Conference rusure::math

    The only famous female mathematician that springs to my mind is
    the one who was killed in the fourth or fifth century AD for refusing
    to give up her pagan beliefs. I think she was Greek, and I can't
    remember her name, but I could look it up for you tonight.
    
    Peter

>>	Any suggestions/information would be greatly appreciated.

	Start earlier. :-)

	I just ordered a book called More Mathematical People,
				     ------------------------
	apparently a sequel to Mathematical People.  If you
			       -------------------
	are lucky you might find a copy of one or the other at
	a local library (or if less lucky, at a local bookstore).

	As I remember the description, two of the people covered
	(in the second book) are women, J. Robinson (work on
	Hilbert's problem about Diophantine equations?) and M.E.Rudin
	(she's mentioned in my topology books a couple of times,
	e.g., CH implies the box product of a countably infinite
	number of copies of the real line is paracompact).  But
	it won't arrive by Monday.

	Dan

I'd also heard of that mathematician in the 4th century.  All I can remember 
of the story is that she was killed by a mob armed with clam shells.

For a bio with a slightly more upbeat ending try Emma Noether.  She has a 
conference room in ZK3, and the little bio on the wall suggests that she
would be a good subject.

    Hippolyte?  That story is probably R-rated.  Not just because of
    violence, either.
    
    Too bad the Noether conference room is LOCKED these days.  I recall
    reading some pretty amazing stuff about her.
    
    Maybe we could start some rumors, like:  "It was really Peano's wife
    who wrote down the axioms, so he wouldn't forget what he was supposed
    to be doing."  :-)
    
      John

    Sonya Kovelevski would probalby be an intersting example.  I think
    there is a biography about her called "A Convergence of Lives".

    A magazine for mathematicians called "The Mathemetical Intellegencer"
    would be a good place to look for ideas for this.  I have copies at
    home and can look thru them tonight for some pointers if you wish.

    Another place too look is the "Dictionary of Scientific Biography",
    once you have a name to go on.  The books "Mathematical People"
    mentioned earlier sound like a good source too.

    - Jim

Article 13420 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected]
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 15 Nov 90 19:13:10 GMT
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Nf-From: ENH.Prime.COM!JRAMSDEN    Nov 15 12:12:00 1990


Next Monday ? mmm that's cutting it a bit fine, but if it's  any  help
here's a brain dump of the women mathematicians I know of.

Firstly there was the head librarian of the library of  Alexandria  in
the  6th  century.   I  don't  remember  her  name exactly, but it was
something like Hypathia.

Unfortunately she came to a sticky end (skinned alive) when Egypt  was
invaded  by  Muslim  tribesmen.   In fairness, the Arabians did a very
good job preserving Greek  mathematical  &  scientific  writings,  and
adding  to  them  (particularly  in  medicine  &  astronomy).  But the
commander of the  raiding  party  referred  to  above  was  apparently
something of an airhead whose motto was "if in doubt burn it" !

On the occasion in question he  is  reported  to  have  said  (of  the
books)  "If  they  are  commentaries on the Koran they are superflous,
and otherwise if they are not the Koran they are heretical"

Moving on a few centuries to the 19th, there was Sophia Germaine.  She
corresponded   with  the  German  mathematician  Carl  Gauss,  and  is
credited with several significant results, including a  criterion  for
the  existence  of  cubic residues, and a divisibility result relating
to Fermat's last Theorem.

(I always get her muddled up with  Sophus  Lie.  But  recently  I  was
surprised  to  find  out that the latter was a man, contrary to what I
seemed to have remembered reading earlier.)

Gauss was not aware that Sophia was a woman, and was  astonished  when
she whisked  off her false beard, let down her hair, and revealed all.
(This is artistic licence on my part - I think she  actually  informed
him by letter :-)

In the same century there was Ada Lovelace, who ably assisted  Charles
Babbage with his work on the well known Difference Engine.

Recently I imagine the number of women involved with mathematics  must
have  increased  considerably.  Two who come to mind are Olga Taussky,
who has done work on quadratic  forms,  and  young  (using  that  word
advisedly)  Ruth  Lawrence  at  Harvard.   I  don't  know what Ruth is
engaged on at the moment, but having  got  her  degree  when  she  was
about 12 or something, it must be fairly advanced !


