Fritz Joachim Weyl
Encyclopedia
Fritz Joachim Weyl was born in Zurich, Switzerland. Today Weyl is regarded as a renowned mathematician. During his lifetime he taught at many universities, significantly contributed to research in mathematics and came to be very well respected. One of the universities he taught at was the George Washington University
(GW), in Washington DC.
. Fritz received his Bachelor of Arts
degree from Swarthmore College
, which is located in Pennsylvania
, in 1935. Weyl then went on to obtain a Master's degree
in 1937 from Princeton University
, in New Jersey
. Finally Weyl was awarded a PhD
, also by Princeton University
in 1939 for his work in the field of mathematics. His PhD dissertation at Princeton was entitled “Analytic Curves” and is twenty-five pages in length.. Salomon Bochner served as his dissertation
advisor and oversaw his research in the area while Weyl was studying at Princeton. Bochner too is well known in the math world. He is a native of Germany
and received his PhD in 1921 from the University of Berlin. His dissertation advisor was Erhard Schmidt. While at Princeton, Bochner advised many students who went on to achieve much academic success in their own right.
, Indiana University
, and the George Washington University
. In addition to teaching, Weyl was employed as a research analyst by the U.S. government for a period of time. After his stay there he went on to serve as the Dean of Science and Mathematics at Hunter College
in New York City
.
at the time. Many American (and global) universities were affected by the war. GW was no exception but given GW’s strategic location in metropolitan D.C., it would be appropriate to conclude that more emphasis was paid to developing programs here than in less vital locations in other parts of the country. An estimated 7,000 GW graduates served in the armed forces.
The math department at GW has a long history and tradition. In 1935 the department of statistics
was the first of its kind in a college of arts and sciences in the U.S. In 1946, during Professor Weyl’s time here, a theoretical physics
conference was held at GW. It was put on in a joint effort by the university and the Carnegie Institution of Washington. At the conference theoretical physicists
met with biologists
to conduct a study of living processes, Dr. Weyl was in attendance. The conference held in 1946 served as the postwar resumption of a conference series held annually which began in 1934. Sources state that these meetings were not standard academic gatherings, in the sense that a small number of active researchers gathered for a discussion of problems, and to pose questions to spark continued work and activity in the immediate years to come. Conversely standard conferences, the bulletin reported, would merely recycle results previously obtained.
James Henry Taylor
was a mathematics professor at GW from 1929 to 1958 and then professor emeritus until his death in 1972. During Dr. Weyl’s time here, he and Dr. Taylor worked together in the GW math department. During 1946 the department is noted as having taught advanced analytics
, geometry
, and tensor
analysis. Some time shortly after 1946 however the department developed thirty-four additional courses in everything from collegiate algebra
to analytic geometry
and plane trigonometry
. Today the university awards a "grand math prize
" in Taylor’s honor. Another famous professor in the GW math department with Weyl in 1946 was Florence Marie Mears
, who taught at GW from 1929 to 1955. The year of 1946 was particularly renowned in the GW mathematics department for having so many famous mathematicians there at once.
When Dr. Fritz Weyl died on July 20, 1977 the mathematics community considered the loss to be devastating. Shortly thereafter on October 8, 1977 the Board of Trustees for the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
(SIAM) issued a memoriam. In part it read: “…in warm recognition of his enduring vision for both the beauties and the practicalities of applied mathematics…the members and officers of SIAM and SIMS offer their heartfelt tribute”.
George Washington University
The George Washington University is a private, coeducational comprehensive university located in Washington, D.C. in the United States...
(GW), in Washington DC.
Early life
Fritz was the son of another famous mathematician named Hermann WeylHermann Weyl
Hermann Klaus Hugo Weyl was a German mathematician and theoretical physicist. Although much of his working life was spent in Zürich, Switzerland and then Princeton, he is associated with the University of Göttingen tradition of mathematics, represented by David Hilbert and Hermann Minkowski.His...
. Fritz received his Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
degree from Swarthmore College
Swarthmore College
Swarthmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college in the United States with an enrollment of about 1,500 students. The college is located in the borough of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, 11 miles southwest of Philadelphia....
, which is located in Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
, in 1935. Weyl then went on to obtain a Master's degree
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
in 1937 from Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, in New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
. Finally Weyl was awarded a PhD
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...
, also by Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
in 1939 for his work in the field of mathematics. His PhD dissertation at Princeton was entitled “Analytic Curves” and is twenty-five pages in length.. Salomon Bochner served as his dissertation
Thesis
A dissertation or thesis is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings...
advisor and oversaw his research in the area while Weyl was studying at Princeton. Bochner too is well known in the math world. He is a native of Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
and received his PhD in 1921 from the University of Berlin. His dissertation advisor was Erhard Schmidt. While at Princeton, Bochner advised many students who went on to achieve much academic success in their own right.
Career
Professor Weyl taught at a number of different universities during his life. These include a stay at the University of Illinois, the University of Maryland, College ParkUniversity of Maryland, College Park
The University of Maryland, College Park is a top-ranked public research university located in the city of College Park in Prince George's County, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C...
, Indiana University
Indiana University
Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...
, and the George Washington University
George Washington University
The George Washington University is a private, coeducational comprehensive university located in Washington, D.C. in the United States...
