Talk:Emmy Noether/Archive 1

her students
I think it would be good to look more deeply into her students, since many of her ideas seem to have come out from them. It seems she had 14 official ones:

Max Deuring - Wilhelm Dörate - Hans Fitting - Heinrich Grell -Margarethe Hermann (Grete)- Yaakov Levitzki - Hans Reichenbach - Otto Schilling - Ruth Stauffer - Chiungtze Tsen - Werner Vorbeck - Werner Weber - Wolfgang Wichmann - Ernst Witt.

That includes some famous names. But one quickly finds others: Alexandroff, Gottfried Koethe, van der Waerden, Olga Taussky Todd. And I think also Emmanuel Lasker, Wolfgang Krull.

Charles Matthews 15:53, 15 May 2005 (UTC)


 * Lasker is a generation older than Noether. Any influence goes the other way. -- Walt Pohl 00:02, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * I just want to mention that in the 70's, I was asked (by a chessplayer) about the "rumor" that Lasker had cribbed off of Noether; it was just a natural assumption, that the World Chess Champion of the time could not have been a serious mathematician. But indeed, he published his theorem (fundamental theorem of arithmetic, for polynomial rings) in 1915, and she generalized it with what we now call Noetherian Rings, in 1921. They did overlap for a time but he preceeded (so "generation" is a bit of an exageration). So today it's called the Lasker-Noether Theorem. Both were remarkable geniuses. Pete St.John (talk) 23:15, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

The uses of "very" and "beautifully" seem to detract from the treatment I would expect from the article. Are there significant quotes that establish the case that these contributions stand out among the entire body of mathematics as superlative? Jake 22:49, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Sure, plenty. Just look in any bio of her.  Perhaps the article was more expansive and complimentary when your comment was made, but right now I think it's alright.  When one has an extremely famous mathematician, I think it's expecting too much that every single positive comment be sourced with a quotation or reference.  --C S (Talk) 01:21, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Pronounciation
Does anyone know definitely how her name is pronounced? I'm thinking perhaps "nur-ter", by analogy with Goethe and Goedel. But that's just a guess, I don't speak German. Tualha 23:46, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I've always heard it pronounced "nur-ther" . -- Walt Pohl 00:02, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * Definitely "nur-ter" A Geek Tragedy 14:28, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, Noether and Goethe are pronounced similarly and with a hard "t", not the English "th". All three are pronounced with the same Umlaut-ö pronounciation that is approximated e.g. in "nurture", so "nur-ter" comes close. But notice that there is no hint of an "r" in either of the words. --Stephan Schulz 14:57, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

I feel sure that SHE would have rhymed it with "Goethe" - but God knows how it got mangled once she traversed the Atlantic.

I knew her nephew and he was called all sorts of things, but I think he stuck with Goethe.


 * Johnbibby 10:49, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup
User:Stevertigo has suggested a cleanup and wikification: remove first-name references, familiar language, etc. I have made changes to have it map reasonably to MOS:BIO. Some further cleanup might be required, but I will leave that for others to decide. If it looks okay, remove the cleanup tag in the article. John (Jwy) 01:05, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Umlauts

 * Copied over from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics

I observe that this article has (recently, I believe) become congested with umlauts. Unless, as we are not likely to, we change the spelling of Noetherian ring, this should be straightened out, with a reasonable allowance of "Noether"s for a mathematician who is usually so called in English, and who died on the faculty of Bryn Mawr College. Septentrionalis 15:36, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
 * And, if I may add, the German Wikipedia also spells the name de:Emmy Noether. So do German libraries, like the catalogue of the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek. And so did she herself. I'm copying this over to the talk page of the article. --Lambiam Talk  16:45, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
 * It is definitely Noether, also in German texts (e.g., B. L. v.d. Waerden, Algebra, Erster Teil) The mistake is reasonable: ö is in fact a ligature for an elder oe, which still sometimes is used alternatively with ö.  (My first name really is Jörgen, not Joergen.)  However, in spelling names, people often prefer to retain older orthography; which is what Emmy did. JoergenB 19:10, 16 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Very true, as Goethe is usually spelled without the umlaut in both German and English (see de:Goethe). - grubber 23:54, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I am happy with both (as long as redirects exist) - I was responsible for putting umlauts in for Max und fuer Fritz - who I think would only have written their name that way. Emmy presumably changed when her name was Americanized or Americanised. As this is an ENGLISH Wikipedia I have no problem with saying that umlauts don't exist in English - and the German Wikipedia can do whatever it likes!


 * Johnbibby 10:46, 18 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Maybe she was born a Nöther, yes/no? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 142.157.64.13 (talk • contribs).


