Kurt Reidemeister
Kurt Werner Friedrich Reidemeister (13 October 1893 – 8 July 1971) was a mathematician born in Braunschweig (Brunswick), Germany.
Kurt Werner Friedrich Reidemeister | |
|---|---|
 Kurt Reidemeister in 1956 or 1958 in Switzerland | |
| Born | 13 October 1893 |
| Died | 8 July 1971 (aged 77) |
| Nationality | German |
| Alma mater | University of Hamburg |
| Spouse | Elisabeth Wagner |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Mathematics |
| Thesis | Über die Relativklassenzahl gewisser relativ-quadratischer Zahlkörper (1921) |
| Doctoral advisor | Erich Hecke |
| Doctoral students | Günter Hotz Heiner Zieschang |
Life
He was a brother of Marie Neurath. Beginning in 1912, he studied in Freiburg, Munich, Marburg, and Göttingen. In 1920, he got the Staatsexamen (master's degree) in mathematics, philosophy, physics, chemistry, and geology. He received his doctorate in 1921 with a thesis in algebraic number theory at the University of Hamburg under the supervision of Erich Hecke.[1][2][3]
He became interested in differential geometry; he edited Wilhelm Blaschke's second volume on the topic,[4] and both made an acclaimed contribution to the Jena DMV conference in September 1921.[5][6]
In October 1922[2][3] or 1923[1] he was appointed assistant professor at the University of Vienna. While there he became familiar with the work of Wilhelm Wirtinger on knot theory, and became closely connected to Hans Hahn and the Vienna Circle. Its 1929 manifesto lists one of Reidemeister's publications[7] in a bibliography of closely related authors.
In 1925 he became a full professor at the University of Königsberg; he stayed until 1933, when he was regarded politically unsound by the Nazis and dismissed from his position. Whilst there he organised the Second Conference on the Epistemology of the Exact Sciences in conjunction with journal Erkenntnis.[8]
Blaschke managed to get a promise about Reidemeister's reappointment, and in autumn 1934 he got the chair of Kurt Hensel at the University of Marburg. He stayed there, except for a visit to the Princeton Institute for Advanced Study in 1948–1950, until he got appointed to Göttingen University in 1955, where he stayed until his emeritation.[1][2][3]
Works
Reidemeister's interests were mainly in combinatorial group theory, combinatorial topology, geometric group theory, and the foundations of geometry. His works include Knoten und Gruppen (1926), Einführung in die kombinatorische Topologie (1932), and Knotentheorie (1932). He co-edited the journal Mathematische Annalen from 1947 until 1963.[9] He was also a philosopher. His book "Das exakte Denken der Griechen" (1949) is not as well known as his mathematical work. In it he remarks that mathematical thought is "just the beginning of thought".
References
- O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Kurt Reidemeister", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St Andrews
- Rafael Artzy (1972). "Kurt Reidemeister 13.10.1893 — 8.7.1971". Jber. DMV (in German). 74: 96–104.
- Friedrich Bachmann and Heinrich Behnke and Wolfgang Franz (1972). "In memorian Kurt Reidemeister" (PDF). Math. Ann. (in German). 199 (1): 1–11. doi:10.1007/bf01419571. S2CID 122203410.
- Wilhelm Blaschke, Vorlesungen über Differentialgeometrie, Springer, Grundlehren der mathematischen Wissenschaften, 1921-1929, vol. 2: Affine Differentialgeometrie
- Jahresversammlung in Jena vom 18.—25. September 1921, Jahresbericht der Deutschen Mathematiker-Vereinigung, vol.30, p.27-28, 1921
- W. Blaschke and K. Reidemeister (1922). "Über die Entwicklung der Affingeometrie" (PDF). Jahresbericht DMV. 31: 63–81.
- Kurt Reidemeister (1928). "Exaktes Denken". Philosophischer Anzeiger. 3: 15–47.
- Stadler, Friedrich (2015). The Vienna Circle: Studies in the Origins, Development, and Influence of Logical Empiricism. Springer. ISBN 9783319165615.
- Title page of vol.274 (1986)
External links
