The Institute for Advanced Study Annual Report 1985/86 ^ V The Institute for Advanced Study Annual Report for the Fiscal Year Julyl, 1985-June30, 1986 The Institute for Advanced Study Olden Lane Princeton, New Jersey 08540 U.S.A. Printed by Princeton University Press Originally designed by Bruce Campbell U is fundamental to our purpose, and our Extract from the letter addressed by the express desire, that in the appointments to the Founders to the Institute's Trustees, staff arid faculty , as well as in the admission dated June 6, 1930, Newark, New Jersey. of workers and students, no account shall be taken, directly or indirectly, of race, religion or sex. We feel strongly that the spirit characteristic of America at its noblest, above all, the pursuit of higher learning, cannot admit of any conditions as to persontiel other than those designed to promote the objects for which this institution is established, and particularly with no regard whatever to accidents of race, creed or sex. 92'5SO Table of Contents Trustees and Officers 9 Administration 10 The Institute for Advanced Study: Background and Purpose 11 Report of the Chairman Founders Caroline Bamberger Fuld Louis Bamberger Board of Trustees John F. Akers T. D. Lee President and University Professor Chief Executive Officer Columbia University IBM Corporation G. Daniel Mostow Daniel Bell Henr\/ Ford 11 Professor Hetin/ Ford II Professor of Matliematics of Social Sciences Yale University Harvard University Martin E. Segal Thornton F. Bradshaw Cliainnan Chairman of the Board Martin £. Segal Company RCA Zeph Stewart Charles L. Brown Director Chairman of the Board The Center for American Telephone and Hellenic Studies Telegraph Company Washington, D.C. Fletcher L. Byrom Donald B. Straus Denver, Colorado President Research Institute of the American Gladys K. Delmas Arbitration Association New York, Nezv York Frank E. Taplin J. Richardson Dilworth Princeton, Nezv Jersey Princeton, New Jersey Michel L. Vaillaud Michael V. Forrestal Chairman, President and Laivyer Chief Executive Officer Neiv York, Neiv York Schlumberger, Ltd. Wilfried Guth James D. Wolfensohn Managing Director President Deutsche Bank AG James D. Wolfensohn, Inc. Federal Republic of Germany New York, New York Ralph E. Hansmann Harry Woolf New York, New York Director The Institute for Advanced Study Trustees Emeriti Joseph L. Doob Lloyd K. Garrison Sidney D. Drell Howard C. Petersen Norton Simon Board and Corporate Officers J. Richardson Dilworth Ralph E. Hansmann Chairman of the Board Treasurer James D. Wolfensohn Donald C. Jenkins President of the Corporation and Assistant Treasurer Vice-Chairman of the Board Patricia H. Labalme Secretary of the Corporation Administration Harry Woolf, Director Patricia G. Dixon, Secretary Patricia H. Labalme, Associate Director and Secretary of the Corporation Helen J. Laesker, Secretary Allen I. Rowe, Associate Director for Administration and Finance Laura C. Schuchmann-Gliick, Secretary Mary S. Wisnovsky, Assistant to the Director Sarah Johns, Secretary James Barbour, Manager of Administration Sabina Modzelewski, Comptroller Libraries Elliott Shore, Historical Studies and Social Science Momota Ganguli, Mathematics and Natural Sciences School of Historical Studies Rose T. Murray, School Administrative Officer School of Mathematics Linda Y. Sheldon, School Administrative Officer School of Natural Sciences Page E. Hartwell, School Administrative Officer School of Social Science Peggy A. Clarke, School Administrative Officer The Institute for Advanced Study: Background and Purpose The Institute takes the follounng premises on the ically to support and assist the Institute's in- nature of learning as fundamental, most important tellectual purposes in every way possible. work is the product of the disciplined and creative Although the Institute is small when meas- individual mind; accordingly, the individual ured in terms of the size of its immediate aca- scholar must he responsible for how he uses the pre- demic community or of its operating budget, cious resources of his oivn time and erjergy; the its intellectual weight is great and its influence community of peers in his area of intellectual work on science and scholarship extraordinary. is the ultimate judge of the results. (From Proce- From its earliest years, it has been internation- dures FOR Academic Governance of the ally recognized as one of the world's leading Institute.) centers of research. Indeed, its successful ex- ample has created numerous imitators both in the United States and abroad. The Institute for Advanced Study, an inde- From the beginning, the Institute has pendent, private institution devoted to the been an international organization, although encouragement, support and patronage of American in location and organizational learning, was founded in 1930 as a commu- form. It has operated throughout its existence nity of scholars where intellectual inquiry on the premise that science and learning tran- could be carried out in the most favorable cir- scend national boundaries and that scholars cumstances. Focused