 * No. None of the primary sources (including her CV and papers published by her) uses the umlaut. And neither did her Father, Max Noether. --Stephan Schulz 19:06, 1 March 2007 (UTC)


 * "In 1809, the Tolerance Edict of Baden stated that the male head of every Jewish family who did not already have a distinguishing hereditary surname was to assume one for himself and his children. Elias Samuel, along with his wife and children, was given the name Nöther.... Elias Samuel's grandson Max, the mathematician, and his children used the spelling Noether, although Max's marriage documents still show the official spelling as Nöther." (Auguste Dick, "Emmy Noether, 1882-1935") Mica (talk) 04:12, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Emmy Amalie, Amalie Emmy, or just Amalie?
On the web I find three versions of her full birth name: In version 3 "Emmy" was only a nickname. The overwhelming number of Google hits (2420) is for the first version, and I've changed the lead sentence of the article accordingly. The second still get 524 hits, and includes things like "Amalie (Emmy) Noether", which point at 3. There are also a respectable number of "Emmy (Amalie) Noether"s, but I can't count such things using Google – and Google counts are not an authority anyway; most texts are copies of other texts. And actually the Britannica entry goes with version 2, lending it more credibility. I must add that, personally, I find 3 quite plausible. Anyone near Erlangen who feels like inspecting birth records? --Lambiam Talk 17:22, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
 * 1) Emmy Amalie Noether
 * 2) Amalie Emmy Noether
 * 3) Amalie Noether

Addendum. The German Wikipedia has Amalie „Emmy“ Noether. --Lambiam Talk 20:01, 16 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Nice research. If "Emmy" is her nickname, it could be written Amalie "Emmy“ Noether. Here are some examples:


 * Manuel J. "Pete" Fernandez
 * Joseph Christopher "Mac" McConnell, Jr. in Joseph C. McConnell
 * Virginia ("Ginny") Patterson Hensley in Patsy Cline
 * There is another approach here: Manual of Style (biographies). --Jtir 21:26, 16 October 2006 (UTC)


 * The German National Library uses "Emmy Noether" and redirects other variants. --Jtir 21:54, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Person: 	Noether, Emmy Andere Namen: 	Noether, Emmi Noether, Amalie Emmy Nöther, Emmy Noether, E. Lebensdaten: 	1882-1935 Berufe: 	Mathematikerin Sachgebiete: 	28p Ländercode: 	XA-DE

Here is a quote from Noether dated 1919: Lebenslauf aus der Feder von Emmy Noether von 1919 "Ich, Amalie Emmy Noether, bin am 23. März 1882 zu Erlangen geboren, ... " Lebenslauf von Emmy Noether, undatiert, Eingangsvermerk 4.6.1919, zitiert nach Tollmien.

Translation [replacing the very bad previous Babelfish version]:

Curriculum vitae from the pen of Emmy Noether, 1919

"I, Amalie Emmy Noether, was born on 23 March 1882 in Erlangen ..."

Curriculum vitae of Emmy Noether, undated, accession date mark 4 June 1919, cited by Tollmien. Ajrocke (talk) 13:00, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

These sources seek to explain her name.
 * "Emmy (or Amalie as she was named) was born on March 23, 1882, in Erlangen, ..." Lynn M. Osen, Women in Mathematics
 * "Emmy (or Amalie, as she was called in Germany) who developed into one of the ..." Patricia Emison, Growing with the Grain, Dynamic Families Shaping History from Ancient Times to the Present

IMO the lead should be simplified by calling her "Emmy Noether", thereby matching the name of the article, and a footnote added stating that she herself used "Amalie Emmy Noether" in 1919 and that she used "Emmy Noether" in her 1927  Göttingen paper. Two other data points would be her disseration and Another data point would be a paper she wrote while in America. There is an example of a footnote explaining name variants in Zinaida Serebryakova. --Jtir 14:19, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

She used "Emmy Noether" in her 1907 dissertation. --Jtir 14:30, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

In these pre-America papers she is "Emmy Noether". In this 1908 publication of her dissertation she is "Fräulein Emmy Noether". --Jtir 14:52, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

IMO, there is some confusion here between usernames and legal names. There seems to be no doubt whatsoever that Noether normally called herself and was called Emmy Noether, and published her books and articles under that name. I don't think it is necessary to add more confirmation of that fact here.

However, people sometimes get more known under nicknames or noms de plume than under their real names; cf. e.g. the Russian politician Vladimir Ivanovich Uljanov. People also often don't use all their given names as authors. The article should remain named as it is (as should the article on Lenin); but in an encyclopædia, the (full) legal name also ought to be given, in the first line (or the legal names, if the name was legally changed during her lifetime). I think that the only unresolved issue is to find out what this name was. It is hard to judge whether the references from the German National Library are useful for this purpose, without knowing if they use legal name or most common author name or some other principle. The 1919 quotation from Noether herself is much more interesting, since the text is a kind of CV, and she would be more apt to use the legal name in such a context. (Therefore, it would also be a bit misleading to refer to the fact that she called herself Amalie Emmy Noether 1919 in a footnote; many persons wich use some nickname almost exclusively would be prepared to make exceptions in more official contexts.)

