×

Mathematics and politics in the Soviet Union from 1928 to 1953. (English) Zbl 1006.01009

This long and important article is based on very clear and distinct personal memories by the author, a noted Russian-born, now American mathematician. This is particularly true for the situation of mathematics in Leningrad of the 1930s. Basing his judgment also on recent Russian publications of hitherto unknown sources, Lorentz gives acute descriptions of the ideological intrusion of dogmatic Marxism upon Russian mathematics and mathematicians by people like E. Kolman and L. A. Leifert. The author reports on the sufferings and deaths of many scientists in concentration camps, including his own father. He explains the survival and preferential treatment of mathematics after the shock waves of the great “turnabout” and the trials of 1936/37 by its apolitical nature.
Nevertheless he also shows the political actions and compromises by various leading Soviet mathematicians including A. N. Kolmogorov, P. S. Aleksandrov, A. D. Aleksandrov. Lorentz surmises possible blackmail against Kolmogorov that caused him to otherwise unexplainable actions such as his joint open letter with P. S. Aleksandrov against Solzhenitsyn on the pages of “Pravda” in 1974, reproduced p. 217. The author gives a detailed report on the “case of the academician Lusin”, the teacher of both Kolmogorov and P. S. Aleksandrov, who had to stand a political trial in 1936 with several of his students turning against him, but defended by S. N. Bernstein and A. N. Krylov. Lorentz describes in detail the situation of “Leningrad during the blockade” (208 ff.) reporting on own conflicts with the secret police.
The author does not discuss the circumstances of his defection to or capture by the Germans which would make for another fascinating story and historical study.

MSC:

01A60 History of mathematics in the 20th century
01A72 Schools of mathematics
PDFBibTeX XMLCite
Full Text: DOI

References:

[1] Front Nauki i Tekhn., 7, 123-125 (1936)
[2] Aleksandrov, A. D., Why Soviet scientists stopped publishing abroad, Voprosy Istor. Esteststvoznan. i Tekhn., 3, 4-24 (1996) · Zbl 0918.01018
[3] Aleksandrov, A. D.; Kolmogorov, A. N.; Lavrentiev, M. A., Mathematics: Its Content, Method, and Meaning (1964)
[4] Aleksandrov, P. S., Mathematical life in USSR: pages of an autobiography, Uspekhi Mat. Nauk, Part I, 34, 241-278 (1979)
[5] Arkhiv (AN SSR), 1945-50. TSGAOR f. 9401, op. 2, g. 27, t. VI, 1. 283-299.; Arkhiv (AN SSR), 1945-50. TSGAOR f. 9401, op. 2, g. 27, t. VI, 1. 283-299.
[6] Birstein, V. J., The Perversion of Knowledge: The True Story of Soviet Science (2001), Westview: Westview Cambridge
[7] (Brown, A., The Soviet Union: A Biographical Encyclopedia (1991), Macmillan: Macmillan New York)
[8] Conquest, R., The Great Terror, A Reassessment (1990), Oxford Univ. Press: Oxford Univ. Press Oxford
[9] Delo 555, NKVD records, Leningrad, 1942.; Delo 555, NKVD records, Leningrad, 1942.
[10] Delo akademika N. N. Lusina [Trial of the academician N. N. Lusin], (S. S. Demidov and B. V. Levshin, Eds.), RKhGI, St. Petersburg, 1999.; Delo akademika N. N. Lusina [Trial of the academician N. N. Lusin], (S. S. Demidov and B. V. Levshin, Eds.), RKhGI, St. Petersburg, 1999.
[11] Eichhorn, E., Felix Hausdorff-Paul Mongré: Some aspects of his life and the meaning of his death, Recent Developments of Topology and Its Applications (1992), Academie-Verlag: Academie-Verlag Berlin, p. 85-117 · Zbl 1154.01317
[12] Ermolaeva, N. S., On the so-called “Leningrad mathematical front”, Trudy St.-Petersburg Mat. Obshch., 5, 380-394 (1998) · Zbl 0961.01017
[13] Erugin, N. P., About those who survived, Nauka i Tekhn., Minsk (1989)
[14] Gill, G., Stalinism (1989), St. Martin Press: St. Martin Press New York
[15] (Zdravkovska, S.; Duren, P. L., Golden Years of Moscow Mathematics. Golden Years of Moscow Mathematics, History of Mathematics, 6 (1993), Amer. Math. Soc: Amer. Math. Soc Providence) · Zbl 0793.01001
[16] Golovanov, Ya., Cases No. 555, executors and victims, Ogonyok, 5, 16-19 (1992)
[17] Igoshin, V. I., M. Ya. Suslin (1996), Nauka-Fizmatlit: Nauka-Fizmatlit Moscow
[18] Kolman, E., Subject and Method of Modern Mathematics (1936)
[19] Kolman, E., We Should Not Have Lived That Way (1982), Chalidze Press: Chalidze Press New York
[20] (American and London Mathematical Societies, Kolmogorov in Perspective. Kolmogorov in Perspective, History of Mathematics, 20 (2000), Amer. Math. Soc: Amer. Math. Soc Providence)
[21] Bogolyubov, N. N.; Koshlyakov, N. S., Uspekhi Mat. Nauk, 45, 173-176 (1990)
[22] Kuznetsov, P. I.; Egorov, D. F., Uspekhi Mat. Nauk, 26, 171-206 (1971)
[23] Lorentz, G. G., Superpositions, metric entropy, complexity of functions, widths, Bull. London Math. Soc., 22, 54-61 (1990)
[24] Lorentz, G. G., Who discovered analytic sets?, Math. Intelligencer, 23, 28-31 (2001)
[25] Lusin, N. N., Leçons sur les ensembles analytiques (1930), Gauthier-Villars: Gauthier-Villars Paris · JFM 56.0085.01
[26] Lyusternik, L. A., The youth of the Moscow mathematical school, Uspekhi Mat. Nauk, 22, 137-161 (1967)
[27] Tretii Polyus, 4 (1997)
[28] Mat. Sb., 39, 1-14 (1931)
[29] On the Leningrad Mathematical Front (1931), Gos. Soz. Econ. Izd: Gos. Soz. Econ. Izd Moscow/Leningrad
[30] (Dear, C. B., Oxford Companion to WWII (1995), Oxford University Press: Oxford University Press Oxford)
[31] Shentalinsky, V., The KGB’s Literary Archive (1995), The Harville Press: The Harville Press London
[32] Sidorskii, L., Stars and thorns, Smena, 75, 19225 (1989)
[33] (Rubinstein, J.; Naumov, V. P., Stalin’s Secret Pogrom: The Postwar Inquisition of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (2001), Yale University Press: Yale University Press New Haven)
[34] Struggle for Materialistic Dialectics in Mathematics (1931), Communist Academy: Communist Academy Moscow
[35] Suslin, M., Sur une définition des ensembles mesurables B sans nombres transfinis, C. R. Acad. Sci. Paris, 169, 88-90 (1917) · JFM 46.0296.01
[36] Vilenkin, N. Ya., Formulas on plywood, Priroda, 6, 95-104 (1991)
[37] Volkogonov, D., Stalin (1992), Novosti: Novosti Moscow
[38] Vyshinskii, A., Reelection of professors, Izvestia, 3850 (1930)
This reference list is based on information provided by the publisher or from digital mathematics libraries. Its items are heuristically matched to zbMATH identifiers and may contain data conversion errors. In some cases that data have been complemented/enhanced by data from zbMATH Open. This attempts to reflect the references listed in the original paper as accurately as possible without claiming completeness or a perfect matching.