Allen Shields*

Egorov and Luzin: Part 2

This column for vol. 9, no. 4 (1987) dealt with the mathematicians N. N. Luzin and D. F. Egorov. Since then additional material has come to my attention, some of it while I was visiting the Soviet Union for six weeks in May and June 1988�9

We begin with Egorov. If one looks at vol. 35, no. 1 (1928) of the journal Matemati~eski~ Sbornik, published by the Moscow Mathematical Society, one finds a list of all the members of the society at that time, with the date they joined the society. The president is Egorov (1893), and the vice president is Luzin (1910). (Egorov was born in 1869 and Luzin in 1883.) Curiously, Kol- mogorov is not listed, although he had already pub- lished a number of important papers (he was born in 1903). Inside the front cover there is a note in French and in Russian to the effect that the journal will pub- lish papers in Russian, French, German, English, and Italian. Papers in Russian must have a r~sum~ in one of the other languages, and papers not in Russian must have a Russian r~sum(~ (which will be supplied by the editors upon request). The instructions about figures include the restriction that there be at most one figure for each four pages of text. Authors received 50 free reprints. Finally, all correspondence is to be sent to: Prof. D. F. Egorov, Moscow 69, Borisoglebskff per., No. 8, Apartment 5. (Inside the back cover the ad- dresses of the officers of the society are given; Luzin's address is: Moscow 2, Arbat, No. 25, Apartment 11, telephone 3-35-16.)

Three years later, inside the front cover of vol. 38, no. 1-2 (1931) of the journal one finds a different mes- sage from the editors:

Starting with the next number the journal Matemati~eski~ Sbornik will appear with the title Sovetski~ Matemati~eski~ Sbornik.

Until recently the Mathematical Society had retained its cliquish academic character. Prof. Egorov, a reactionary and a churchman, headed the society. He opposed the

* Column editor's address: Department of Mathematics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, M148109-1003 USA

policies of Soviet p o w e r . . , under the guise of defending "academic traditions" and "pure apolitical science."

The growth of the proletarian strata among the grad- uate students . . . and their struggle against the reac- tionary wing of the professors decisively turned the basic cadres of Soviet mathematicians.., to active participation in social construction . . . .

In the Mathematical Society an initiative group, in- cluding many prominent mathematicians, was formed to reorganize the society�9 The declaration of the initiative group was accepted by the Mathematical Society (it was published in the journal Nau~ni~Rabotnik no. 1, 1931). The Society expelled Egorov and other reactionaries, and re- placed them mainly with graduate students . . . .

�9 . . The editors of Sovetskff Matemati&skir Sbornik call upon Soviet mathematicians to close ranks around the journal and help to turn it into a fighting organ of Soviet mathematics.

The editors invite the collaboration of foreign scholars sympathetic to the Soviet Union.

Inside the back cover is a notice that material for the journal should be sent to editor in chief Lazar Aro- novi~ Lyusternik, or to the Secretary: Aleksandr Iosi- fovi~ Gel'fond. [Note: they seem to mean Aleksandr Osipovi~ Gel'fond; no A. I. Gel'fond is listed in Mat 40 [1959].]

The name "Sovetskii Matem. Sbornik" was not in fact ever used by the journal.

As regards the initiative group [Lev], Note 12 gives the fol lowing reference: L. A. Lyusternik, L. G. ~nirel'man, and others, "'Declaration of the Initiative Group for the Reorganization of the Mathematical So- ciety," Nau~nif Rabotnik 1930, no. 11/12, pp. 67-71. [The title is a translation of the Russian original. I have not seen this article, and if anyone could send me a copy I would be very grateful.]

In no. 3 -4 of the same vol. 38 of the Sbornik one finds an appeal to Soviet mathematicians to support the journal, and to break with the old tradition of pub- lishing their best works abroad�9 Because they want to have an international journal, articles in Russian will continue to have foreign r~sum~s, and articles will be accepted in the four other languages indicated above. The editors in chief now are P. S. Aleksandrov and A. F. Bermant. Manuscripts are to be sent to Bermant. Authors now receive 100 free reprints.

In the same issue there is a report on the first all-

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E r n e s t K o l ' m a n

Russian conference on planning in mathemat ics , which met June 5-9, 1931. The report stresses the need for a close connection between theory and the practice of socialist construction, as called for by the Central Commit tee of the Party and by comrade Stalin. The necessary planning is said to be impossible in bourgeois countries. In bourgeois mathematics one observes the isolation of theory from practice. This tendency in the present period of the decay of capi- talism is expressed in mathematics in formalism, which treats all mathematics as a chess game with meaningless symbols, and by subjective intuitionism.