Many of those quoted sources who deal with the official name implicitly or explicitly state that Emmy was a nickname for Amalie. Some give both names. The 1919 quotation could mean either (but definitely fixes Amale before Emmy, if both are legal). I'd personally bet on the nickname version; but I think it's better we ask the Germans for advise. JoergenB 20:34, 19 October 2006 (UTC)


 * She is speaking in the first person in the CV quote, beginning "Ich", so the footnote is correct.
 * I used BabelFish to translate "Lebenslauf":
 * German→English: "Personal record" (This is gramatically correct but doesn't make sense to me.)
 * German→French: "Curriculum vitae" (This is standard usage in English, so I chose it.)
 * Perhaps there is an alternative translation of "Lebenslauf".
 * --Jtir 22:45, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
 * A "Lebenslauf" is a CV or resume. In Germany two kinds of CV have been common in the past, one in table form, the other one in essay form (and usually handwritten). Application for employment often used to require the hand-written essay form. --Stephan Schulz 22:54, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks. That's very helpful. Could you take a look at it? (It is at the bottom of the page.) --Jtir 23:04, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I had a look. It looks like the essay form "Lebenslauf", and she refers to herself as "Amalie Emmy Noether". This is not conclusive about her legal name, unfortunately. Scientists usually stress the name they publish under (I publish as "Stephan Schulz", my full name is "Stephan Peter Schulz"), so if she published as Emmy, she would certainly mention that part of her name even if it is just a nickname. We need either a conclusive secondary source (a good bio), or a conclusive primary one, like her birth certificate or passport. --Stephan Schulz 06:54, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks for taking a look and confirming the content. I have found an even better source for this "Lebenslauf", together with two others. Two are scans of her own handwriting: Emmy Noether (1882-1935) - Lebensläufe. They are all consistent in that she calls herself "Amalie Emmy Noether". Interestingly, she underlines "Emmy" in the one dated 1907. Her 1900 application (which is not a scan) is signed "Gehorsamt Emmy Noether". --Jtir 12:23, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Underlining is a common way to mark the 'use-name' - meaning that she is not called by the first name, Amalie, but indeed by the name Emmy. Was Emmy marked in any other way, e.g. with small geese feet (a nice German way to say 'citation marks') of some kind? JoergenB 13:19, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The underlining in the handwritten 1907 Lebenslauf is the only discernible form of distinction. I do not know what the conventions were in early 20th century Bavaria/Prussia, but it might indeed well have purely the function of indicating the Rufname as being the second Vorname. Since having the second given name as "call name" by itself is quite common, it should be possible to find examples of such indications. While this does not appear conclusive, the consistent use of "Amalie Emmy" in the curricula vitae lends some support to theory 2. Theory 1 is obviously ruled out. So much for counting Google hits. --Lambiam Talk  14:52, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

I didn't use computers to translate; I read the full German text, and noted that it was a kind of CV. She indeed writes about herself; but this doesn't make the replacement of a full name on top by a footnote to it more sensible. IMO, this is a rather unencyclopædic way to handle it, Jtir. It is even better to write a note stating Here we should have given her real name, but we have not been able to decide on what it was yet better. Yes, it would make us look silly and unserious; but so does Jtir's new formulation, and it would have the advantage of telling the casual reader that this is a temporary thing.

As I stated before, it's rather worthless to quote a library service, when you don't know if it uses author names or legal names. The most relevant references are to her biographers, since they probably took more care in going to the sources. Since you couldn't wait, Jtir, while this was sorted out, I'll make a change myself to the probable name form, and rewrite the note to reflect our insurity. If you revert it, I propose you do it to the latest version of Helm's. However, I am not going to continue any edit war on this. JoergenB 23:16, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
 * WP:MOSBIO supports your position: "While the article title should generally be the name by which the subject is most commonly known, the subject's full name should be given in the lead paragraph, if known.", and I will certainly defer to it. I have not determined what is an authoritative biography. Could you take a look at Dick, Auguste. Emmy Noether, 1882-1935. and give us your opinion or, better yet, post some quotes from it? --Jtir 18:25, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * For an example, see Horace. Septentrionalis 19:27, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Definitive answer

I sent an e-mail message concerning the issue to Dr. Cordula Tollmien, who wrote several studies on Emmy Noether.. She replied thus:
 * Ich kann die Frage ganz klar geantworten: Emmy Noether hatte zwei Vornamen: Amalie und Emmy; Emmy war der Rufname, so steht es in ihrer Geburtsurkunde.
 * In einem Lebenslauf - das war (und ist) in Deutschland eine sehr offizielle Angelegenheit - hätte sie nie einen Nicknamen oder die Verkleinerungsform ihres Names aufgeführt. Das war damals einfach nicht üblich.
 * Ich freue mich, dass ich Ihnen helfen konnte, und grüße Sie sehr herzlich
 * Cordula Tollmien

(translation)


 * I can give a quite clear answer to the question: Emmy Noether had two given names: Amalie and Emmy; Emmy was the call name, that is how it is recorded in her birth certificate.
 * In a curriculum vitae - which was (and is) a very official matter in Germany - she would never have given a nickname or the diminutive form of her name. That was just not done at the time.
 * I'm glad to have been able to be of help, and give my warm greetings to you
 * Cordula Tollmien

I think that settles it. --Lambiam Talk 01:40, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks for checking into this and for the translation. And thank-you Dr. Tollmien. This information together with her interpretation of the underlining of "Emmy" in the 1907 "Lebenslauf" would be great additions to her web site. Unlike a personal email message, information on a web site may be examined by anyone and is therefore verifiable. --Jtir 06:29, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I have requested an ILL copy of Dick (1981) (an authoritative bio), but it may be some time before I have it. Unfortunately it is out of print and available on the used book market for prices above $600. This is more than I care to donate to the "free" encyclopedia. :-) However, it appears that many academic libraries hold a copy. --Jtir 14:20, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Bibliographic records
The project subpage Talk:Emmy Noether/Sources is available for bibliographic records and extended quotations. --Jtir 18:48, 20 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I realized that bibrecs on the Talk page were going to make it too cluttered, so I created a project subpage. There is now an infobox at the top of the Talk page with a link to this subpage. --Jtir 19:01, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Emmy Noether and Albert Einstein

