Mathematician yet to decide if he needs $1 million prize

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Published time: March 24, 2010 08:56
Edited time: June 13, 2010 07:52

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Mass media, Russia, Thrills&Spills

A reclusive Russian mathematician who was awarded a $1 million is yet to decide whether he needs the money. Grigory Perelman has denied reports of his rejecting the prize for solving one of the greatest math problems.

On Tuesday, British tabloid the Daily Mail said the reclusive scientist told them he had turned down the money. But on Wednesday, Russian tabloid Life.ru published an interview with the mathematician, where he insists that he has not yet made up his mind.

The prize Perelman is entitled to receive is for solving the Poincaré Conjecture, which is linked to the understanding of multidimensional shapes.

The US-based Clay Mathematics Institute offers $1 million for solving one of its seven “Millennium Problems” of the last hundred years. Perelman is so far the only one to have done it.

Grigory Perelman lives in St. Petersburg and has little contact with the outside world. He has a history of not accepting awards for his groundbreaking work. In 2006, he was awarded the highest prize for mathematics, The Fields Medal, but turned it down.

Comments (1)

Sergios Zambouras 12.06.2010 07:53

The man is, obviously, extraordinary! He makes all the rest of us, look like the idiots we are -looking at the finger pointing to the moon (the 1 million dollar price), not the moon itself. The moon, is what Perelman has or has not in mind to do. In the meantime, he has already brought a smile in our faces and taught ignorants like me, at least one thing, we can comprehend: curiosity makes us no more knowledgable, let alone wiser. Thank you (efcharisto), Mr Perelman!

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