Emmy Noether – Mathematician Extraordinaire (eBook)

Contents 5
Preface 7
Chapter 1 Max and Emmy Noether: Mathematics in Erlangen 22
1.1 Max Noether’s early Career 23
1.2 Academic Antisemitism 27
1.3 Emmy Noether’s Uphill Climb 36
1.4 Classical vs. Modern Invariant Theory 44
1.5 Max Noether’s Career in Retrospect 56
Chapter 2 Emmy Noether’s Long Struggle to Habilitate in Göttingen 60
2.1 Opportunities for Women in Göttingen, 1890–1914 60
2.2 Habilitation as the Last Hurdle 65
2.3 Noether’s Attempt to Habilitate 69
Chapter 3 Emmy Noether’s Role in the Relativity Revolution 84
3.1 Einstein’s Road to General Relativity 85
3.2 Hilbert’s Approach to Einstein’s Theory 88
3.3 Einstein reads Hilbert 91
3.4 Klein’s Interests in General Relativity 94
3.5 Noether on Invariant Variational Problems 100
3.6 On the Slow Reception of Noether’s Theorems 106
Chapter 4 Noether’s Early Contributions to Modern Algebra 110
4.1 On the Rise of Abstract Algebra 110
4.2 Noether’s Contributions to Abstract Ideal Theory 113
4.3 Noether’s Ideal Theory and the Theorem of LaskerNoether 117
4.4 Van der Waerden in Göttingen 119
4.5 Pavel Alexandrov and Pavel Urysohn 127
4.6 Brouwer and the Two Russians 130
4.7 Urysohn’s Tragic Death 133
4.8 Helping a Needy Friend 136
Chapter 5 Noether’s International School in Modern Algebra 142
5.1 Mathematics at “The Klie” 142
5.2 The Takagi Connection 146
5.3 Bologna ICM and Semester in Moscow 149
5.4 Helmut Hasse and the Marburg Connection 155
5.5 Takagi and Class Field Theory 158
5.6 Collaboration with Hasse and Brauer 160
5.7 Noether’s “Wish List” for Favorite Foreigners 166
5.8 Paul Dubreil and the French Connection 171
Chapter 6 Emmy Noether’s Triumphal Years 175
6.1 The Marburg “Schiefkongress” 175
6.2 Rockefeller and the IEB Program 179
6.3 Birth of the Brauer-Hasse-Noether Theorem 183
6.4 Olga Taussky and the Hilbert Edition 190
6.5 From Vienna to Göttingen 192
6.6 Taussky on Hilbert’s 70th Birthday 196
6.7 Zurich ICM in 1932 201
Chapter 7 Cast Out of Her Country 208
7.1 Dark Clouds over Göttingen 208
7.2 First Wave of Dismissals 213
7.3 Hasse’s Campaign for Noether 218
Chapter 8 Emmy Noether in Bryn Mawr 232
8.1 Bryn Mawr College and Algebra in the United States 232
8.2 Emmy Noether’s New Home 238
8.3 Emmy’s Efforts on Behalf of Fritz Noether 245
8.4 Last Visit in Göttingen 254
8.5 Lecturer at Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study 260
Chapter 9 Memories and Legacies of Emmy Noether 273
9.1 Obituaries and Memorials 273
9.2 Fate of Fritz Noether and his Family 285
9.3 Hasse’s Sympathies for Hitlerism 297
9.4 Noether and “Hebraic Algebra” 298
9.5 “German Algebra” in the United States 302
9.6 On Noether’s Influence and Legacies 304
9.7 Courant, Alexandrov, and Grete Hermann 309
Bibliography 315
Name Index 347