. In addition to teaching, Weyl was employed as a research analyst by the U.S. government for a period of time. After his stay there he went on to serve as the Dean of Science and Mathematics at Hunter College
Hunter College
Hunter College, established in 1870, is a public university and one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York, located on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Hunter grants undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate degrees in more than one hundred fields of study, and is recognized...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
Time at George Washington University
Weyl joined the department of mathematics at GW around 1946. The President of the University at the time was Cloyd Heck Marvin. During this time period, GW is described as having been particularly vibrant in student life. As of 1945, the university offered 387 courses to almost 13,000 wartime students. These programs were primarily conducted under a contract between GW and the U.S Office of Education for Engineering, Science and Management War Training. The establishment of this program was seen as necessary and was inherently due to the U.S.’s heavy involvement in World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
at the time. Many American (and global) universities were affected by the war. GW was no exception but given GW’s strategic location in metropolitan D.C., it would be appropriate to conclude that more emphasis was paid to developing programs here than in less vital locations in other parts of the country. An estimated 7,000 GW graduates served in the armed forces.
The math department at GW has a long history and tradition. In 1935 the department of statistics
Statistics
Statistics is the study of the collection, organization, analysis, and interpretation of data. It deals with all aspects of this, including the planning of data collection in terms of the design of surveys and experiments....
was the first of its kind in a college of arts and sciences in the U.S. In 1946, during Professor Weyl’s time here, a theoretical physics
Theoretical physics
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics which employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena...
conference was held at GW. It was put on in a joint effort by the university and the Carnegie Institution of Washington. At the conference theoretical physicists
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
met with biologists
Biology
Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...
to conduct a study of living processes, Dr. Weyl was in attendance. The conference held in 1946 served as the postwar resumption of a conference series held annually which began in 1934. Sources state that these meetings were not standard academic gatherings, in the sense that a small number of active researchers gathered for a discussion of problems, and to pose questions to spark continued work and activity in the immediate years to come. Conversely standard conferences, the bulletin reported, would merely recycle results previously obtained.
James Henry Taylor
James Henry Taylor
James Henry Taylor was a professor of mathematics at George Washington University from 1929–1958, and professor emeritus from 1959 until his death.- Early life :...
was a mathematics professor at GW from 1929 to 1958 and then professor emeritus until his death in 1972. During Dr. Weyl’s time here, he and Dr. Taylor worked together in the GW math department. During 1946 the department is noted as having taught advanced analytics
Analytics
Analytics is the application of computer technology, operational research, and statistics to solve problems in business and industry. Analytics is carried out within an information system: while, in the past, statistics and mathematics could be studied without computers and software, analytics has...
, geometry
Geometry
Geometry arose as the field of knowledge dealing with spatial relationships. Geometry was one of the two fields of pre-modern mathematics, the other being the study of numbers ....
, and tensor
Tensor
Tensors are geometric objects that describe linear relations between vectors, scalars, and other tensors. Elementary examples include the dot product, the cross product, and linear maps. Vectors and scalars themselves are also tensors. A tensor can be represented as a multi-dimensional array of...
analysis. Some time shortly after 1946 however the department developed thirty-four additional courses in everything from collegiate algebra
Algebra
Algebra is the branch of mathematics concerning the study of the rules of operations and relations, and the constructions and concepts arising from them, including terms, polynomials, equations and algebraic structures...
to analytic geometry
Analytic geometry
Analytic geometry, or analytical geometry has two different meanings in mathematics. The modern and advanced meaning refers to the geometry of analytic varieties...
and plane trigonometry
Trigonometry
Trigonometry is a branch of mathematics that studies triangles and the relationships between their sides and the angles between these sides. Trigonometry defines the trigonometric functions, which describe those relationships and have applicability to cyclical phenomena, such as waves...
. Today the university awards a "grand math prize
The Taylor Prize in Mathematics
The Taylor Prize in Mathematics is a cash prize awarded annually to a graduate student of mathematics at The George Washington University in Washington, DC. The prize is named after Dr...
" in Taylor’s honor. Another famous professor in the GW math department with Weyl in 1946 was Florence Marie Mears
Florence Marie Mears
Florence Marie Mears was a professor of Mathematics at The George Washington University.-Background and education:...
, who taught at GW from 1929 to 1955. The year of 1946 was particularly renowned in the GW mathematics department for having so many famous mathematicians there at once.
Other work
Both Fritz and his father Hermann published much work on mathematical research. Most of Hermann’s published work is not in English however. In 1970, Constance Reid wrote a book about Hermann and his work in mathematics. In 1949, Hermann published a book entitled Philosophy of Mathematics and Natural Science. This work was originally published by Princeton University Press. Fritz and Hermann published a book together called Meromorphic Functions and Analytic Curves. This work is believed to be based on notes from a course given in the Institute for advanced study during the first term of 1942–1943. While Fritz was working for the U.S. government he complied what is known as Research in the service of national purpose; proceedings of the Office of Naval Research Vicennial Convocation, in 1966. This work is available at the National Museum of American History located at the Smithsonian. Also many researchers have cited Weyl’s work when conducting their own. For example his work is cited as a reference in the publication The Philosophical Review.When Dr. Fritz Weyl died on July 20, 1977 the mathematics community considered the loss to be devastating. Shortly thereafter on October 8, 1977 the Board of Trustees for the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
The Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics was founded by a small group of mathematicians from academia and industry who met in Philadelphia in 1951 to start an organization whose members would meet periodically to exchange ideas about the uses of mathematics in industry. This meeting led...
(SIAM) issued a memoriam. In part it read: “…in warm recognition of his enduring vision for both the beauties and the practicalities of applied mathematics…the members and officers of SIAM and SIMS offer their heartfelt tribute”.