Michael J. Barany

On the origin of numbers

The swashbuckling adventures of Francis Galton sparked a hunt for the roots of human mathematics that continues 100 years after his death, Historian of science Michael Barany explains why

Remunerative Combinatorics: Mathematicians and Their Sponsors in the Mid-Twentieth Century

Conventional wisdom notwithstanding, mathematics is not cheap. Particularly in the era of mathematics following World War 2 and accelerating after the Cold War, where mathematicians’ extensive regional and international travel for workshops, seminars, conferences, and residencies became the norm, the problem of funding mathematical research and publication has relied upon one of the most consequential areas of interaction between mathematicians and non-mathematicians—namely, relations between mathematicians and their financial sponsors. This chapter examines the work of the American organizers of the 1950 International Congress of Mathematicians to marshal a wide range of state, philanthropic, corporate, and intergovernmental interests in support of their discipline, with a focus to the lasting effects of World War 2 on their efforts. I argue that money-driven processes of elaboration and accommodation shaped both the framing and substance of mathematicians’ research, pedagogy, and professional organization at mid-century.