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Home , Andrzej Mostowski, Kazimierz Kuratowski

Krzysztof R. Apt, Einar Fredriksson 100th anniversary of the Polish Mathematical Society NAW 5/21 nr. 1 maart 2020 53

Krzysztof R. Apt Einar Fredriksson Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica, Amsterdam IOS Press en MIMUW, University of Amsterdam [email protected] [email protected]

Event PTM Jubilee Congress, 3–7 September 2019, Kraków 100th anniversary Polish Mathematical Society

From 3 to 7 September 2019 the Polish Mathematical Society celebrated its 100th anniver- gathered about 200 participants. Ten ar- sary with a Jubilee Congress in Kraków (Cracow), . This is a short account of this rived from abroad, among them John von congress by Krzysztof R. Apt and Einar Fredriksson. Neumann from Budapest and Witold Hure- wicz from Amsterdam. The Polish Mathematical Society (Polskie sue consisted of articles exclusively written Throughout its existence several famous Towarzystwo Matematyczne, in short PTM) by Polish mathematicians, but as a gesture mathematicians were presidents of the PTM. was founded in Kraków (Cracow), 2 April towards the international community they Perhaps the best known are (chronological- 1919, less than half a year after Poland were all written in French (except one writ- ly): Samuel Dickstein, , Ka- regained independence at the end of the ten in Italian). zimierz Kuratowski, and Wacław Sierpiński. First World War. (Between 1795 and 1918 mentions in his his- To commemorate the 100th anniversary the country was divided between , torical book [1] that from the beginning the of the PTM a Jubilee Congress took place and Russia.) The founding group PTM maintained close contacts with math- in Kraków from 3 to 7 September 2019. It consisted of 16 mathematicians, among ematicians in other countries and cites as was an impressive event that attracted 852 them Stefan Banach and Otto Nikodym. The examples P. S. Aleksandrow, Elie Cartan, E. participants and led to no less than 508 society was first a local organization, but Čech, S. Lefschetz, T. Levi-Civita, N. N. Łuzin, lectures. The list of participants read as a soon became a countrywide one. In particu- P. Montel, R. L. Moore, G. Vitali, J. Winograd- ‘Who is Who in Polish ’, with lar, in November 1919 some Warsaw math- ow, and E. Zermelo. only few exceptions, such as Jan Mycielski ematicians, including Samuel Dickstein and The decade preceding the WWII was a pe- and from the Univer- Wacław Sierpiński, became its members. riod of glory of Polish mathematics, especial- sity of Boulder, Colorado, USA, and Janusz In 1920 the PTM founded the Fundamen- ly flourishing in Lwów (now , Ukraine). Onyszkiewicz (a former Minister of Defence ta Mathematicae journal that exists up to A group of prominent mathematicians, in- in the first post-communist government and the present day. The journal and its name cluding Stefan Banach, Mark Kac, Stanisław Solidarity pioneer), a former mathematician were conceived by Zygmunt Janiszewski. Mazur, , and Stanisław Ulam, at the Mathematics Department of the War- Unfortunately, he did not live to see the worked at the Lwów School of Mathematics, saw University. All three of them were active first issue since he succumbed soon after notably in functional analysis, theory, in mathematical , and connected in the to the influenza pandemic at the age of 31. and probability theory. sixties and seventies with the Warsaw semi- Wacław Sierpiński and So, not surprisingly, the first congress of nar of the great logician ; took over as Editors-in-Chief. The first is- the PTM took place in Lwów in 1927 and we both were his students. Photo: Marek Welzel Marek Photo: Plenary meeting of the congress 54 NAW 5/21 nr. 1 maart 2020 100th anniversary of the Polish Mathematical Society Krzysztof R. Apt, Einar Fredriksson