on mathematics and and scientists are members of one common- classical studies at the outset, the Institute to- wealth of the mind. Of the present Faculty, day consists of the School of Historical Stud- many have begun their scientific and schol- ies, the School of Mathematics, the School of arly careers outside the United States. One- Natural Sciences and the School of Social Sci- third of the Visiting Members come from ence. Each School has a small permanent Fac- abroad, mostly from the great centers of ulty, and some 160 fellowships are awarded learning of western Europe and Asia, and, to annually to Visiting Members from other re- a lesser extent, from other regions of the search institutions and universities through- world. out the world. With its devotion to the continuing exami- The objectives of the Institute were de- nation of new and centrally important ques- scribed as follows in the Founders' original tions as thev arise at the frontiers of knowl- letter to the first Trustees: "The primary pur- edge, the Institute partakes of the character of pose is the pursuit of advanced learning and both a university and a research institute, but exploration in the fields of pure science and it also differs in significant ways from both. high scholarship to the utmost degree that the Unlike a university in its small size—its aca- facilities of the institution and the ability of demic membership at any time numbers the faculty and students will permit." During about 200—it has no commitment that all the past half-century, these goals have been branches of learning be represented in its Fac- implemented by a Faculty of exceptional ulty and Members. Unlike the usual research merit; by an annually renewed group of Vis- institute, it supports many different fields of iting Members chosen from among the manv study, maintains no laboratories, and above who apply; and by the development of facili- all, welcomes temporary members whose in- ties and a mode of operation designed specif- tellectual development and growth are one of 12 Background and Purpose its principal purposes. But it shares with both and no focus excludes those outside it. The universities and research institutes a devotion choice and conduct of research are matters to learning, in the double sense of the contin- which are decided entirely by each individual uing education of the individual and of the in- member of the Institute. tellectual enterprise on which the member is The Institute is nonetheless an intellectual embarked. community and not a mere collection of schol- For more than five decades the Institute for ars. Community is possible because Faculty Advanced Study has made a substantial con- and Members have some substantial knowl- tribution to the world of higher learning by edge outside their own fields of specializa- providing support—intellectual and mate- tion. The fact that the Visiting Members live rial—to Visiting Members whose develop- together in Institute housing, eat in the same ment and growth constitute one of its princi- dining hall, share the same common room pal purposes. More than one third of these and libraries, and carry out their work in an Visiting Members are young men and women institutional setting where human scale has 35 years of age or less whose work at the In- been carefully maintained is conducive to stitute involves the Faculty in a substantial common interest, mutual understanding and amount of postdoctoral training. Though friendship. none of the Visiting Members is a student in The Faculty and Members of the Institute the narrow sense of being a degree candidate, are also a part of the larger community of the communal atmosphere and many oppor- Princeton, with its University and its many in- tunities for discussion with Faculty members stitutions of research and learning. Although and peers, both within and outside seminar the Institute has no administrative or organic meetings, are propitious to scholarly growth. connection with Princeton University, there The Institute devotes special attention to has always been close collaboration between young people of accomplishment and prom- the two institutions on matters of common in- ise, offering them membership at a stage in terest. Many Institute seminars are open to in- their careers when independent work is of the terested members of the University's faculty highest importance to their intellectual devel- and graduate school, and University seminars opment. These younger Members then return and conferences are frequently attended by to or join the faculties of universities all over Institute Faculty and Members. Without the the world and share what they have learned University, Princeton itself would be both as a result of their stay at the Institute. This physically and intellectually inadequate as the might be termed the invisible work of the In- site of the Institute; and the Inshtute has stitute; its visible work is contained in the brought a degree of international excellence to publications of the Faculty and Visiting Mem- the general academic climate of Princeton, bers.