04/05/2021

Viana discusses the popularization of mathematics in a live broadcast by SBMAC.

IMPA's Director-General, Marcelo Viana, participated, this Monday (3), in the series of live streams that the Brazilian Society of Applied and Computational Mathematics (SBMAC) is holding together with the Faculty of Sciences of Unesp in Bauru during the week of celebration of National Mathematics Day (May 6). In the conversation, broadcast on SBMAC's YouTube channel , Viana highlighted the importance of popularizing mathematics, in addition to sharing details about his career and the consolidation of Brazilian mathematical research.

The director-general of IMPA recalled his arrival to pursue his doctorate at the institute in 1986 at the invitation of emeritus researcher Jacob Palis. “I was very direct and said I only needed a scholarship. And his response was, 'We have one, come.'” Viana shared that he finds mathematics the most beautiful subject that exists. “In mathematics, everything has rules; you can understand and explain it. The space for debate is finite. There comes a point when someone proves a theorem and that's it, there's nothing left to debate about whether the person believes it or not.”

The first International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) he attended, in 1990 in Japan, was a milestone in his further fascination with the discipline, he revealed. “It was the first time the congress was held in Asia, and more specifically in Kyoto, one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Besides the mathematics and all the rituals of the ICM, there was this fantastic place, full of new experiences. It was so impressive that I must be the only person who has been to every ICM since 1990,” he joked.

Viana also highlighted the rapid advancement of Brazilian mathematics in recent decades, with achievements such as the Fields Medal awarded to Artur Avila, an extraordinary researcher at the institute, in 2014, and Brazil's entry into Group 5 of the International Mathematical Union (IMU) in 2018. “These things don't change our reality and our difficulties, but it's a sign of a great deal of progress made in a very short time. Brazilian mathematics didn't exist in the 1950s.”

The popularization of mathematics was also one of the topics addressed by Viana in the conversation. According to the director-general of IMPA, researchers in the field need to mobilize in this regard. "Many times journalists want to talk about mathematics but are terrified. So, we have to show them how to build this dialogue," he pointed out.

Presenting the subject in an attractive way is one of the focuses of Viana's weekly column in Folha de S.Paulo , recalled Tatiana Miguel, a professor at Unesp in Bauru and one of the moderators of the live event. “Writing the column is a big challenge because the newspaper is for a broad audience, so the language has to be as direct as possible,” commented Viana. “One of the goals of writing the texts is to make people feel better about mathematics.”

The live streams from SBMAC and the Faculty of Sciences at Unesp Bauru, in celebration of National Mathematics Day, will take place throughout this week. More information is available on the organization's social media channels .