------------------------------------------------------------------------
John R Ramsden             |  The hen is a noble beast,
  ([email protected]) |  but the cow is forlorner,
Prime Computer Inc,        |  as it stands in a muddy field
Framingham, Mass.          |  with a leg at each corner.
                           |        W Maconnegal  (19th Scottish poet)
------------------------------------------------------------------------


Article 13426 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (Dave Seaman)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 15 Nov 90 20:35:27 GMT
References: <[email protected]> <[email protected]>
Sender: [email protected]
Reply-To: [email protected] (Dave Seaman)
Organization: Purdue University
Lines: 12

In article <[email protected]> [email protected] writes:
>Firstly there was the head librarian of the library of  Alexandria  in
>the  6th  century.   I  don't  remember  her  name exactly, but it was
>something like Hypathia.

I submit that there is a difference between a librarian and a mathematician.
For a real mathematician, try Emmy Noether (for whom Noetherian rings are
named).

--
Dave Seaman	  					
[email protected]


Article 13431 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (George Georgiou)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 15 Nov 90 21:52:03 GMT
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In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Dave Seaman) writes:
>For a real mathematician, try Emmy Noether (for whom Noetherian rings are
>named).
Here is reference:


Emmy Noether, a tribute to her life and work / editors, James W. Brewer, Martha
  K. Smith. -- New York : M. Dekker, c1981.
  x, 180 p., <10> p. of plates : ill. ; 23 cm.
  Includes bibliographies and index. 

Noether, Emmy, 1882-1935.

CALL NUMBER: QA29.N6 E47

George Georgiou                       [email protected]
Computer Science Department           +---------------------------+
Tulane University                     |       Fiat Lux            |
New Orleans, LA 70118                 +---------------------------+


Article 13432 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (John Forbes Hughes)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
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Sender: [email protected]
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Organization: Brown University Department of Computer Science
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In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Dave Seaman) writes:
>In article <[email protected]> [email protected] writes:
>>Firstly there was the head librarian of the library of  Alexandria  in
>>the  6th  century.   I  don't  remember  her  name exactly, but it was
>>something like Hypathia.
>
>I submit that there is a difference between a librarian and a mathematician.
>For a real mathematician, try Emmy Noether (for whom Noetherian rings are
>named).
>
>--
>Dave Seaman	  					
>[email protected]

And I submit that one person can be two things at once. For example, 
President Garfield came up with a proof of the Pythagorean Theorem. 
To that extent, he was a mathematician, although he was primarily a
politician. I believe that W.R. Hamilton was not primarily a mathematician
either. 
   And, by a peculiar coincidence, Julia Robinson was "officially" a 
statistician, although she was actually a mathematician. There is a 
long and amusing story behind this one; perhaps she would make a
good subject for the original poster's daughter's paper...
   One anecdote: when she was at Berkeley, she got a request from some
administrator asking how she spent her time. She ignored it, and was asked
again, and finally asked her deaprtment chair what to do. The chairperson
said "Just write down what you did each day last week." What she wrote was
"Monday: Tried to prove conjecture. Tuesday: Tried to prove conjecture.
Wednesday: Tried to prove conjecture. Thursday: Tried to prove conjecture.
Friday: Conjecture false." Apparently the administrators didn't ask again.

-John Hughes


Article 13445 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (Emilio Millan)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 16 Nov 90 04:44:19 GMT
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Sender: [email protected]
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One other famous female mathematician is the Russian, Sofia Kovalevskaya.
For information, see her autobiographical A RUSSIAN CHILDHOOD, published
by Springer-Verlag, or the biography LITTLE SPARROW.

                                                 Emilio


Article 13440 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (Douglas Harper)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 16 Nov 90 02:31:22 GMT
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In article <[email protected]> [email protected] writes:
>Firstly there was the head librarian of the library of  Alexandria  in
>the  6th  century.   I  don't  remember  her  name exactly, but it was
>something like Hypathia.
>
>Unfortunately she came to a sticky end (skinned alive) when Egypt  was
>invaded  by  Muslim  tribesmen.   

This is a rather unfortunate time to accuse Muslims of a crime they
couldn't have committed.  Hypatia was in fact brutally murdered by
fanatical Christians, not Muslims of any stripe.  This is hardly
surprising, considering that she died in 415 A.D, whereas Muhammad
wasn't born until ca. 570 A.D.

--
-- 
Douglas Harper                     [email protected]

For an interesting twist on the problem:

While perhaps not of the same caliber as the mathematicians
mentioned in the previous replies, you (or your daughter) 
could try to contact Prof. Shafi Goldwasser at MIT's Lab 
for Computer Science.

