May 8, 2007, 3:30 pm, Tuesday
Sergey Finashin, http://www.math.metu.edu.tr/~serge/index.html
Middle East Technical University, Department of Mathematics
The story of Perelman and some problems of organization of science: reflection on ethics, politics and research
Perelman's story raised rather hot questions, which are widely discussed
now in mathematical society: about the low ethical standards in
mathematical research and unappropriate credits for mathematical results,
about the role played by "prestigeous math journals" and possibility to
replace journal publications of papers by web-archive publications,
about the officials of the mathematical unions
and of the committees proposing awards: these people
(neither the award that they propose)
cannot be scientifically respected if instead of top-level experts
we see just administrators and politicians from mathematics.
I will recall the story of Perelman (which is usually somehow perverted by the mass media) and give personal remarks about the discussable issues.