This Seminar began in Moscow in November 1943 and has continued without interruption up to the present. We are happy that with this vol ume, Birkhiiuser has begun to publish papers of talks from the Seminar. It was, unfortunately, difficult to organize their publication before 1990. Since 1990, most of the talks have taken place at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Parallel seminars were also held in Moscow, and during July, 1992, at IRES in Bures-sur-Yvette, France. Speakers were invited to submit papers in their own style, and to elaborate on what they discussed in the Seminar. We hope that readers will find the diversity of styles appealing, and recognize that to some extent this reflects the diversity of styles in a mathematical society. The principal aim was to have interesting talks, even if the topic was not especially popular at the time. The papers listed in the Table of Contents reflect some of the rich variety of ideas presented in the Seminar. Not all the speakers submit ted papers. Among the interesting talks that influenced the seminar in an important way, let us mention, for example, that of R. Langlands on per colation theory and those of J. Conway and J. McKay on sporadic groups. In addition, there were many extemporaneous talks as well as short discus sions."

The Seminar has taken place at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, since 1990 and it has become a tradition, starting in 1992, that the Seminar be held during July at IHES in Bures-sur-Yvette, France. This is the second Gelfand Seminar volume published by Birkhauser, the first having covered the years 1990-1992. Most of the papers in this volume result from Seminar talks at Rutgers, and some from talks at IHES. In the case of a few of the papers the authors did not attend, but the papers are in the spirit of the Seminar. This is true in particular of V. Arnold's paper. He has been connected with the Seminar for so many years that his paper is very natural in this volume, and we are happy to have it included here. We hope that many people will find something of interest to them in the special diversity of topics and the uniqueness of spirit represented here. The publication of this volume would be impossible without the devoted attention of Ann Kostant. We are extremely grateful to her. I. Gelfand J. Lepowsky M. Smirnov Questions and Answers About Geometric Evolution Processes and Crystal Growth Fred Almgren We discuss evolutions of solids driven by boundary curvatures and crystal growth with Gibbs-Thomson curvature effects. Geometric measure theo retic techniques apply both to smooth elliptic surface energies and to non differentiable crystalline surface energies."

After reading the manuscript, some biologists inquired why, on the basis of the broad experimental material presented in this book, we had not come up with a model describing the operation of the cerebellum. To answer this question, we decided to write a preface to our book. How the nervous system copes with the complexity of the world is one of the central problems of neurophys iology. The question was clearly formulated for the frrst time by N. A. Bernstein. Considering the problem of motor control, he pointed out that the main objective of motor coordination is to overcome the redundant number of degrees of freedom of the motor apparatus or, in other words, to diminish the number of independent variables which control the movement (Bernstein 1967). These I. M. Gelfand and M. L. Zetlin ideas were further developed by (Gelfand and Zetlin 1966). They proposed, in particular, the "non-individualized" ("non-addressed") mode of control in complex systems, where only the highest levels of the system have the full notion about the fmal task while the main "effectors" act on the basis of very limited information. These propositions were made by Gelfand and Zetlin in a very general form, but, nevertheless, proved to be fruitful in determining the direction of experimental research. For instance, the discovery of the "locomotory region" of the brain stem (Shik et al."

Irene Dorfman died in Moscow on April 6, 1994, shortly after seeing her beautiful book on Dirac structures [I]. The present volume contains a collection of papers aiming at celebrating her outstanding contributions to mathematics. Her most important discoveries are associated with the algebraic structures arising in the study of integrable equations. Most of the articles contained in this volume are in the same spirit. Irene, working as a student of Israel Gel'fand made the fundamental dis- covery that integrability is closely related to the existence of bi-Hamiltonian structures [2], [3]. These structures were discovered independently, and al- most simultaneously, by Magri [4] (see also [5]). Several papers in this book are based on this remarkable discovery. In particular Fokas, Olver, Rosenau construct large classes on integrable equations using bi-Hamiltonian struc- tures, Fordy, Harris derive such structures by considering the restriction of isospectral flows to stationary manifolds and Fuchssteiner discusses similar structures in a rather abstract setting.

It is very tempting but a little bit dangerous to compare the style of two great mathematicians or of their schools. I think that it would be better to compare papers from both schools dedicated to one area, geometry and to leave conclusions to a reader of this volume. The collaboration of these two schools is not new. One of the best mathematics journals Functional Analysis and its Applications had I.M. Gelfand as its chief editor and V.I. Arnold as vice-chief editor. Appearances in one issue of the journal presenting remarkable papers from seminars of Arnold and Gelfand always left a strong impact on all of mathematics. We hope that this volume will have a similar impact. Papers from Arnold's seminar are devoted to three important directions developed by his school: Symplectic Geometry (F. Lalonde and D. McDuff), Theory of Singularities and its applications (F. Aicardi, I. Bogaevski, M. Kazarian), Geometry of Curves and Manifolds (S. Anisov, V. Chekanov, L. Guieu, E. Mourre and V. Ovsienko, S. Gusein-Zade and S. