Christmas Flowers…

Gift Baskets…

axis wheels…

surveillance equipment…

holiday gift basket…

Elliot

Thank you both. Unfortunately this is NOT my daytime job. But I’m working on it

Elliot

When’s the book of collected verse coming out!?

-cvj

I hope writing verse is your daytime job. With talent like this, you can become rich and famous.

Cheers,

Elliot

I do get the feeling that this unusual case has aspects that have not been made completely visible to most of us, and that obscurity has fueled the conflict.

Meanwhile, Perelman remains aloof in Russia, and the sound of one hand clapping continues …

-cvj

Others like me would have to rely on thirdhand account and for that we have to thank the emergence of the blogosphere, which has been described as a social leveller.

But with conflicting accounts presented by vested interests on opposing sides, one would have to sift through the myriad sources to inform of one’s interpretation of the events. Unless subsequent surfacing of “evidence” proves otherwise, I would like to believe that Dr. Yau’s is on a noble cause, and is being victimized for what he stands for.

I don’t know whether Yau’s fight on China’s academic corruption is noble. If Yau is as political as Phillip Griffiths, I bet he would never have tried to fight any form of corruption in China. China is ruled by one party, the communist party, that upholds absolute power. Absolute power, you guess it right, corrupts absolutely. To assume a mathematician, even a Fields medal winner, having some hope to win the fight on academic corruption in China is both naïve and foolish, although the NY Times article seems to indicate that Yau’s fight has born some fruits. I will not be surprised that Yau eventually loses the fight.

What amazed me is the stand that New Yorker took. It in effect stabbed Yau in the back, while he is trying hard fighting Beijing University’s academic corruption. It is no secret that New Yorker is a magazine with mostly liberal stances, and the biggest “vice” for the liberals is that they seem to have difficulties to keep their pants up. I could have never foreseen an alliance between an American liberal magazine and the crooks in Beijing University. It is hard to believe that the communist party chief of Beijing University had asked everyone in the university to study the New Yorker article. New Yorker has achieved something that no American magazine and newspaper has ever done before, to be considered as a communist party document, and Nasar has done Phillip Griffiths a gigantic favor.

Yau has much to learn about politics from Phillip Griffiths.

And where is Dr. Yau creating the so-called academc corruption elsewhere?

Thanks to the New Yorker, Yau’s lies, theft and dirty politics were exposed. Even the NY Times article, written by a journalist with whom Yau has a “special relationship” could not hide all his deeds.

It looks really “noble” to fight academic corruption in China, while creating it everywhere else.

Having no other ways to defend his dishonesty, some turn to conspiracy theories.

There is one point where I would agree with you: the New Yorker article gave Yau a lesson. I hope he will learn from it. But even if he does not, there are a lot of people around who now know the truth. In the future it will be more difficult for him to play his games

I think Yau’s intention to hit hard at Beijing U is a noble one and while naive it may seem, I hope his efforts would galvanize more people who matter into action.

“However, I think the title, Emperor of Math, is questionable as it evokes images of the feudal past of the Chinese history: dictatorial.”

The title is probably a sarcastic reflection of a quote in the New Yorker’s article where Yau was referred as the “king of geometry” or something of that capacity.

In terms of power of mathematical intelligence, it is perhaps true that Yau is an Emperor, or one of the Emperors, of mathematics. In terms of power of mathematical politics, however, the title of “Emperor of Math” belongs to Phillip Griffiths, the mathematician that was quoted a couple of times in the New Yorker article talking about power and control. Griffiths does not do the same level of math that Yau does, but his power and political influence in math has never been matched by anyone, certainly not by Yau.

As described in the NY Times article, Yau has been hitting really hard at Beijing University with academic corruption charges, especially at its math department. He has his reasons. But it was either naïve or arrogance on Yau’s part, he totally neglected the fact that Phillip Griffiths has an honorary degree from Beijing University and has been closely associated with its math department. When opportunity came, Griffiths, tapping into the special relationship he has had with Nasar, hit back. It was to ruin Yau and it almost did. It surely will be a lesson for Yau to remember for the rest of his life. I am sure that Yau now knows who is the real Emperor.

Cheers,

-cvj