Gregory Perelman spotted in St. Petersburg subway | Hacker News Reader

Gregory Perelman spotted in St. Petersburg subway

englishrussia.com

16 pointsold-gregg10 comments

First, it's Grigori (Григорий) or "Grisha" for short. Secondly, there's quite a few mathematicians that have that look. I remember a funny story one of my professors told me about Campus Security not allowing him into a building because they thought he was a homeless person trying to get some food, before another professor called out his name and explained that he was, in fact, an eminent professor in the Math department.

That said, I sometime feel this way when I run into a professor on the BART or something. "Doesn't anybody realize they're in the presence of a genius?"

Wow, that reminds me of a lesson in humility I got once. I was doing math undergrad. The professors used to let a few of us smart-ass types hang out in their math department lounge where the order of the day was playing chess and Go, exchanging attempts at witticism, and avoiding work. One day I noticed a stranger, a shabbily-dressed little old man, hobbling around the room. I distinctly remember thinking: "What is that old guy doing in here? He obviously doesn't belong here. He looks like a bum!"

It was Erdös.

Does this mean that we all now have Erdös numbers of 2?

Only if gruseom published a paper with him, and we have all published papers with gruseom.

I think a little respect for a private man is needed here.

Some background: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5274040.stm

It's not tabloid junk if it's a famous mathematician?

But it's HACKER tabloid junk.

Surely it will appear on these pages again when xkcd makes a cartoon of it.

It's interesting, characteristically Russian tabloid junk. I find it hard to imagine an equivalent thing here.

"English Russia just because something cool happens daily on 1/6 of the Earth surface"

I like this tagline. It's catchy, true, slightly misleading.

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