There follows a long section presenting materials from the conference. First is a resolution based on a speech by E. Kol'man at the final session. It states that the attempt to fit the developing content of mathe- matics into an idealist formal scheme has led to the crisis in the foundations (Brouwer, Hilbert, and the French school of the theory of functions; Sierpiriski and Luzin are mentioned as adherents of the French school). Further, although Soviet mathematics has at- tained one of the top places in world mathematics, it still does not have a form that expresses the socialist character of our Revolution. Until recently a basic ob- stacle had been the attitude of certain reactionary pro- fessors (Gyunter, Egorov, and others).

Other resolutions deal with the need for more insti- tutes, for financial support, and for autonomy. Then there are reports on different areas of mathematics and their connection to applications.

Another reference, given to us by Prof. ~afarevi~ (Shafarevich), is to a journal called Mathematical Sciences for Proletarian Cadres, vol. 1, 1931. The article, entitled "Reorganization of the Moscow Mathematical Society," states that the Society expelled the reaction- aries Egorov, Finikov, and Appel'rot. In addition, the pedagogical units were completely reorganized and have become a section in the Society, a tool in the struggle for Marxist pedagogy in mathematics. The So- ciety elected a new presidium, including: Kol'man, Golubev, Gel 'fond, Orlov, Burstin, Khin~in, Kho- tinski, Raikov, Frankl ' , Yanovskaya, Lyusternik, Lavrent'ev, and others�9

Soon after being expelled from the Mathematical So- ciety, Egorov lost his position at the University. He was arrested and intensively interrogated, apparently falling sick in prison, and then exiled to Kazan. Else- where in this issue of the Intelligencer there is a very interesting interview with Shafarevich by Smilka Zdravkovska. We quote: "As Chebotarev told me, Egorov died in Chebotarev's home, in his arms." (This was in September 1931.) Chebotarev was born in 1894, he was at Kazan University from 1928 until his death in 1947. There is more about Egorov and Luzin in the Shafarevich interview later in this issue.

Luzin's troubles in 1936 began innocently enough with a short article of his in the newspaper Izvestiya (June 27, p. 4) entitled "A pleasant disappointment." I have not seen this, but [Lev] gives an account, and a recent article in Sovetskaya Kultura has several quotes from it. Luzin describes attending the final exams in a secondary school in Moscow. He concluded by ex- pressing complete satisfaction with the results of the exams, writing: "I could find no weak students, the students differed from one another only in that some answered quickly and some slowly, but all performed very well. On this occasion I found precisely that deep understanding of the laws of mathematics, of whose lack I have so often complained." He especially ac- knowledged the school director's personal contribu- tion.

On July 3 Pravda, p. 3, carried an article by the school director entitled "An answer to Academician N. Luzin." He states that the students' performance was not outstanding, for example on the trigonometry exam out of 33 students 11 received the highest grade of 5, 12 received a grade of 4, and 10 received 3. The results for algebra and for geometry were similar. These results were normal, and did not at all justify Luzin's statement that he could not find any weak students. Luzin is severely criticized for overpraising the school, instead of providing comradely criticism.

The very next day Pravda, on p. 2, has an unsigned article entitled "'On enemies in Soviet masks." It in- dudes the following: "A careful examination of the ac- tivity of this academician in recent years shows that the deliberate overpraising of these students is far from accidental. It is but one link in a long chain, and is very instructive in showing the methods by which enemies mask themselves. We well know that N. Luzin is an anti-Soviet person . . . . Academician Luzin could have become an honest Soviet scholar, as did many from the older generation. But he didn' t want this; he, Luzin, remained an enemy, counting on �9 . . the impenetrabil i ty of his mask . . . . It won ' t work, Gospodin Luzin!" ["Gospodin" means gen- tleman, or mister. After the Revolution it was replaced by "grazhdanin," which means citizen.]

Further articles in Pravda followed, on July 9, 10, 12 (p. 3 in each case). The article of July 9 was entitled

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"Tradi t ions of servil i ty." It complains abou t the tradi- t ion of publ ish ing abroad, of judging as valuable only those works that receive foreign approval :

To take only mathematics, the majority of Soviet mathe- maticians (Aleksandrov, Kolmogorov, Khin~in, Bern- ~tein, and others) publish their works abroad and not here, in the USSR, in the Russian language . . . . It is known (see the articles in Pravda for July 2 and 3) that Academician Luzin sent his best works abroad, with the definite political intention of publishing in the USSR, as he himself cynically expressed it, "any rubbish . . . . " One must not suffer such a situation any longer. The Soviet Union is not Mexico, not some sort of Uruguay, but is a great socialist power. And the Russian language is the lan- guage of a mighty people, spoken by at least 150 million people . . . . The conditions have been created in our country for such a great flowering of science, as has not been known, and is not known, in any capitalist country.

