Just turned over a new leaf and became a wise and intelligent student

Chapter 428 School!

"Teacher, so you also approve of Xu?"

Deligne asked Grothendieck tentatively, who was still staring at the video content on the computer screen in a daze. He asked the question even though he knew the answer.

"Or you want me to recognize you?"

Grothendieck glanced at Deligne with disdain evident in his eyes.

"Teacher, I think you don't have to be so blunt sometimes."

Deligne rubbed his face with a wry smile.

Most other people were miserable because they had to deal with an unlucky student in their life, but not him. He was miserable because he had to deal with this little old man.

Grothendieck is really a worry.

But to some extent, Deligne has always regarded him as his number one mentor.

Over the years, whenever Grothendieck offended someone outside, it was Deligne and his other fellow disciples who helped to ease the relationship.

This old man has always believed that only those who can understand his academic concepts and ideas are qualified to be treated kindly by him, and the threshold of this qualification is so high that it is difficult for people to cross it. Haven't you seen that an academic giant like Deligne is also being ridiculed in front of this old man?

"Speaking simply and directly can save a lot of time and improve efficiency."

Grothendieck curled his lips.

"What I hate most is your attitude of putting on a fake smile to please someone even though you clearly don't like them."

"Tell me, what do you want me to do here? You can't just let me watch this video."

However, the old man still relented.

It's not that he really doesn't understand the ways of the world, it's just that he doesn't bother to do those things.

In his opinion, playing along with a bunch of idiots is a waste of time and life.

"Is such that."

Seeing that the old man had relented, Deligne took the opportunity to roughly express his thoughts.

After listening to what Deligne said, Grothendieck suddenly looked at him with some contempt and complained speechlessly.

"Are you guys all doing so badly now? Why do you need a retired person like me to come out and support you in this matter? Besides, I'm just a useless old thing now, and people may not recognize me."

"Hey? Teacher, that's not what you just said."

"I talked to the Chinese before and learned a saying. What's it called? The waves of the Rhine River hit each other one by one. The wave in front will be hit by the wave behind and crashed onto the bank of the Rhine River."

Although Grothendieck said this, he thought about it and looked back at his small villa in the mountains with some nostalgia.

"Okay, I'll give it a try then."

The four young old men looked at each other with joy on their faces.

This time, the stubborn old teacher was finally persuaded. If this succeeds, the teacher's works will continue to be circulated among the people.

This is actually their own selfish desire.

To some extent, Grothendieck can be regarded as the source of these world-class mathematicians. The greater the old man's influence can be maintained before his death, the more nutrients they can obtain under this sturdy tree and expand outward.

Although each of them is a top scholar who has left his name in the history of mathematical research.

But this is far from enough for what they are pursuing, there is something much bigger.

school.

A new school that can stand the test of time.

As the saying goes, where there are people, there are rivers and lakes. Whether it is in the mathematics world or the physics world, this theory is still applicable.

When talking about schools of thought, perhaps more people will think of the two century-long struggles in modern physics and mathematics.

In the world of physics, the battle between Einstein and the Copenhagen School.

In the world of mathematics, the battle between Russell and the Göttingen School.

The former seems to be more popular, but for those present, the latter story is more familiar.

The origin of the Göttingen School was nearly 300 years ago, in 1734. Converted into the Chinese timeline, it should be the th year of Yongzheng's reign.

King George II of England decided to establish a university in Göttingen that would promote the ideals of academic freedom of the European Enlightenment.

This legendary university has indeed become a source of innovation leading the development of science throughout Europe, just as its founder, George II, the first president of the University of Göttingen, recognized.

Countless mathematicians and physicists who have influenced the entire history of human development were born here.

A total of 46 Nobel Prize winners have studied or taught here.

The glory of the Göttingen School of Mathematics originated from a name that is familiar to everyone, Gauss.

After the emergence of the mathematical genius Gauss, mathematical superstars such as Riemann, Dirichlet, Jacobi and Klein emerged one after another, until the emergence of David Hilbert, the Göttingen School officially entered its heyday.

