Kurt Werner Friedrich Reidemeister (13 October 1893 – 8 July 1971) was a
mathematician born in
Braunschweig
Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( , from Low German ''Brunswiek'' , Braunschweig dialect: ''Bronswiek'') is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the Nor ...
(Brunswick),
Germany.
Life
He was a brother of
Marie Neurath.
Beginning in 1912, he studied in
Freiburg,
Munich,
Marburg, and
Göttingen. In 1920, he got the
staatsexamen (master's degree) in mathematics, philosophy, physics, chemistry, and geology.
He received his doctorate in 1921 with a
thesis
A thesis ( : theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: ...
in
algebraic number theory
Algebraic number theory is a branch of number theory that uses the techniques of abstract algebra to study the integers, rational numbers, and their generalizations. Number-theoretic questions are expressed in terms of properties of algebraic ob ...
at the
University of Hamburg under the supervision of
Erich Hecke.
He became interested in
differential geometry; he edited
Wilhelm Blaschke's 2nd volume about that issue, and both made an acclaimed contribution to the Jena
DMV conference in Sep 1921.
In October 1922
(or 1923)
he was appointed assistant professor at the
University of Vienna. While there he became familiar with the work of
Wilhelm Wirtinger on
knot theory
In the mathematical field of topology, knot theory is the study of mathematical knots. While inspired by knots which appear in daily life, such as those in shoelaces and rope, a mathematical knot differs in that the ends are joined so it cannot ...
, and became closely connected to
Hans Hahn and the
Vienna Circle. Its manifesto (1929) lists one of Reidemeister's publications in a bibliography of closely related authors.
In 1925 he became full professor at
University of Königsberg; he stayed until 1933, when he was regarded politically unsound by the
Nazis
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Naz ...
, and dismissed from his chair. Whilst there he organised the
Second Conference on the Epistemology of the Exact Sciences in conjunction with journal ''
Erkenntnis''.
Blaschke managed to get a promise about Reidemeister's reappointment, and in autumn 1934 he got the chair of
Kurt Hensel at the
University of Marburg. He stayed there, except for a visit to the Princeton
Institute for Advanced Study in 1948–1950, until he got appointed to Göttingen University in 1955, where he stayed until his
emeritation.
Works
Reidemeister's interests were mainly in
combinatorial group theory In mathematics, combinatorial group theory is the theory of free groups, and the concept of a presentation of a group by generators and relations. It is much used in geometric topology, the fundamental group of a simplicial complex having in a na ...
,
combinatorial topology In mathematics, combinatorial topology was an older name for algebraic topology, dating from the time when topological invariants of spaces (for example the Betti numbers) were regarded as derived from combinatorial decompositions of spaces, such ...
,
geometric group theory, and the foundations of
geometry. His works include ''Knoten und Gruppen'' (1926), ''Einführung in die kombinatorische Topologie'' (1932), and ''Knotentheorie'' (1932). He co-edited the journal ''
Mathematische Annalen'' from 1947 until 1963.
Title page
of vol.274 (1986)
He was also a philosopher. His book "Das exakte Denken der Griechen" (1949) is not so well known as his mathematical work. In it he remarks that mathematical thought is "just the beginning of thought."
See also
* Reidemeister moves
* Reidemeister–Singer theorem
* Reidemeister torsion
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Reidemeister, Kurt
1893 births
1971 deaths
20th-century German mathematicians
Scientists from Braunschweig
Topologists
University of Hamburg alumni
Academics of the University of Vienna
University of Königsberg faculty
Vienna Circle