Sure he looks the quintessential nerd that he probably is. Dr. Gregori Perelman is two years older than I am and still lives his mother in a tiny apartment in St. Petersburg. His only existing photographs in the public domain shows him to be a cross between Steven Wright and Ted Kaczynski, which is to say, not the most appealing specimen. So much so, that the Russian newspapers that have taken to dressing him up in fashionable clothing with the help of Photoshop when they write affectionately about him.
Having said that, Dr. Perelman is an oddity in these times in the most unusual way. Having proven the Thurston's geometrization conjecture, he was awarded the prestigious medal which he promptly refused and didn’t bother to turn up any functions falicitating him. And it looks like he is also getting ready to turn down a million dollar prize money for another award.
Why is this man fascinating to so many of us? In Russia, where the unfortunate and ill-prepared dissolution of USSR left a whole country without self respect overnight and with no visible infrastructure to compete in the capitalistic world, he is hailed as a symbol of old-style Russian genius. A proud son of Russia who cannot be bought with Western-style crass academic oscar celebrations. This may well be so. But I don’t know how Dr. Perelman fits in with the new Russia with its fascination with mafia dons and cheap hookers.
What is even more troubling to me than the Russian gingoism about him is the American wounded pride. I don’t watch Fox News and the like, but I can only imagine what its “venerable” commentators would say about him if they actually have heard of him. Rejecting a million dollars is more of a sacrilege in the US than murdering a child and feeding it to a pig and then having beastial sex with it (of course I am exaggerating, because in the good old USA, having sex with the pig is much worse than murdering or rejecting a million dollars, ask Anna Nicole Smith’s dead-husband.)
After all that I have read, he seems to be the genuine article. He is probably not the gingoist or the anti-capitalist anti-West nay-sayer he is made out to be. That inspires me greatly. He is someone, after a very long time, that the world can genuinely look upto to stand the test of time by not devaluing his work with crass materialism. Unlike the academics I know back in the US, where junkets and conferences drive their trade and petty office politics drive their work ethic, here is a guy who works for its own sake, for the pure love of scientific discovery. Just like the old masters. For those of us who look at Sub-Commandante Marcos for inspiring a whole population of the genuinely voiceless, Dr. Perelman is a symbol of the same in the academic world, someone who quietly rejecting the business of science for the pleasure of science. This is the sort of scientist that inspired me when I was growing up. Since then, I have met my fair share of high-achieving scientists from MIT, Harvard and Princeton and all they seem to be interested in is how to churn out papers and get grants.
So here is to you Dr. Perelman. May you lead by example and at least let the rest of us believe that there is a way to retain self respect without always having to sell out to the almighty dollar.
But at the end of the day, can he still get a date?
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And the great Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz died yesterday. I feel sad.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez is very ill. Sad.
John Grisham and Steven King, on the other hand, are very much alive and healthy. Even more sad.
There IS no God.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, murderers of all murderers, console ourselves? That which was the holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet possessed has bled to death under our knives. Who will wipe this blood off us? With what water could we purify ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we need to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we not ourselves become gods simply to be worthy of it?
— Nietzsche
And Nietzsche is dead - God
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MRS. HENDY: Oh! I never knew Schopenhauer was a philosopher!
MR. HENDY: Oh, yeah! He's the one that begins with an 'S'.
MRS. HENDY: Oh.
MR. HENDY: Umm, like, uh, 'Nietzsche'.
MRS. HENDY: Does 'Nietzsche' begin with an 'S'?
MR. HENDY: Uh, there's an 's' in 'Nietzsche'.
MRS. HENDY: Oh, wow. Yes, there is. Do all philosophers have an 's' in them?
MR. HENDY: Uh, yeah! I think most of 'em do.
MRS. HENDY: Oh. Does that mean Selina Jones is a philosopher?
MR. HENDY: Yeah! Right! She could be! She sings about the meaning of life.
(Sorry couldn't help it, I cannot help but think of Eric Idle and Michael Palin going on and on about it in the "Life of Brian" when I think of Nietzsche.
