Interview with Shing-Tung Yau, first Fields Medal winner for China on how to build China into a leader in math:
2022-07-31 13:52:21Ecns.cn Editor : Liu Yimeng
By Gao Chuyi
Recently, the Fields Medal which is known as the Nobel Prize in mathematics issued every four years was announced. Four "Generation Y", young mathematicians from France, America, Britain and Ukraine won the prizes. There into, June Huh has an especially legendary experience, who is a Korean-American mathematician had a bad math performance and even was repelled by math in his early years, finally becomes another Asian who won the medal after Shing-Tung Yau, Terence Chi-Shen Tao and Bao Chau Ngo.
Which characteristics does a mathematician have? How can China cultivate more native and world-class mathematicians? What can China do if it wants to rise from a "mathematic giant" to a "mathematic power"? Famous Chinese mathematician Shing-Tung Yau who is also the first Chinese Fields Medal winner, had an exclusive interview with the "W.E. Talk" of China News Service recently. He said, "To learn math well, you should have fundamentals and talents, interests and be hardworking. The true essence of math is not solving math problems, especially not those made by others, but requiring us to develop good research direction and good problems and to make our way through."
Here are excerpts from the interview:
CNS:Once you said that you had a home either in China or in the U.S.. And a third home inhabited for over half a century – Mathematic State. How do you become interested in math?
Shing-Tung Yau:I have been interested in math from early time. My father was a philosopher, but he showed special preference to math. Though he did not explore math, he thought it was an important subject. Under the guidance of my father, I had interests in math since then.
When I was 14, my father passed away. I had great interest in math, but I did not get to know real math until my study in UC Berkeley.
Frankly speaking, research areas were one-sided which Chinese mathematician realized and there was not a huge panorama. I saw it till I was in Berkeley.
CNS:You have dual experiences of learning and teaching in the East and the West and lived in the U.S. for nearly 50 years. How to solve the phenomena that Chinese students like to solve Olympic mathematics rather than ask questions?
Shing-Tung Yau:Many people are curious about why Chinese students are good at math but there are few great mathematicians in China. Actually, there are lots of mistakes among them. Among euromericans, people with best math performance are not only taught mathematical primary contents by their teachers but also lay emphasis on stimulating them to have true interests in mathematics, which makes them have enormous original motivation to find the beauties of mathematics.
Many Chinese children do not understand the most essential part of mathematics. They seem happy to solve the problems and to get good test results. However, the true essence of math is not solving math problems, especially not those made by others, but requiring us to develop good research direction and good problems and to make our way through.
To break this difficult situation, utilitarian mind should be abstained. Don't think about getting a promotion or fortune by doing mathematics, compete for the so-called "title of talent" and strive for becoming academicians. When I was in the U.S., I found a lot of young people considering that their research were interesting. They are satisfied, and they do not think about whether they can be academicians or get high salaries. As for people who aspired to engage in scholarship, the real reward is knowledge itself. The most important thing is to solve difficult problems. We should learn from Tang Monk's Journey to the West, during which he overcomes 81 tribulations.
Therefore, to learn mathematics well, they should be talented, interested and hardworking. It takes such a long time. Without interests, people can barely persist. Besides, do not rely on inspiration. It is impossible to solve unanswered problems by just relying on inspiration.
CNS:You are fond of classical Chinese poetry, and you used to write poems. Once you said, Chinese classical literature deeply influences your temperament and self-cultivation in terms of engaging in scholarship. What nourishment and enlightment did Chinese traditional culture bring to you as for doing mathematics?
Shing-Tung Yau:It requires cultural foundation, when pursuing one's studies. Not only do we read classical Chinese poetry, but read Shakespeare, Goethe's Faust and listen to Beethoven's music. Poetry is an important part of Chinese culture. No matter poetry or mathematics, they both explore nature, but the ways of describing are different.
I like ancient style, The Book of Songs (Shijing, also translated as Classic of Poetry), The Songs of Chu (Chuci, also translated as Poetry of the South) and Poetry of Wei, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties, such as The Nineteen Ancient Poems. Overall, my favorite is Han-Fu (also translated as The Rythme Prose of Han Dynasty).
Thanks to reading Bold and Unconstrained School of
Ci lyrics, such as SuDongpo's works, my vision of doing mathematic research is different from other's. I usually encourage students to read more Bold and Unconstrained School of
Ci lyrics and the Historical Records by Sima Qian, which benefits them a lot in doing research, help them open minds and pay attention to more big issues. This is also where the main idea of Qiuzhen College of Tsinghua University – "Explore happiness of the Heaven and Human, open your mind eternally."
CNS:What function indeed does mathematics have? What problems can it help solve for human beings?
Shing-Tung Yau:From the past to the present, mathematics is the foundation of the whole science. To interpret the structure of nature, the only language is mathematics. The basic rules of nature can only be induced by mathematics.
When doing experiment during the early time, nothing can be presented without mathematics. To present the results of such experiments, it needs logical derivations through which it can be applied to mainframe computers or even the Two Bombs, One Satellite project . Actually, all of the scientific projects cannot be completed without mathematics. Especially the internet, which has been developing during the recent decades, is closely related to mathematics, such as finding how to research internet structure and how to send information in the fastest way. There is nearly nothing that can exist without mathematics.
Recently, a lot of mathematicians talked about the epidemic. The number of infected persons in the future can be predicted by mathematical modelling. AlphaGo that defeated human in Go games is closely related to mathematics, in terms of deep learning, AI, etc.
Continued in part 2 for space