In total there were 34 plenary lectures, Wiadomości Matematyczne (Mathema­ service, the three leading Polish cryptolo- about one third of them delivered by Polish tical News), a magazine of the Polish Math- gists, Marian Rejewski, Jerzy Różycki and mathematicians living abroad, which testi- ematical Society, devoted a special, 269 Henryk Zygalski, were moved to France just fies to the size of the Polish mathematical pages long, issue to the anniversary. It after the outbreak of the WWII, including diaspora. Several (almost exclusively Pol- contains among others accounts of the first their research and samples of Enigma. ish) participants arrived from Canada, USA, three congresses of the society, that took This research proved critical for the Al- France, UK, Australia, and other countries. place in 1927, 1931, and 1937, and inter- lied War effort as it became a basic build- (To our knowledge there were three partici- views with the last four presidents of the ing block for the UK intelligence work at pants from the Netherlands.) European Mathematical Society. Bletchley Park from the outset of the war. All talks were supposed to be given in The event was widely covered in the A large number of British cryptology experts Polish, though some of the invited speak- Polish press. There was also an extensive worked towards the cracking of the German ers living abroad after a general introduc- social programme and several interesting codes, most notably the logician and com- tion switched to English. (The website of ‘side’ events. One of them was indirectly re- puter science pioneer Alan Turing. The ac- the congress stated: “English will only be lated to the aforementioned Lwów School complishments there became part of early acceptable in case of plenary lectures giv- of Mathematics. The meeting place of their computer history, but the significant contri- en by those invited guests, who have been members was the Scottish Café and the bution by the Polish cryptologists has been living abroad for many years and thus feel ‘’ written there contained underexposed. Subsequent publications, more comfortable talking about mathemat- open problems posed by mathematicians. and not the least a publication three years ics in a foreign language.”) 24 of these were given by Banach’s collabo- ago by the French authorities, threw new During the opening ceremony Jean-Pierre rator Stanisław Mazur, and for many of the light on the Polish contribution. Bourguignon, the President of the Europe- problems a prize was offered to the person Alan Turing’s nephew Dermot Turing was an Research Council, obtained an honorary giving the solution. For one of the problems present at the conference, promoting a Pol- membership of the society. Also a number (from 1936), Mazur had offered a live goose. ish translation of his recent book — partly of the society awards were conferred. A young Swede, Per Enflo, showed in based on the new French publication. At The extensive scientific programme was 1972 that the problem had a negative solu- a large ceremony in the Peter and Paulus divided into several parallel sessions that tion, and was later, in Warsaw, duly pre- Church in Kraków, the National Pantheon, were named after famous Polish mathema- sented with a live goose by Mazur. In a film the three cryptologists, Rejewski, Różycki ticians. The organizers of the sessions tried preceding the conference on the theme of and Zygalski, were re-buried during the last to adjust the subjects of the talks to the the Lwów School, Per Enflo played a part. day of the conference. sessions’ names. At the evening of the closing day he also A significant participation of mathemat- In particular, one of us was a co-organ- gave a piano concert. ics teachers from high schools and a varie- izer of a session on Logic and Theoretical On the first evening of the conference ty of educational institutions, as well as a Information Science, called ‘Tarski’, which there was a live performance of Opera new organization ‘Women in Polish Math- included a historical lecture about Alfred Matematyczna, produced by the recently ematics’, showed the broad anchorage of Tarski, lectures on Mathematical Logic, and deceased Roman Kołakowski. The opera mathematics awareness and activity of the on Theoretical Computer Science related to also focussed on the Lwów School of Math- PTM — with active chapters in several re- decidability. ematics, Banach, and the turbulent times gions of the country. The programme of the congress reflect- around the city in the period before and in- Given that in Poland a lunch is traditional- ed a broad understanding of mathematics cluding the WWII. Between the wars Lwów ly the main meal, the catering during the con- in Poland. In particular, there were sessions was a legendary Polish city, with outstand- ference presented a — successfully met — on the Didactics of Mathematics, Philoso- ing contributions not only to science, but challenge. During the day the conference phy of Mathematics, and on Mathematical also the arts and media. took place at the new campus of the uni- Physics (“Kac and Ulam’’). Also, there were Another film shown during the confer- versity, the lunch was ingeniously served special sessions devoted to Theoretical ence dealt with the other profound Polish in the emptied and thoroughly cleaned Computer Science (with invited lectures on contribution to mathematics and comput- underground garage, the only space that Algorithmic Game Theory), on Mathematics er science, playing at the same time as could include so many guests. Finally, a in Economics and Finance, and on Mathe- the Lwów School, but this time having its large banquet was held at the Royal Cas- matical Olympiad Problems of ‘remarkable centre in Poznań. Cryptologists there had tle of Niepołomice some 40 km outside of beauty’. been working on deciphering a German en- Kraków. s The scientific programme also included cryption machine ‘Enigma’ since 1930. The a number of panels, in particular about the machine went through improvements dur- Acknowledgement Stefan Jackowski, the president of the PTM from state of Polish mathematics, popularization ing a decade and was adapted for use by 2005 until 2013, provided us with useful histori- of mathematics, and on the education of the German army / Luftwaffe, as well as the cal information about the PTM and Fundamenta mathematics teachers. navy. With the help of the French security Mathematicae.

Reference 1 Kazimierz Kuratowski, Pół Wieku Matematy- A Half Century of Polish Mathematics: Re- 108, Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN / Perga- ki Polskiej 1920–1970, Wiedza Powszechna, membrances and Reflections, International mon Press, 1980. 1973, in Polish. English version appeared as: Series in Pure and Applied Mathematics, Vol.