Anatole Beck
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Anatole Beck (19 March 1930 – 21 December 2014) was an American mathematician.


Education and academic career

Beck graduated from
Stuyvesant High School Stuyvesant High School ( ) is a co-ed, State school, public, college-preparatory, Specialized high schools in New York City, specialized high school in Manhattan, New York City. The school, commonly called "Stuy" ( ) by its students, faculty, a ...
in 1947, studied at
Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn in New York City, United States. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls nearly 14,000 students on a campus in the Midwood and Flatbush sections of Brooklyn as of fall ...
(Bachelor's degree 1951) and in 1956 received his PhD from
Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
under
Shizuo Kakutani was a Japanese and American mathematician, best known for his eponymous fixed-point theorem. Biography Kakutani attended Tohoku University in Sendai, where his advisor was Tatsujirō Shimizu. At one point he spent two years at the Institu ...
. In 1958 he became Assistant Professor and in 1966 Professor in th
Department of Mathematics
at the
University of Wisconsin–Madison The University of Wisconsin–Madison (University of Wisconsin, Wisconsin, UW, UW–Madison, or simply Madison) is a public land-grant research university in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. It was founded in 1848 when Wisconsin achieved st ...
. He married Jewish feminist writer Evelyn Torton Beck in 1954; they had two children before divorcing in 1974. He met his second wife Eve-Lynn Siegel Beck in 1998, she was cousins with Michael Bleicher, one of Anatole’s longtime friends. He was a visiting professor at the
Technical University of Munich The Technical University of Munich (TUM or TU Munich; ) is a public research university in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. It specializes in engineering, technology, medicine, and applied and natural sciences. Established in 1868 by King Ludwig II ...
, the
London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...
and a visiting scholar at the
University of Göttingen The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen (, commonly referred to as Georgia Augusta), is a Public university, public research university in the city of Göttingen, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1734 ...
,
University of Warwick The University of Warwick ( ; abbreviated as ''Warw.'' in post-nominal letters) is a public research university on the outskirts of Coventry between the West Midlands and Warwickshire, England. The university was founded in 1965 as part of ...
,
University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a collegiate university, federal Public university, public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The ...
, and the
Hebrew University The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. It is the second-ol ...
. Beck's work dealt with
ergodic theory Ergodic theory is a branch of mathematics that studies statistical properties of deterministic dynamical systems; it is the study of ergodicity. In this context, "statistical properties" refers to properties which are expressed through the behav ...
,
topological dynamics In mathematics, topological dynamics is a branch of the theory of dynamical systems in which qualitative, asymptotic properties of dynamical systems are studied from the viewpoint of general topology. Scope The central object of study in topolog ...
,
Probability Probability is a branch of mathematics and statistics concerning events and numerical descriptions of how likely they are to occur. The probability of an event is a number between 0 and 1; the larger the probability, the more likely an e ...
in
Banach spaces In mathematics, more specifically in functional analysis, a Banach space (, ) is a complete normed vector space. Thus, a Banach space is a vector space with a metric that allows the computation of vector length and distance between vectors and ...
,
measure theory In mathematics, the concept of a measure is a generalization and formalization of geometrical measures (length, area, volume) and other common notions, such as magnitude (mathematics), magnitude, mass, and probability of events. These seemingl ...
,
search theory In microeconomics, search theory studies buyers or sellers who cannot instantly find a trading partner, and must therefore search for a partner prior to transacting. It involves determining the best approach to use when looking for a specific ite ...
,
linear search problem In computational complexity theory, the linear search problem is an optimal search problem introduced by Richard E. Bellman and independently considered by Anatole Beck. The problem "An immobile hider is located on the real line according to ...
, and mathematics in the social sciences.


Union leadership, political activism, and social commentator

Beck was an ardent supporter of unionism and
cooperative economics Cooperative (or co-operative) economics is a field of economics that incorporates cooperative studies and political economy toward the study and management of cooperatives. History Cooperative economics developed as both a theory and a concret ...
, helping to found the faculty union chapter at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and serving as the Vice President of the Wisconsin Federation of Teachers. He spoke out strongly in favor of academic freedom on campus, and was an early supporter of the free speech rights of the movement against the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...
in the 1960s. He witnessed the “ Dow Riots” of October 18, 1967 in the Commerce Building (now Ingraham Hall), condemning the police violence against students at a faculty meeting. Beck made headlines in 1977 when he offered a $100 grant to a "white Quaker female student with financial need" to highlight the University of Wisconsin's policy of accepting gifts with discriminatory conditions attached. Around 1980 he and Jim Donnelly founde
Wisconsin University Union
(WUU) which focused on promoting shared governance and academic freedom. Beck was interested in solving social problems. In 1996 he wrote

advocating for investment in education, universal public preschools with adequate stimulation and nutrition. Ahead of his time, he argued for free public transportation, advocated for greater leisure, and a universal basic income from what he called the “knowledge dividend” from all past knowledge and innovation. Arguing against overtime for some and unemployment for other, he predicted that, unchecked, companies would offer little stability, longer hours and create a global economy of “exoslavery,” where the conditions of slavery could be moved to other countries. He condemned economists for calling this rational and free trade, predicting increases in underemployment, homelessness, a rise in TB, and disinvestment in basic research, among other things. He also called for a tax on security transactions, now called a Tobin tax. Beginning in 2008 he was a commentator on the Insurgent Radio Kiosk on Madison's community radio station WORT. In 2009 Beck was interviewed extensively by Robert Lange for the UW-Madison Oral History Program.


Headlines

* Michael N. Bleicher, Donald W. Crowe: Excursions into Mathematics, AK Peters, 2000 (first 1967) * Continuous flow in the plane, Grundlehren der mathematischen Wissenschaften, Springer Verlag, 1974 (participation Mirit and Jonathan Lewin) * with M. Bleicher: Packing convex sets into a similar set in Konrad Jacobs: Selecta Mathematica, Volume 3, Springer Verlag 1971 * A paradox. The Tortoise and the Hare, in Konrad Jacobs: Selecta Mathematica, Volume 5, Springer Verlag 1979


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Beck, Anatole 1930 births 2014 deaths 20th-century American mathematicians Brooklyn College alumni Scientists from New York City University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni Stuyvesant High School alumni Scientists from Madison, Wisconsin Mathematicians from New York (state) 21st-century American mathematicians