As regards the reference to Uruguay , [Lev], Note 26, states that that count ry had recently b roken diplo- matic relations wi th the Soviet Union.

One of those w h o read the articles in Pravda on July 2 and 3 was the physicis t Pyotr Leonidovi~ Kapitsa. He was ou t raged , a n d wro te a letter, da t ed July 6, 1936, to the Cha i rman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, V. M. Molotov. Last year this letter was re- pr in ted in the n e w s p a p e r Sovetskaya Kultura, May 21, 1988, p. 6. We quote some excerpts:

The article in Pravda on Luzin puzzled, astounded, and angered me and, as a Soviet scholar, I feel that I must tell you what I think about this.

Luzin is accused of much. I don't know if these charges are correct but even if they are completely justified this does not change my negative attitude to the article.

First let us begin with some accusations of a petty char- acter. He did not publish his best works in the Soviet Union. Many of our scientists do this, and primarily for two reasons: 1) printing and paper are of poor quality here; 2) by international custom, priority is only given for works published in French, German, or English. And if Luzin published bad works in the Soviet Union, then this is the fault of the editors of the journals that accepted t h e m .

If he envied his students and therefore sometimes had inequitable relations with them, this phenomenon, unfor- tunately, occurs even among the strongest scholars.

Thus there remains one, very serious, charge against Luzin, that he hid his anti-Soviet feelings behind flattery, though somehow this doesn't seem such a great offence. Here we h a v e . . , a very important question of principle: how should one treat a scholar whose ethics do not corre- spond to the spiritual needs of the epoch?

Newton, who gave mankind the law of gravity, was a religious maniac. Cardano, who found the formula for solving cubic equations and made a number of important discoveries in mechanics, was a wastrel and libertine. What would you have done with them if they had lived here in the Soviet Union?

Or suppose that someone close to you fell ill. Would you call a brilliant doctor if his ethical and political convic- tions were contrary to your o w n ? . . .

I don't want to defend Luzin's moral qualities, but there is no doubt that he is a very strong mathematician, one of our four best mathematicians. Besides, he did more than

Nikolai Luzin

anyone else to gather and to educate the pleiad of young Soviet mathematicians we now have.

I consider that a country having strong scholars such as Luzin must first of all do everything so that their talents are used as fully as possible for mankind.

People such as Luzin, who are ideologically not suitable to us, must, first, be given conditions in which they can continue their scientific work without having wide social influence. Second, everything possible must be done to reeducate them in the spirit of the epoch to make good Soviet citizens of them . . . .

Was everything possible done to reeducate Luzin, and people like him in the Academy of Sciences? And can methods such as the article in Pravda attain this g o a l ? . . .

In general how did you go about reconstructing the Academy? You began by selecting party comrades for the Academy. This would be the best method if among the party members there were strong scholars. Leaving aside the social sciences, our party academicians are much weaker than the academicians of the older generations, and their influence is therefore small . . . . Our principal scientific capital continues to be the older generation . . . .

Having in hand the economic achievements and polit- ical gains of our country, I don' t understand why one cannot reeducate any academician, no matter whom, if only one proceeds in a considerate and individual manner. Recall, for example, the case of Pavlov . . . . [Ed- itor's note: see below.]

From these considerat ions . . . I see in the Pravda article only a hostile step towards our science and our Academy, since it does not reeducate our scholars and does not raise their prestige in the country.

And Luzin's name is sufficiently well known in the West that such an article will not pass unnoticed. The ar- ticle is weak and unconvincing, and can give rise to . . . ridicule.

Seeing the harm that all this does to science in the So- viet Union, I felt that I had to write you about this.

A day or two later a m e s s e n g e r arr ived at Kapi tsa ' s inst i tute wi th a package f rom Molotov for Kapitsa. Ka- pi tsa was at his dacha, in the village of Zhukovka , and the m e s s e n g e r w e n t t h e r e . K a p i t s a o p e n e d the package and found inside his o w n letter. In the u p p e r left corner of the first page, in a precise handwri t ing , were the words: " N o t wan ted , re turn to citizen Ka- pitsa. V. M o l o t o v . " Kapi t sa was ve ry a n g r y at Mo- lo tov 's answer , and in his archives there is the draft of a letter to Stalin abou t it. The letter was neve r sent, however .