 * This remark moved here from the main article. --Lambiam Talk  04:22, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't know exactly where to put this, but she edited (or proofread)some of Albert Einstein's work for him prior to publication. He basically asked her to verify the mathematics (not arithmetic!). He also sent an eloquent eulogy which was read at her funeral. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jane k hsuan (talk • contribs) 00:32, 25 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I've added a link to an obituary by Einstein to the external links. --Lambiam Talk  04:31, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Circumstances of death
"Her doctor told her that she needed an operation..."

The part about Noether's death reads like a cover up. Is the article implying that she had an abortion and subsequently died? If not then it should be worded less ambiguously.

Dan McCarty 22:25, 30 October 2006 (UTC)


 * She had a tumor of the uterus. I think there was no mystery except that she had only informed a few close friends about the operation. I also believe she lived a couple of days after the operation, and died after a sudden and unexpected deterioration of her condition. But I have no source for this. Hopefully all can be cleared up when Jtir receives the ILL. --Lambiam Talk  00:13, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

"Conceptual Physics"
The following was appended to the second to last paragraph in the biography section by 75.8.231.187:

Much of the previous two paragraphs is taken, without attribution, from the online textbook Conceptual Physics, page 8, which may be found at http:// www.lightandmatter.com/cp/index.html

I will follow up on the editor's talk page. (John User:Jwy talk) 02:07, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Revision
I'm planning to reconstruct this article with the goal of bringing it to FA status. I should mention that I have very little knowledge of mathematics, but I've brought four other biographical articles to FA. I'll be working on it at my drawing board, so please feel free to check in and/or leave comments on my talk page. Cheers! – Scartol  •  Tok  01:43, 10 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Okay, I've finished my first round of work on this article. I've tried to include everything from the previous version, while including all the new stuff.


 * Obviously, the algebra section needs work (anyone who knows about these things, please have a go at it), and we're searching for a final citation on the physics bit. Thanks to everyone who's helped out so far! – Scartol  •  Tok  15:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

isomorphism thms. <-->integral dependence???
The article states:


 * "Noether's 1927 work Abstrakter Aufbau der Idealtheorie in algebraischen Zahl- und Funktionenkörpern formulated what are now called the isomorphism theorems, describing a set of natural transformations. Key to these theorems is the concept of integral dependence."

I have not read this work, but it strikes me as weird (or at least improbable) that isomorphisms and natural transformations should be related to integral dependence! I could imagine that integral dependence is key idea to finite extensions of fields or algebras etc., but not to isomorphism theorems. I'm off for some days, but if somebody could check this or clarify, it would be great. Jakob.scholbach (talk) 09:37, 17 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm to blame for these sentences. Here's how I wrote 'em. (Note that I'm a total moron about math.)


 * Gilmer (see bibliography) writes on p. 136: "The concept of integral dependence is to Aufbau what the a.c.c. is to Idealtheorie..." (ie, the root and basis of it). On the page for isomorphism theorems, then, it says that these theorems come from Aufbau. So either the iso.theorems page is wrong, or Gilmer is wrong, or I somehow bollocksed it up in the translation. Again, I'm the last person in the world who should be writing about math, so other folks should check and modify this if necessary. – Scartol  •  Tok  11:47, 17 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Gilmer may be right, but there's more going on in Aufbau than just integral dependence. Section 4 is where Noether states and proves the isomorphism theorems, after three sections about (I think) integral dependence and before one on prime and primary ideals (plus a few more I can't translate top of my head -- my German is sketchy at best, so I'm relying mostly on my knowledge of the material and cognates rather than the actual text).  Integral dependence has nothing do to with the isomorphism theorems, except that the latter are foundational, so of course handy in dealing with the former.  Gleuschk (talk) 12:43, 19 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, I also found this a bit odd, but it has been fixed now. Geometry guy 13:25, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Photos
There are a lot of photos of Noether at, and the ones marked copyright MFO are available under the creative commons license. I dont know whether this means wikipedia can use them. R.e.b. (talk) 14:26, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what MFO means, but since they're not explicitly released by the owner into the public domain or CC, I hesitate to add them to the commons. If anything, I feel that they're likely to get in the way of the FA process. (But others with more experience on photo matters are free to explain why I'm wrong.) – Scartol  •  Tok  15:52, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

