack Cohen).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Mathematics Genealogy Project
personal data
SURNAME Stewart, Ian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British mathematician
DATE OF BIRTH September 24, 1945