Barry Mazur

The Language of Explanation

Born in New York City, Mazur attended the Bronx High School of Science and MIT, although he did not graduate from the latter on account of failing a then-present ROTC requirement. Regardless, he was accepted for graduate school and received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1959, becoming a Junior Fellow at Harvard University from 1961-64. He is currently the Gerhard Gade University Professor at Harvard University. In 1982 he was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences. Mazur has received the Veblen Prize in geometry and the Cole Prize in number theory from the American Mathematical Society. He was also awarded the 2000 Leroy P. Steele Prize for Seminal Contribution to Research.

In an expository paper, Number Theory as Gadfly, Mazur describes number theory as a field which produces, without effort, innumerable problems which have a sweet, innocent air about them, tempting flowers; and yet... number theory swarms with bugs, waiting to bite the tempted flower-lovers who, once bitten, are inspired to excesses of effort!

He expanded his thoughts in the 2003 book "Imagining Numbers (particularly the square root of minus fifteen)."