According to this page "The Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach gGmbH (MFO) owns the copyright to most of the images used on this website. Those images labelled with "Copyright:MFO" can be used under the Creative Commons License Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Germany." R.e.b. (talk) 16:56, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
 * That's great! Alas, it appears that none of the pictures featuring Emmy are listed as MFO; they all have "unknown" as the copyright status (and most of those are listed in the books are being part of one collection or another), or have no copyright info listed. Grrr! Thanks for the link, though. I added a photo to Fritz Noether, at least. – Scartol  •  Tok  17:51, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
 * See also Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Mathematics. Two German Wikipedians persuaded MFO to make this generous gift. Regards, High on a tree (talk) 22:07, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Comments
I'm totally impressed with the quality of the writing. Good job :) There are a few things I had questions about: Karanacs (talk) 15:50, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
 * He received a doctorate from the University of Heidelberg in 1868 – the first in his family to do so - the first to receive a doctorate? The first to receive a degree from the University of Heidelberg?  This level of higher education was fairly rare, I think, so this might not be necessary to include.
 * Is Fritz's birth year known? The other two brothers have a birth year listed.
 * Do you know what exactly this means " she worked at the University of Erlangen's Mathematical Institute, without pay"? Did she just continue to do research and make use of their facilities or did she have actual duties (beyond subbing for her father)?  Is there any information about why she chose to stay there?
 * There should be a citation after each quotation (even it that means duplicating citations in subsequent sentences). This one didn't have a specific citation "What will our soldiers think when they return to the university and find that they are required to learn at the feet of a woman?" "
 * She spent many years working in an unpaid role. Is it known whether she was supported by her parents or had her own money?
 * Is this referring to a specific instance or was this a regular occurrence? "When "outsiders" visited Noether's lectures, it took only thirty minutes for them to leave in frustration or confusion"  It seems a little odd to me, but I have a feeling if it was explained further it would just bog down the paragraph.
 * "Her colleagues have expressed frustration at the fact that she was never elected to the Göttingen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften (Academy of Sciences) and was never promoted to the position of Ordentlicher Professor" - which colleagues?
 * Why did she need to negotiate with the Rockefeller Foundation before going to Bryn Mawr?
 * I don't understand this - "Several results in algebraic geometry, such as the Brill–Noether theorem, the Noether–Lefschetz theorem, and several other Noether theorems, are named after her father Max Noether." - Were those Max's theorem's or Emmy's? This sentence makes it sound as if those were Max's, but the previous sentence was speaking of her work.
 * I wonder if some of the mathematical concepts need to be explained a bit better. Most non-mathematicians won't know what Galois theory is, for example.  The sections on Galois theory and invariant theory especially left me a bit lost.  I could follow the others for the most part.
 * Ref 68, the Moon Duchin reference for "The Sexual Politics of Genius", doesn't list a publisher


 * Thanks for the review; responses and repairs to follow soon. I trust you don't mind if I copy your comments to the peer review page? (I'll respond there as well, to leave an easier paper trail for folks at FAC to follow.) –  Scartol  •  Tok  16:55, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Comments (2)
I think it looks pretty good. I think there is a bit of trouble with the wikilinking. Some places are underlinked, or the links are in the wrong order.


 * Thanks for your feedback, Filll. Could you be more specific? I tried to strike a balance, so if you can give me an area I'll be happy to have a look. – Scartol  •  Tok  21:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I am also not a big fan of the dashes in the middle of the text.


 * You mean the spaced en dashes? I have personal reasons for preferring them, and they're approved in the MOS – so I vote to keep them. – Scartol  •  Tok  21:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I prefer to put quotations in sections like

to set them apart from the text in a clean fashion.


 * I'm strongly opposed to boxes for quotations. I feel they disrupt the flow of the text and make quotes into distracting bubbles. – Scartol  •  Tok  21:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I was surprised not to read about the famous "underpants" incident (from ET Bell's book).


 * I had not found that book. Do you have an ISBN so I might track it down? (I read one book-length and two chapter biographies and didn't hear about either underpants or "Herr Noethe".) – Scartol  •  Tok  21:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Also no remarks about the title "Herr Noethe", a common joke among her German students apparently (from Bell again).

Also no discussion about the trouble Hilbert had getting her hired at Gottingen. No mention of the famous "badeanstalt" comment.


 * Perhaps you missed the first paragraph of University_of_Göttingen? It's there. – Scartol  •  Tok  21:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I will ponder this a bit more. But I like it so far. Very nice.--Filll (talk) 18:54, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks again. I'm hoping to send it to FAC soon, but of course comments are very welcome. – Scartol  •  Tok  21:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * On the wikilinks: I will try to go through it again and fix the problems I can find, if they truly are problems. The book I am referring to is of course Men of Mathematics. It has some infelicities, but it is quite famous. Although our article does not mention Noethe that I could see, my strong recollection is that there is a chapter there about her, at least in one of the editions. Better to check to be sure however.--Filll (talk) 22:01, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I shall hunt it down with all speed. Many thanks for the info. – Scartol  •  Tok  22:44, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Oops, I may have spoken too soon. No library in my area has it; someone else will have to provide relevant info. – Scartol  •  Tok  22:46, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Warning. Bell takes liberties in embellishing the narrative, thus making prosaic stories more entertaining. As our Men of Mathematics article puts it in an understatement, the book "is not known for the accuracy of its historical scholarship". --Lambiam 07:33, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Interesting. Since it may therefore be questioned as a reliable source, sounds like it's best not to add info from it. – Scartol  •  Tok  11:29, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree that one has to be quite cautious about material from Men of Mathematics. As I recall, some who have tried to investigate some of the narratives have been underwhelmed by Bell's standards for accuracy. Nevertheless, it can be a useful pointer for other places to dig. I would not rely on Bell's work alone however. I would want to verify whatever I read in Bell. It is quite entertaining however.--Filll (talk) 20:52, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Except it sounds like the items relating to Noether – as recounted above – can't be verified. Perhaps the "Herr Noethe" thing is a version of the "Der Noether" story in the article? And perhaps the "underpants" incident is a form of the handkerchief description from A. Dick? – Scartol  •  Tok  11:48, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Bell provides references and further details. Therefore, many of these accounts can be checked and verified. --Filll (talk) 17:09, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Little bird flying in with an update
Hi Scartol ,

