Jacques Hadamard

Fifty years ago when Jacques Hadamard set out to explore how mathematicians invent new ideas, he considered the creative experiences of some of the greatest thinkers of his generation, such as George Polya, Claude Lévi-Strauss, and Albert Einstein. It appeared that inspiration could strike anytime, particularly after an individual had worked hard on a problem for days and then turned attention to another activity. In exploring this phenomenon, Hadamard produced one of the most famous and cogent cases for the existence of unconscious mental processes in mathematical invention and other forms of creativity. Written before the explosion of research in computers and cognitive science, his book, originally titled The Psychology of Invention in the Mathematical Field, remains an important tool for exploring the increasingly complex problem of mental life. The roots of creativity for Hadamard lie not in consciousness, but in the long unconscious work of incubation, and in the unconscious aesthetic selection of ideas that thereby pass into consciousness. His discussion of this process comprises a wide range of topics, including the use of mental images or symbols, visualized or auditory words, "meaningless" words, logic, and intuition. Among the important documents collected is a letter from Albert Einstein analyzing his own mechanism of thought.

This book presents a fascinating story of the long life and great accomplishments of Jacques Hadamard (1865-1963), who was once called 'the living legend of mathematics'. As one of the last universal mathematicians, Hadamard's contributions to mathematics are landmarks in various fields. His life is linked with world history of the 20th century in a dramatic way. This work provides an inspiring view of the development of various branches of mathematics during the 19th and 20th centuries.Part I of the book portrays Hadamard's family, childhood and student years, scientific triumphs, and his personal life and trials during the first two world wars. The story is told of his involvement in the Dreyfus affair and his subsequent fight for justice and human rights. Also recounted are Hadamard's worldwide travels, his famous seminar, his passion for botany, his home orchestra, where he played the violin with Einstein, and his interest in the psychology of mathematical creativity. Hadamard's life is described in a readable and inviting way.The authors humorously weave throughout the text his jokes and the myths about him. They also movingly recount the tragic side of his life. Stories about his relatives and friends, and old letters and documents create an authentic and colorful picture. The book contains over 300 photographs and illustrations. Part II of the book includes a lucid overview of Hadamard's enormous work, spanning over six decades. The authors do an excellent job of connecting his results to current concerns.While the book is accessible to beginners, it also provides rich information of interest to experts. Vladimir Mazya and Tatyana Shaposhnikova were the 2003 laureates of the Insitut de France's Prix Alfred Verdaguer. One or more prizes are awarded each year, based on suggestions from the Academie francaise, the Academie de sciences, and the Academie de beaux-arts, for the most remarkable work in the arts, literature, and the sciences. In 2003, the award for excellence was granted in recognition of Mazya and Shaposhnikova's book, ""Jacques Hadamard, A Universal Mathematician"", which is both an historical book about a great citizen and a scientific book about a great mathematician.

Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

We are just fortunate that one of the greatest mathematical minds of recent times has made this effort to show to readers some of the opportunities that the intellectual tradition of Euclidean geometry has to offer."--BOOK JACKET.

This is the English translation of a volume originally published only in Russian and now out of print. The book was written by Jacques Hadamard on the work of Poincare. Poincare's creation of a theory of automorphic functions in the early 1880s was one of the most significant mathematical achievements of the nineteenth century. It directly inspired the uniformization theorem, led to a class of functions adequate to solve all linear ordinary differential equations, and focused attention on a large new class of discrete groups. It was the first significant application of non-Euclidean geometry. This unique exposition by Hadamard offers a fascinating and intuitive introduction to the subject of automorphic functions and illuminates its connection to differential equations, a connection not often found in other texts.

Would well repay study by most theoretical physicists." — Physics Today "An overwhelming influence on subsequent work on the wave equation." — Science Progress "One of the classical treatises on hyperbolic equations." — Royal Naval Scientific Service Delivered at Columbia University and the Universities of Rome and Zürich, these lectures represent a pioneering investigation. Jacques Hadamard based his research on prior studies by Riemann, Kirchhoff, and Volterra. He extended and improved Volterra's work, applying its theories relating to spherical and cylindrical waves to all normal hyperbolic equations instead of only to one. Topics include the general properties of Cauchy's problem, the fundamental formula and the elementary solution, equations with an odd number of independent variables, and equations with an even number of independent variables and the method of descent.

Jacques Hadamard, among the greatest mathematicians of the twentieth century, made signal contributions to a number of fields. But his mind could not be confined to the upper reaches of mathematical thought. He also produced a massive two-volume work, on plane and solid geometry, for pre-college teachers in the French school system. In those books, Hadamard's style invites participation. His exposition is minimal, providing only the results necessary to support the solution of the many elegant problems he poses afterwards. That is, the problems interpret the text in the way that harmony interprets melody in a well-composed piece of music. The present volume offers solutions to the problems in the first part of Hadamard's work (Lessons in Geometry. I. Plane Geometry, Jacques Hadamard, Amer. Math. Soc. (2008)), and can be viewed as a reader's companion to that book. It requires of the reader only the background of high school plane geometry, which Lessons in Geometry provides. The solutions strive to connect the general methods given in the text with intuitions that are natural to the subject, giving as much motivation as possible as well as rigorous and formal solutions. Ideas for further exploration are often suggested, as well as hints for classroom use. This book will be of interest to high school teachers, gifted high school students, college students, and those mathematics majors interested in geometry.