Sunday, May 22nd 2005
Losing a Legend
You may not know the guy, but you probably have heard the story about him:
Dr. George B. Dantzig, a mathematician who devised an algorithm that helped create linear programming, now a vital tool in computing, industry and other fields, died on May 13 at his home in Stanford, Calif. He was 90.
Before turning to the dark side, he was a Berkeley grad student. You may recognize his story (via Slashdot):
George B. Dantzig, then a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, arrived late for a statistics class one day and found two problems written on the board. Not knowing they were examples of “unsolvable” statistics problems, he jotted them down and solved them as a homework assignment. (The equations Dantzig tackled are perhaps more accurately described not as unsolvable problems, but as unproved statistical theorems for which he worked out proofs.)
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This legend is used as the setup of the plot in the 1997 movie Good Will Hunting.
Decent movie, I must say. Dr. Dantzig, your story has been an inspiration to all us engineers who struggle through even the “solvable” problem sets. May you rest in peace and your legend live on forever through Matt Damon’s acting.
I actually do know the guy’s work. (I do work in the same field) It’s pretty impressive stuff. He was one of those guys who was a legend before he died. One of my professors tells a story of how he came to America and was shocked to see him still alive (and became his student). “This is one of those legendary people you read about in books. He’s supposed to be dead!”
Comment by B.A.D. — 5/23/2005 @ 12:57 pm