I've been delving into Emmy's math a little, as you asked, and it's beginning to unfold before my eyes, like one of those paper flowers in tea. :) Until I did, I hadn't realized how backward I was in math; I'd almost caught up to the 18th century, but I missed out on most of the 19th and 20th centuries. :P  So I've had a little remedial reading to do; if I'm trying to leap from "See Spot run" to Shakespeare, maybe I'm at Beowulf.

I know you're anxious to bring this biography to FAC, but let me beg you for a little more time to brood over her work. To throw the ravenous tiger of our mutual ambition a steak (to keep him occupied), I've made this list, which maybe we and others could flesh out? It needs a good introduction and perhaps you know of a publication with "official" translations for her works? I could do it, but people might complain that it was WP:NOR. In principle, we could split the table into parts for each of the major periods in her work, but I kind of like it integrated and whole. If readers wanted to sort articles by topic or period, perhaps they could use the sorting functions at the top of each column.

I also want to help out Moni, so please don't be surprised to see me vacationing in the Everglades! ;) Willow (talk) 19:00, 9 May 2008 (UTC)


 * No rush. I've got Balzac to keep me warm. (I'm almost done reading La Peau de chagrin, yay!) I'm afraid I don't have any official translations for her work; I've been sticking to biographies. Thanks in advance for your fine efforts with all of this. – Scartol  •  Tok  00:39, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Comments on updated version
According to your request at WT:MATH, some remarks about the mathematical content of the article: Some concerns/remarks
 * First of all, and above all, this is quite an amazing article.
 * "Galois theory is related to invariant theory". Please explain this. Galois theory is concerned with associating groups to field extensions, whereas invariant theory is about groups occuring in geometric transformations etc. So this needs to be somewhat clearer for an FA ;)
 * "a finitely generated domain A over a field k has a transcendence basis x1,...xn such that A is integral over k[x1,...xn]." I'm not sure whether the term transcendence basis is the usual term. (It may be so). As far as I know, tr.b. refers to a field extension K over k. Perhaps you just say that A has some elements x1,...,xn such that...
 * In the non-commutative algebra, I could imagine a word about the Brauer group would be a plus.
 * A great many of the historical work is available at digizeitschriften.de. For example Rationale Funktionenkörper. It would be nice to add these URLs to the article.
 * As for references: in addition to the refs you already have, I propose to add a ref to a contemporary math textbook whenever a particular theorem is talked about (for example Noether normalization lemma, also give a link to Eisenbud, Commutative Algebra or something similar. This way a reader interested in the mathematics (less in history) will have the opportunity to learn the theorem (the historical refs are of less value in this respect, because the mathematical language has completely changed). Jakob.scholbach (talk) 19:36, 18 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Thank you for all of this, Jakob. I'll have to let the math-literate folks look into these, because I, alas, am most certainly not capable of helping with any of the maths matters. Cheers. – Scartol  •  Tok  01:36, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Another thing: why do you write "Emmy Noether is a German-born Jewish mathematician..."? No reason to say German-born, this implies that she was later some other nationality, right? Just simply say German. Jakob.scholbach (talk) 13:31, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, fair enough. Changed. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:35, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

A couple of comments

 * The introduction lists Noether's theorem as a result in invariant theory. I suppose in the most general sense this is true, since the theorem explains why certain physical quantities such as energy remain "invariant" (i.e. constant), however the term "invariant theory" is normally used for invariants of algebraic systems such as systems of polynomial equations or algebraic varieties, not for physical or analytical systems. This algebraic invariant theory is what Gordan worked on and what Noether wrote her thesis on. The proof of Noether's theorem uses completely different tools.
 * Thanks for these comments, Axel. I'm going to leave this one for the maths people. – Scartol  •  Tok  01:42, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
 * That's true, and we should re-write that section with more finesse. However, my own understanding is that Noether's theorem and her earlier algebraic invariant work share a common concern, namely, what quantities are constant under a group of transformations.  Whether the group is coordinate transformations in general relativity, or complex linear transformations in fields, seems like a question of "special cases"?  Willow (talk) 16:16, 1 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The introduction should mention that Noether met van der Waerden in Göttingen in 1924 and that the second volume of his highly influential book Moderne Algebra is essentially due to her. (Mentioned later in the article, but important enough for the lead IMHO.)
 * I agree. Done.
 * I'll address the rest of these comments soon – thanks again! – Scartol  •  Tok  01:42, 20 May 2008 (UTC)