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After the Pravda articles meetings were held in uni- versifies and scientific institutes to discuss the articles. A commission was set up in the Academy to study the case. The commission's report is given in Pravda, Aug. 6, 1936, p. 3. Among other things Luzin is accused of publishing, without credit, results due to various stu- dents of his, including Suslin, Aleksandrov, Kolmo- gorov, Lavrent'ev, and Novikov (see point 5 in the re- port). Also, there is reference to Luzin's refusal in 1930

Luzin lost his position in the university but was not expelled from the Academy of Sciences.

to sign a letter of protest to French scientists for inter- fering in Soviet affairs. The French, and others in western Europe, were protesting the trial of the so- called Industrial Party. (See point 4 in the report, and see [Lev].) Luzin lost his position in the university but was not expelled from the Academy of Sciences.

Incidentally, the 1988 issue of Sovetskaya Kultura re- ferred to above has two other letters by Kapitsa. One was written in 1937 to protest the arrest of the physi- cist Fok, and the third was written in 1980, to An- dropov (then head of the KGB) to protest the treat- ment of the physicists Sakharov and Orlov. Kapitsa was in an unusual position when he wrote to Molotov about Luzin. For years Kapitsa had been at Cambridge University, working in the Cavendish Laboratory with Rutherford. The Soviet Union was interested in get- ring him back. Kol'man describes an occasion in the s u m m e r of 1931 w h e n he and Bukharin were at- tending a conference in London. One day they went to Cambridge to see Kapitsa, who invited them home to dinner. After the meal Bukharin tried to convince him to return, and promised him "mountains of gold" if he would return (see [Kol], p. 176, in the chapter entitled "Return to science"). Kapitsa was hesitant, but his wife was against it. Kapitsa spent his summers at his dacha in the Soviet Union. He did this again in 1934, but when he wanted to return to England the Soviet authorities refused permission. He was given his own institute in Moscow, and since he knew they needed him he had a certain independence.

The 1980 letter of Kapitsa describes Lenin's relations with I. P. Pavlov. Pavlov was hostile to Soviet power after the Revolution. He took every opportunity to criticize the authorities, he wore his Tsarist medal, and he crossed himself whenever he passed a church. Lenin simply paid no attention to all this. For Lenin, Pavlov was a great scholar and Lenin did everything possible to provide him with good working condi- tions. In the early 1920s the food situation was cata- strophic in Petrograd, but Lenin ordered that Pavlov's

dogs should receive their full food rations. Kapitsa re- members Academician A. N. Krylov telling him of how he bumped into Pavlov one day and said to him: "Ivan Petrovi~, may I ask a favor of you? . . . . Natu- rally," Pavlov replied. "Please take me as one of your dogs."

Finally we say a few words about Kol'man, who was mentioned above, and also in this column, vol. 10, no. 3, for his defense of the plant breeder and "geneticist" Lysenko against Kolmogorov. Kol'man (1892-1979) was born in Prague in a middle-class German Jewish family. He received his doctorate at the Charles Uni- versity in Prague, was mobilized into the Austro-Hun- garian army, and sent to the Russian front, where he was captured in 1916. He supported the Bolshevik rev- olution, joined the Communist Party, and stayed in the Soviet Union. He was connected for a time with the Institute of Red Professors, and with the Marx- Engels-Lenin Institute. After the Second World War he returned to Prague. In 1948, following the change in government in Czechoslovakia, he was arrested and deported to Moscow, where he spent three and a half years in Lubyanka Prison. After being released he took up science writing again.

In 1953 Kol'man was apparently the first (in the So- viet Union) to defend cybernetics, which had been much disparaged (see [Gr]). He returned to Prague where he took a critical attitude to the entry of Soviet troops in 1968. Eventually he emigrated to Sweden, where he published in memoirs (see [Kol]), in German and Russian, under the title We shouM not have lived that way. The memoirs have a list of all persons cited - - the re is no mention of Egorov or Luzin. There are three references to Kolmogorov--first that Kolmo- gorov and Aleksandrov read in manuscript a book of Kol'man in 1937, second that in 1974 they joined the chorus denouncing Solzhenitsyn when he was ex- pelled from the Soviet Union, and third that Kolmo- gorov had first (October 1956) been negative towards cybernetics, and then in April 1957 changed his mind and supported it. One must conclude that the title of his book does not refer to any change of heart toward his role in the attacks on Egorov and Luzin.

Bibliography [Kol] Arnogt (Ernes0 Kol'man, We should not have lived

that way, New York: Chalidze Publications (1982). [Rus- sian].

[Gr] L.R. Graham, Science and philosophy in the Soviet Union, New York: A. Knopf (1972).

[Lev] Aleksey E. Levin, Anatomy of a public campaign: "Academician Luzin's case" in Soviet political history, preprint.

Mat 40 [1959] Matematika v SSSR za sorok let, 1917-1957, vol. I, II, Gos. izdat, fiz.-mat, lit., Moscow- Leningrad (1959). (Russian).

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