In the field of physics, the University of Göttingen is also one of the sources of quantum physics, and it is not an exaggeration to call it a holy land of physics.

Top physics masters including Planck, Hertz, Heidelberg, Fermi, Pauli and Oppenheimer also developed here.

It can be said that the Göttingen School has completely influenced the development of modern science as a whole.

You can go to any school library and pick out a textbook from the science and engineering section.

No matter what subject, field, or direction, there must be formulas or theories originating from the Göttingen School in this textbook.

It was not until World War II that the Göttingen School was torn apart and reduced to ruins under the influence of world turmoil.

Most of the outstanding scholars of the Göttingen School fled to the United States. During their short development process in the United States, these scholars produced important results and contributions to a greater or lesser extent.

Even though Xu Qingshan is causing a lot of controversy outside now, he has solved the Riemann hypothesis.

But the fundamental reason why it is so popular is also closely related to the influence of the Göttingen School.

To build a world-class, historical school requires hundreds of years of continuous effort, but to destroy the physical body that houses it only requires a few orders in a war.

But the soul it possesses will continue to be carried.

However, at the end of the Göttingen School and in the more than 100 years after its collapse.

Some new and influential schools of thought emerged in the academic world, including the Princeton School, which inherited part of the Göttingen legacy, the Moscow School, which was on the fringe of the world mainstream but had a history like Göttingen, the short-lived Polish School, and the Bourbaki School in France with its avant-garde style.

However, there has never been another school like the Göttingen School that has the momentum to dominate its contemporaries and carry forward the past and open up the future.

Those present here cannot be considered members of the Göttingen School.

But Grothendieck's achievements at his peak made him regarded by the world as a leader comparable to Hilbert, the leader of the Göttingen School, as well as Russell and Brouwer.

In other words, they once had the hope of creating a new school of mathematics.

In fact, Grothendieck was indeed regarded as the leader of the new school of mathematics for a period of time.
However, this trend disappeared before the school was fully formed due to Grothendieck's withdrawal.

The so-called new school of mathematics has no chance to gain popularity in the academic world.

Compared to the grand scene of the battle between the three major schools of logic, form and intuition created by the three representative figures Russell, Hilbert and Brouwer from 1900 to 1930.

The new mathematical school of Grothendieck, which died in the womb, was like a small stone dropped into the history of academia, without causing any ripples at all.

But now they see hope in Xu Qingshan.

That is the hope of creating a new school of mathematics. In their understanding, the new school of mathematics will not be limited to any conditions and limitations.

Instead, it is different from traditional mathematics and can push pure numbers and applied numbers towards a unified existence again.

They will not be limited to the research field of any school; they can study the research directions of all schools.

But it is just like the principle of unity implemented by the Göttingen School back then.

What they are pursuing is the grand unification of mathematics.

This may be the limit of every mathematician's dreams.

If they want to occupy their own place in the brilliant history of mathematical academics, they must not only match the achievements of the past, but also surpass and unify them.

Of course, it is impossible for Deligne and others to pull Grothendieck out to continue to be the leader of the new school. This is not very realistic.

Because Grothendieck was already old enough, let alone Grothendieck, even the four of them could hardly become the leader of a new school at this time.

One of the necessary conditions to become the founding leader of a world-class new school.

That is to be young enough.

Being young enough means he still has a long time to live, which also means he will have a longer academic career and productive period.

Just like the Göttingen School back then.

The decisive factor that made the Göttingen School successful and its long-lasting inheritance was Gauss's high productivity.

There is a widely circulated theory in economics.

【Impossible Triangle】

This means that when the economy and society are developing, it is difficult to achieve three goals at the same time, such as the free flow of capital, a fixed exchange rate and monetary policy independence.

This theory has been applied to various fields.

For example, there is the impossible triangle in training in the fitness circle, the impossible triangle in dating partners, it is impossible for a man to possess the three attributes of being handsome, rich, and loyal at the same time, and it is impossible for a woman to possess the three attributes of being beautiful, good-tempered, and capable at the same time.

And there is also such an impossible triangle in the field of mathematics.

High level, high yield and extra long standby time.

Many talented mathematicians died young. After all, academic research is a very life-shortening activity.