 * "Two weeks after Noether left for Göttingen, her mother died suddenly in Erlangen." When did she leave for Göttingen?
 * Late April. Added. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * "her brother joined the army" -- Which one?
 * The German army. Added. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The translation nicht beamteter ausserordentlicher Professor as "unofficial associate professor" is dubious. A "Beamter" is a lifetime civil servant in Germany; all regular professors in Germany are Beamte. "Nicht beamteter" means "not a Beamter". "Ausserordentlich" does not mean "unofficial" here; it means that she's not a regular full professor with a lifetime job, but rather an adjunct professor, the normal first step on the career ladder after having obtained Habilitation.
 * The translation in the article is the one provided in Kimberling (p. 18). I'm happy to change the wording, but we'll need to remove the quotes. Is "adjunct professor" a fair way to put it? It's worth pointing out that even after receiving the title of nicht beamteter ausserordentlicher Professor, Kimberling indicates (as do others) that she did not receive a salary. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * The usual translation is extraordinary Professor; this should be followed by an explicit contrast to the paid Ordinary Professor to explain the adjective. Would Privatdozent be accurate? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:17, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * No, Privatdozent is one step before a (ordinary or extraordinary) professor. Jakob.scholbach (talk) 09:19, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
 * The German Wikipedia translates Außerordentlicher Professor as "Associate Professor" (for USA/Canada) or "Reader/Senior Lecturer" (for GB/AUS/NZ). The term is further mentioned in Professor. We also have an article on Beamter; is beamtet in this academic context reasonably equivalent with "tenured"? --Lambiam 17:13, 24 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The section on her personality shouldn't be stuck in the middle of her biography.
 * Why not? It seems to me like as good a place as any; the diverse elements don't feel right integrated into the other sections, and it would seem very odd to put this section at the start or the end of her biography. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * "one wrote in a notebook with regard to a class which ended at 1:00 PM: "It's 12:50, thank God!" -- I'm pretty sure every teacher has had a student writing a similar note in their notebook; I don't see what this anecdote is supposed to tell us about Noether.
 * I would argue to keep it. I feel that it shows how people outside her famous circle felt about being there. (While other teachers probably do receive this kind of reaction, I feel the story shows that not everyone was on board with her style.) What do other folks think? – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Maybe a better story might be the one about how Emil Artin (I think it was him) would get her to explain her ideas three times while going on a long walk in the forest. By the third time, she was so out of breath that she had to slow down the speed of her explanations, enough so that at least Artin could understand her.  Maybe that was in Taussky's memoir?


 * "500 Reichsmarks (about US$120)" -- it would be more helpful to relate this sum to a typical salary at the time rather than to US Dollars.
 * But it wasn't a salary she was receiving; it was a prize amount. If I remember correctly, every time I've seen a lump sum discussed on WP, I've usually seen it compared to another currency. What do other folks think? – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * We should also make clear that these are 1932 dollars, since the United States has seen at least ten-fold inflation since. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:15, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * the section "Invariant theory and elimination theory" doesn't mention what Noether contributed.
 * Good point; I'll let someone from the math world add this. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * On it, boss. :) It turns out that we have to move elimination theory to her Second Epoch, for reasons I'll explain tomorrow. Willow (talk) 16:16, 1 June 2008 (UTC)


 * A major difference in approach should be mentioned: her thesis advisor Gordan worked to find invariants concretely and she took up that approach for her thesis. Hilbert in proving his Hilbert basis theorem adopts an abstract approach, proving the existence of a basis without providing a procedure to construct it, leading Gordan to famously exclaim "This is not mathematics, this is theology". Noether more and more moved over to the abstract, general and theoretical camp, away from Gordan. This is the deeper significance of her viewing her thesis an ugly mess of equations.
 * Again, this sounds like a good point, and I'll let a maths-intelligent person take care of this. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Her paper "Zur Invariantentheorie der Formen von n Variabeln ( On the Theory of Invariants for Forms of n Variables ) was really good in helping me understand her transition, especially for understanding her perspective in her early days. Her self-description CV from the Kimberling reference was also good for her later perspective.  There's a lot more that could be said that's not in the article yet; please be patient! :) Thanks so much for helping us, Axel; we really appreciate it and we'll try to address everything asap. :) Willow (talk) 16:16, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

AxelBoldt (talk) 23:32, 18 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks again for your comments, Axel. – Scartol  •  Tok  15:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

IP additions to External links
While I appreciate the attention to detail visited on this article by 70.19.146.142, I feel that the number of links and their formatting are problematic. An "Articles" section is not standard, and the links to articles we've got right now is more than sufficient; I believe others should go on the List of publications by Emmy Noether. Hopefully we can resolve this rather than reverting each others' edits. (Especially since I just initiated the FAC nomination.) Thanks! – Scartol  •  Tok  17:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Train left the station while I was asleep ;)
Hey all,

