Chapter 1040 Is It Possible to Win Three Awards at Once?

This result almost exceeded everyone's expectations, including Chang Haonan.

According to the statement in 1998, the Gauss Prize will be awarded to scholars who have made great contributions in the field of applied mathematics.

Although Chang Haonan has made many achievements in the field of applied mathematics, he has hardly published any results in this field in the form of papers, and the Poincare conjecture does not seem to be easily related to applied mathematics.

However, Paris did not seem to have the idea of ​​further explanation. He just put down the envelope and card in his hand and motioned the winner to go on stage to receive the award.

This is not abnormal.

The difference between mathematics and applied mathematics is not so clear.

Especially since technology has developed to this day, it is not easy to find the so-called pure mathematics that is completely "pure and useless".

Including those unpopular number theory directions that were considered to have only interest value a century ago, after the advent of the information age, they have also found their own fields of application.

So, if we have to say that Chang Haonan and Perelman have contributed to the application field...

No one can refute it.

Of course, there will definitely be some scholars in the field of applied mathematics who have some opinions about this, but at most they will just complain in their hearts.

Even if they want to question it, they can only wait until the next session to see the situation -

If it is still awarded to a scholar who is more theoretical, and the other party does not have hard-core results such as the Poincare theorem, it is not too late to settle accounts together.

And in fact, after hearing that Chang Haonan and Perelman won the Gauss Prize, there are still a group of people who are very happy.

That is, several other scholars who are also candidates for the Fields Prize.

This is easy to understand.

A total of four awards were awarded today.

Among them, the Nevanlinna Prize is completely irrelevant to the research direction of most people.

There are still three.

You two have already received two of them together.

Then it is reasonable that the last one should be the turn of others, right?

The competition range of the Fields Prize is originally very narrow, and the number of possible winners in each session does not exceed two hands at most.

The denominator has two less at once, which is naturally great news for others.

After all, everyone is a competitor, and it is very decent not to pull each other down and stab each other.

It is human nature to gloat over the misfortune of two people who are likely to be eliminated. There is nothing to blame.

In short, amid the thunderous applause and the attention of the audience, Chang Haonan and Perelman, who were still a little confused, had to leave their seats, greet the people around them, and walk to the stage.

The Gauss Prize is also a round golden medal, but the shape is much simpler, with only Gauss's head, full name, awarding organization, and three lines of letters "For applied mathematics" printed on it.

Not to mention Perelman, a strange man who refused to accept the Fields Prize in another timeline, even Chang Haonan did not have any psychological fluctuations about this.

In fact, even he began to feel that he might not be eligible for this Fields Medal.

Therefore, when he was accepting the award, he just slightly modified the content he prepared for the Fields Prize and said it out loud:

"I am very grateful to the International Mathematical Union and the German Mathematical Association for their recognition of my research results. The Poincaré conjecture, that is, "a simply connected closed three-dimensional manifold is a three-dimensional sphere", is a pure and abstract concept that does not seem to have any practical value. In fact, because its description is too simple and intuitive, it often gives non-mathematicians the illusion of moaning without illness."

When he said this, everyone in the audience, including Paris and Perelman who had already spoken next to him, smiled knowingly-

The abstract nature of the Poincaré conjecture and the simplicity of its description formed an extreme contrast.

So much so that without sufficient professional training, the conjecture itself cannot be understood by the textual meaning of the conjecture alone.

It also makes it difficult for amateur scientists to touch on this research direction.

It is in sharp contrast to the field of number theory, which receives 10,000 junk submissions every day.

After a brief pause, Chang Haonan continued:

"However, Thurston's geometrization program presented the landscape of three-dimensional manifolds to the world, and Hamilton's Ricci flow provided a powerful tool for curvature construction of Riemann metric. In the process of proving the Poincare conjecture, with the development of computer technology, the development cycle from pure theory to application algorithm has become shorter and shorter. Also thanks to the development of computer technology, the boundary between pure mathematics and applied mathematics has gradually begun to be broken..."

"..."

"In practice, the application of Ricci flow on two-dimensional surfaces has been gradually launched, and our research has proved that the application of Ricci flow on three-dimensional manifolds is more profound, mysterious, and powerful. Although the topological and geometric knowledge of three-dimensional manifolds is far from popular, as a faithful portrayal of natural truth, we believe that this mathematical tool will become a powerful weapon to rewrite the course of history in the future..."

"..."

Although he looked calm on the surface, Chang Haonan found that his shirt was almost soaked with sweat after he returned to his seat with the medal.

Obviously, in this situation, it would be a lie to say that I was not nervous at all.

At this time, Charles Fefferman, who had just wanted to play a prank, came over again.

"Chang, don't worry, you are too young, I believe you will win the award in 4 years..."

Chang Haonan lowered his head and looked at the Gauss medal in his hand for a while, then closed the box and looked up at Fefferman's eyes.

After looking for a long time, he was sure that the other party was indeed here to comfort him.

It's just that the way of comforting him was a little inappropriate...

"Well, thank you for your... blessing."

Chang Haonan sighed.

Deleigne also interrupted at this time:

"In fact, Fefferman is still very optimistic about you, he just... is not very good at organizing words."

He is too familiar with Fefferman's mouth.

If he didn't explain it later, it might cause some misunderstanding.

It has happened in the past.

"Yes, I also bet $1,000 on you to win the prize... Now I'm afraid it's going to go down the drain..."

Fefferman continued, but because of his half-joking tone, Chang Haonan couldn't guess whether it was true or false.

But the other party had no ill intentions, that was certain.

Just as the three of them were chatting back and forth, Paris once again took the same envelope to the stage.

This time, it must be the Fields Medal.

However, perhaps it is because he has just experienced a round of wolf coming.

Or perhaps it is because after removing two competitors, there are only four candidates with clear hope.

Although the venue has returned to silence, the atmosphere is no longer as depressing and anxious as last time.

Everyone is waiting for the final announcement of the results with a more relaxed attitude.

"Ahem--"

Paris deliberately coughed twice to keep the suspense.

But he also knew that the participants today had been dragged for too long.

So he quickly changed back to his original solemn and steady voice:

"From his sudden appearance to his earth-shattering achievements, what he pursued was to realize the magnificence of geometric structures and the depth of natural truths..."

"In his research on differential geometry and topology, he provided people with new tools to understand the shape of the world and the universe..."

"..."

At the beginning, people were still very interested.

But the more they listened, the more they felt something was wrong.

Just this description... Why does it feel a little familiar?

I don't know when, the first sight turned to the direction of Chang Haonan and Perelman again.

Then, everyone realized one thing.

"Why do I feel like it's still the two of them?"

Until Paris pointed out the Poincare conjecture at the end, the answer was very clear.

Not to mention others, even Chang Haonan himself was confused -

No, buddy?

I just said all the acceptance speeches I prepared?

Are you asking me to rewrite one?