Her recent work is in cryptography.

Sam

    
    Yes, getting the information by Monday is a little tight.
    
    Two famous women mathematicians have been mentioned in this conference:
    Sonya (Sofia) Kovalevsky, who was a student of Weierstrass, in the
    second half of the 19th century.  She was Russian, but went to Germany
    to study with Weierstrass.  She made contributions in the area of
    analysis and applied math.  There are a few recent serious biographies.
    
    Emmy Noether, who was a student of Hilbert, and wrote papers with him.
    She lived in Germany, but came to the US in the 1930's (taught at Bryn
    Mawr).  She worked in algebra, but Noetherian rings are named for her
    father, Max, I believe.
    
    To get more info, you could call the Association for Women in Math, at
    Wellesley College.  There's also been a lot of curriculum development
    on 'women in math and science'.  AWM might be able to point you to
    some.  The Math Assoc of America (in Washington DC) has a committee,
    Women and Mathematics, that can provide information - may be hard to
    get by Monday.  And public libraries might have some material.
    
    There are lots of contemporary women mathematicians, who are "famous"
    (are mathematicians ever famous?) - Julia Robinson, Olga Taussky-Todd,
    Karen Uhlenbeck, etc.  
    
         Martha

Article 13454 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (James Propp)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 16 Nov 90 15:39:45 GMT
Sender: [email protected] (Mr Background)
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In article <[email protected]> [email protected] writes:
>Firstly there was the head librarian of the library of  Alexandria  in
>the  6th  century.   I  don't  remember  her  name exactly, but it was
>something like Hypathia.

For more on Hypatia, see pages 102-107 of Edna Kramer's "The Nature and
Growth of Modern Mathematics", Volume 1.

Unfortunately, all of Hypatia's original scientific writings have been lost
(though commentaries on the Conics of Appolonius, the Almagest of Ptolemy,
and the Arithmetica of Diophantus are attributed to her).

Jim Propp

    ==================================================================
    ||          "It takes some mathematical sophistication          ||
    ||             to see why this fact is not obvious."            ||
    ==================================================================


Article 13511 of sci.math:
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From: [email protected] (Stephen R. Tate)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: woman mathematician -- need info fo
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 19 Nov 90 17:11:41 GMT
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In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Peter Wayner) writes:
>[email protected] (Dave Forsyth) writes:
>>Aren't Noetherian rings named for Max Noether, rather than Emmy Noether?  He 
>Nope, Emmy. Or at least that is what they taught me in Algebra Class.

I think that Noetherian rings are indeed named for Emmy Noether.
Incidentally, here's a quote of none other than Albert Einstein:

   "In the judgment of the most competent living mathematicians,
    Fraulein Noether was the most significant creative mathematical
    genius thus far produced since the higer education of women
    began.  In the realm of algebra, in which the most gifted
    mathematicians have been busy for centuries, she discovered
    methods which have proved of enormous importance in the
    development of the present-day younger generation of mathematicians."

That quote came from one of the biographical blurbs in Gallian's
abstract algebra book --- the book actually has quite a few interesting
biographical entries on famous mathematicians.

-- 
Steve Tate                         [email protected]
Dept. of Computer Science
Duke University
Durham, NC  27706

    In my opinion, Emmy Noether was, by far, the greatest female 
    mathematician there has been.  I don't know much about her life story
    though.  I heard two anecdotes about her.  One is that she sent in a
    paper to some prestigous journal in Germany, and was enthusiastically
    received until they found out that it was a Flau Noether not a Herr.
    Then they got all upset and refused to publish it...
    She was first denied a position of assistant professorship because
    she was a woman.  David Hilbert later intervened on her behalf and she
    got her professor position.  They used to play a game in Goettingen. 
    All math prof. would gather around and have a stack of paper recently
    published ready.  Then someone would name the title of these paper and
    each prof. took turn to give a summery of what that paper was about. 
    One was out of the game when one said "I haven't read that paper."  In
    the end, the last two survivors were always David Hilber and Emmy
    Noether, and they would go on and on and on until everyone was tired.
    
    Eugene
             

My daughter ended up reporting on Grace Hopper, and did very well.  She shared
the responses that appeared here and in the usenet with her teacher and 
classmates, and what otherwise would have been an ordinary assignment became
an adventure, leading to information they otherwise would never have
come across.  Altogether, we got 45 responses from around the world, about
23 notable female mathematicians.

Thank you all very much for your help.

Best wishes.

Richard Seltzer