I hadn't realized until just now that this article was already at FAC! I was leisurely reading three of her articles only this morning, thinking, "Oh well, I'll figure that sentence out later." The race is now to the not-swift, paraphrasing Solomon. ;) I'll try to address some of the concerns above and on FAC, but I've a lot to do today; maybe someone else — umm, like a real expert, hint, hint — can help out as well? Willow (talk) 15:52, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I want to apologize if I jumped the gun, W. I took the comment on your talk as a nod to go ahead. Curse my intemperate disposition! I know you didn't sign up to spend your day plowing through this stuff, but since I've got a busy workweek coming up, I'm devoted to being available today to get as much done as possible before Monday shows up. – Scartol  •  Tok  16:06, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Einstein letter
With reference to the discussion of the date of Einstein's letter, now archived and which I saw just now, the anonymous user was right: the letter was published on the 4th of May, not the 5th. I downloaded the NYT article through my library, and it is identical to the one reproduced on the MacTutor website, except that it uses "Goettingen" and "Fraeulein" instead of the words with diacritics. I've changed the date in the article. Hope this helps, Shreevatsa (talk) 14:12, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Cheers for that. Scartol  •  Tok  15:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Great! Thanks!  Ozob (talk) 02:31, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Göttingen institute image
The Göttingen mathematics institute image's byline is an anachronism; while I believe Noether taught in that building, it was built in 1929 and did not yet exist when the department approved Noether's habilitation. See for example the department's page. Huon (talk) 15:54, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Nationality
Jocme listed Noether's citizenship as "Bavarian", with an edit summary of "She was German but citizenship was Bavarian cf. Albert Einstein (i gave a good reference, It's ridiculous to revert that,). Moreover she did not live in the Federal Republic of Germany, where the Wiki-Link went to."

I have several problems with that. First of all, Albert Einstein is rather alone in giving the citizenship of a member state of the German Empire. I just checked Karl Weierstrass, David Hilbert, Felix Klein, Richard Courant, Hermann Minkowski and Edmund Landau, mathematicians of the same era or a little earlier, and with the exception of Courant, they all give no citizenship, but give the nationality as a variant of "German" (there are some earlier mathematicians such as Leopold Kronecker who did most of their work before the unification of Germany and whose nationality we give as non-"German", but there also are counterexamples such as Carl Friedrich Gauss and Bernhard Riemann). If we don't want to point to modern Germany, we can instead link to the German Empire (and the link to Bavaria does not point to the Kingdom of Bavaria either, if we're sticklers for historical precision). More relevantly, Bavarian citicenship within the German Empire is akin to the citizenship of a US State; it is irrelevant for almost all practical purposes. In the lead, every single article I checked described its subject as a "German" mathematician, even those which did give the nationality as "Prussian". For these reasons, I changed the citizenship to German nationality and removed the mention of Bavaria from the lead's first line; it's mentioned a little later in connection with her Erlangen birth anyway. Huon (talk) 16:12, 5 February 2012 (UTC)


 * One point is that there was basically no German citizenship until 1934 (Nazi Germany changed it). Before that one could basically be a citizen of a member state only. It may be the case that other articles are not too precise about that, but should that be a reason to be imprecise? I only provided a reference for the citizenship of Noether, the reference did not mention the citizenship of these other mathematicians, so I would hesitate to change that until one has a reference. But if we have one, we should be precise. But definitely, Gauss and Riemann did not have German citizenship. It takes some effort to find reliable sources, though.


 * You changed the Wikilink in the introduction to German. This is better than calling her German which is appropriate to a citizen of modern Germany. On the other hand, since there is no separate article for Bavarians or Bavarian citizenship, a link to Bavaria therefore seemed to be appropriate. Moreover the Bavarian citizenship remained the same with the 1918/19 change from a monarchy to a republic in Bavaria, a link to the Kingdom of Bavaria would not give right impression. Concerning her citizenship in the infobox, I think one should be precise and give the correct one. One could also mention it as "Bavarian (Germany)". --Jocme (talk) 18:04, 5 February 2012 (UTC)


 * You are technically correct in noting that she had Bavarian citizenship, but at least from 1913 onwards (if not from birth) she had German citizenship as well; compare the mention of the Nationality Law of the German Empire and States (RuStAG) in German nationality law. I doubt we need to bother with the intricacies of German citizenship law at such a level of detail; thus I changed her "citizenship" to "nationality" - that seems to be the standard parameter for German biographies of that era, not just for mathematicians (see for example Theodor Fontane, about as Prussian as possible, or Wilhelm Busch). Also as usual, we mention the Kingdom of Bavaria in the context of her place of birth. I see no need to deviate from the precedents. Huon (talk) 18:50, 5 February 2012 (UTC)


 * The information in German nationality law and the reference cited therein is partially misleading, 1999/2000 just the name of the law changed (with some additions for immigration). Through the standardizing 1913 law Noether was "German" due to her Bavarian citizenship (by Par. 1). (The same law today (and also before 1999) tells you in Par. 1 that one is German if one has the German citizenship).


 * It's a matter of choice, if one likes to mention the details, which don't need much more space than the imprecise statements. I am in favour of the details. On the other hand it may be reasonable that we are more precise with British mathematicians than with german ones, cf. the categories for Scotish and Welsh mathematicians, etc.--Jocme (talk) 20:30, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree it's a matter of choice; I'll ask for input at WT:WikiProject Germany. They should know what's preferable. Secondary source describing Noether as a "Bavarian mathematician" instead of a "German mathematician" are rare, though. Huon (talk) 00:25, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 20:26, 3 May 2016 (UTC)