Overusing your brain can easily cause premature aging.

But Gauss is a rare person in history who possesses the impossible triangle at the same time.

He lived to be 78 years old. He began to produce academic output at the age of 17. He discovered the prime number distribution theorem and the method of least squares. Until his death, he was still writing his last paper.

His 60-year academic research career is unprecedented in ancient and modern times.

Deligne and others saw the shadow of Gauss in Xu Qingshan. To some extent, Xu Qingshan has even surpassed Gauss, who is also 20 years old.

Gauss published his famous number theory work "Research on Arithmetic" when he was 24 years old, but Xu Qingshan's "Complete Mathematics: Number Theory" has already entered the market stage.

Of course, this is a bit too shameless in comparison.

The fact that he could be compared with Gauss by these top mathematicians is enough to prove Xu Qingshan's future possibilities.

Won Ma.

If you are an elderly top mathematics scholar at the end of your academic career, you meet a legendary UR with a lot of gold behind him.

What should you do at this time?
Deligne and his colleagues chose to bring their teacher together to use the new school of mathematics that they had not achieved at the beginning as the initial investment fund.

It injected the most critical start-up capital into Xu Qingshan's business when he was starting out.

Grothendieck has now lost his ambition to dominate the world, but with the opportunity before him, he feels that it would be a good idea for him to be a mascot.

More importantly, he was able to see up close and personal a young man who had surpassed himself shine step by step.

In particular, he also saw his own shadow in this young man.

Perhaps Grothendieck's era has passed too long, and many people have forgotten that the old man was best at turning obscure mathematical concepts into vivid and interesting stories.

The cohomology theory he founded built a rainbow bridge between algebra and topology, closely connecting the two fields that originally had little intersection.

When he watched Xu Qingshan's speech, he seemed to see his younger self.

I saw that my academic work was continuing and becoming even more brilliant.

Otherwise, he would not have agreed so easily and walked out of the mountains with a demanding look on his face.

Xu Qingshan had no idea that his good friends at Princeton were planning something that could shock the entire mathematics community.

He is now happy with his small achievement.

Of course, it is not an academic achievement, but an achievement in personnel recruitment.

He met the top talent he had selected, a top talent in the field of machine learning who was confused and distressed.

"Joshua, I think you could relax a little."

Xu Qingshan looked at the old man in front of him with a long face, unkempt hair, and eyes that looked quite melancholy and depressed, and comforted him.

"I'm very optimistic about your work. It's their loss if they didn't approve your application. I invited you here through Jessica because I wanted to discuss the development direction of neural networks with you."

Xu Qingshan comforted Joshua Bengio with an empathetic look on his face, but he was actually thinking about how to keep Old Deng and his team in China.

"Thanks for your affirmation, Xu, but maybe I won't be able to stay in Montreal next year."

Joshua smiled bitterly.

Even though the Great Wall in front of him, which was said to be reachable only by a good man, looked really majestic, he could not muster much interest.

"Joshua, I don't think you need to be so discouraged. Jessica told me that you have always been the core of Canada's machine learning field. I have also read the neural probabilistic language model you wrote many times. I understand you."

Xu Qingshan patted Joshua on the shoulder.

"No, Xu, I'm actually wondering if I really took the wrong path."

Joshua looked up at the sky, his words full of self-doubt.

"The creation of deep learning is the result of Hinton, and Yang has established his position with convolutional neural networks. Now they all seem to be in contact with enterprises. I have lost my partners on the academic road, and I am the only one who is pursuing this path that is least likely to make money."

"I don't know if my research is still valuable, really."

Joshua looked at Xu Qingshan with gratitude.

“Thank you for your invitation, but...”

“Don’t be so quick to say but.”

Xu Qingshan said with a smile.

What I fear the most is that you are now valued by the University of Montreal and are full of confidence and passion, but what if you say that you are now doubting yourself? That's easy!
“Joshua.”

"You must always believe that the things that can change the future of this world must be the purest things."

"You said you are an academic purist who yearns for utopia. Do you think the Riemann hypothesis is not pure enough?"

(End of this chapter)