31–33 of 33 posts
Grothendieck's work is, for me, a rather perfect example of what's happened in the 20th century to mathematics, where the boundaries of knowledge have been pushed so hard and so far that there is almost no hope for anyone to even begin to understand the substance of the work outside a very tiny circle of people who pretty much dedicated life to that arcane corner of the field. I really wish vulgarization was an actua…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> their technical output ceased I think Grothendieck was still writing multi-1000-page mathematical manuscripts up until he died. I know there are such unpublished manuscripts floating around the mathematical community. As Wikipedia states " he lived secluded, still working tirelessly on mathematics until his death in 2014". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Grothendieck
Good point and it's not cut and dried but the character of his output had changed to the extent that it was not published in technical journals as it had been: >Relatively little of his work after 1960 was published by the conventional route of the learned journal, circulating initially in duplicated volumes of seminar notes; his influence was to a considerable extent personal. His influence spilled over into many ot…
Grothendieck didn't publish much in journals at all, ever. He was famous for writing books, not technical articles, such as the EGA and SGA series. His later work was the same, and the resulting manuscripts were widely sought because they were really good stuff.
Before he died he also claimed to have many tens of thousands of pages more that would never see the light of day, and people have sought those documents ever since.
I'm quite familiar with his output because my PhD is in algebraic geometry, and I've worked through his (known) writings extensively.
Here [1] is his complete list of publications. You'll notice by far his output is books and lecture notes, with very few papers at any point in his career.
[1] https://webusers.imj-prg.fr/~leila.schneps/grothendieckcircl...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good point and it's not cut and dried but the character of his output had changed to the extent that it was not published in technical journals as it had been: >Relatively little of his work after 1960 was published by the conventional route of the learned journal, circulating initially in duplicated volumes of seminar notes; his influence was to a considerable extent personal. His influence spilled over into many ot…
>but the character of his output had changed to the extent that it was not published in technical journals as it had been Grothendieck didn't publish much in journals at all, ever. He was famous for writing books, not technical articles, such as the EGA and SGA series. His later work was the same, and the resulting manuscripts were widely sought because they were really good stuff. Before he died he also claimed to h…