We must confess that we have learned more about mathematics over the course of observing this patient’s behavior than we did at school.
We should add that G.’s skill as a mathematician is recognized among the experts in the field. He summarizes the results of his research in articles that he then sends to specialized journals, which publish them. His articles appear to be read and used, because they are cited by several mathematicians in other articles that G. has showed us. In one of these articles, his name is associated with a theorem, “G.’s theorem”; another uses “G.’s constant.” Students have even defended dissertations in which they have answered questions raised by G. in his work. He keeps us informed on the day-to-day progress of his research and mathematics in general.
We asked him if he would like to meet his mathematician correspondents — which we would have considered beneficial for this patient who has no real contact with the world — but he calmly refused, asserting his desire for peace and quiet.
THE PROBLEM OF THE TWO RACES
BY R. VON MISES, ISTANBUL
(Matematicheskii Sbornik, Moscow, 1934)
The example that follows is, by its very subject, of particular interest.
In a country in Europe whose inhabitants number around 65 million, the population is composed of two races A and B, with respective figures of 0.9 % and 99.1 %. A very small number of these inhabitants perform scientific research in physics or chemistry. No absolute scale to measure scientific capacity exists. It is generally accepted that the winners of the Nobel Prize form a set of the highest values with this capacity. The list of winners from the years 1901 to 1933 includes 27 names from said county, of which 5 belong to race A.
We will now address these figures with established formulas.
[…]
From these calculations, we can conclude that there is a probability of about 85 % that, among the individuals of race A, the probability of there being an eminent talent in physics or chemistry is at least 20 times and at most 42 times greater than in race B.
EXERCISES IN MULTIPLICATION AND DIVISION
(Matematisches Arbeits- und Lehrbuch, Neuenheim-Verlag, 1937)
- The construction of an insane asylum costs 6 million Reichsmarks. How many detached houses at 15,000 Reichsmarks each could have been built for that sum?
- The care of a mentally ill patient costs 8 Reichsmarks a day. How many Reichsmarks will this mentally ill patient cost after 40 years?
PIERRE MEYER (interview, December 18, 2006, cont.). I’m the one who saved these two articles. But like me, Mortaufs was interested in what was happening in Germany. Bernadette told me about the little German girls with blond braids whom the family hosted during the International Exposition in 1937. There were also grand receptions in Chatou, with members of the French Academy, friends from the France-Germany Committee, sometimes foreign guests as well. Marguerite had a notebook in which she wrote down the menus for the dinners she gave. As for Mortaufs, he had been going to Germany since the early ’30s — he had some scientific contacts and many friends there. He traveled a lot, I think. Marguerite didn’t go with him, but with that whole household, what would you expect?
CARMO’S CONJECTURE IN THE FINITE CASE
NOTE BY A. SILBERBERG, PRESENTED BY C. MORTAUFS
(Reports from the Academy of Sciences, Meeting of March 27, 1939)
We prove, for Galois fields, a conjecture similar to the one proposed by Carmo in the complex field. From this we deduce a few corollaries and a few questions to which we hope to return in a future paper.
PIERRE MEYER (interview, December 18, 2006, cont.). This is André Silberberg’s very first article. It may well also be the very first note Mortaufs presented at the Academy of Sciences. He was elected at the beginning of 1939. This article was found among Mireille Duvivier’s papers. The ones on Gorenstein, too. She must have gotten them from her mother.
ASSESSMENT OF THE G. CASE
BY J. MEYERBEER, PSYCHIATRIC DOCTOR, SAINT-MAURICE HOSPITAL
(Gazette of the Association of Psychiatric Doctors of France, Vol. 47, 1939)
In our previous articles (Gaz. Assoc. Psy. Doc. Fr. 28, 1920, Fr. Rev. Psy. Med. 11, 1930), we mentioned G.’s interest in current events. Here we will be content to make a list of the subjects on which he has commented for us over the years.
TOPICS FROM CURRENT EVENTS ADDRESSED BY THE PATIENT
Among these, the Paris Colonial Exposition of 1931, the choice of Hitler as German chancellor, the death of Paul Painlevé (a mathematician who didn’t retreat from our times, he commented), the riots of February 1934, the victory of the Popular Front, the start of the war in Spain, and the Olympic Games in Berlin.
He was particularly taken aback by the interviews with Hitler published by certain newspapers. “Look, Doctor Meyerbeer, the journalist even had that fraud autograph a photo for him,” he showed us one day.
In mathematics, the important step taken by a Russian mathematician towards demonstrating Goldbach’s conjecture was worth several explanations. “Doctor Meyerbeer, you know what a prime number is, right?” he asked us. Of course, and the patient knows that his therapist knows what a prime number is.
MANICO-MELANCHOLICUS
The patient shifts easily, unexpectedly, and rapidly from a dejected mood to one of happy restlessness, often while speaking on the same topic. This disorder, which is rather mild, seems to particularly manifest during our conversations. The racist politics of the ruling Nazi Party in Germany seem to depress him profoundly.
“They’re going to exterminate us, Doctor Meyerbeer, you and me both. You won’t be able to escape,” he tells us regularly in a bleak voice. And sometimes, almost without taking another breath, he bursts into laughter while showing us a mathematics article in which a Jewish German scholar calculates the probability (which is very high) of a Jewish German being better in physics than an “Aryan” German.
“But can’t you see it’s a joke, Doctor Meyerbeer? Don’t you know I can prove the same thing about psychiatrists for you?”
We must admit that we do not always understand what makes him laugh (especially in mathematics). We considered giving him a lithium treatment, but the mildness of his disorder does not seem to hinder him, especially as we are certain that mathematics, and the fact that he can either find the subject funny or work on it seriously, is enough to bring him back to the side of euphoria.
SAID AND UNSAID
As the list above shows, for twenty years already, the patient has addressed a wide variety of subjects with us. However, it must be noted that G. has never spoken about the triple murder or his time in the war, either spontaneously or at our request. Every question concerning one of these subjects causes a brilliant and slightly exalted discourse to emerge on quite unrelated subjects.
Apart from prime numbers, sardine fishing, the scientific dispositions of Jewish Germans, current politics, and, as always, succubi and other demons with blue eyes, here are a few examples of his assertions collected over the course of the years: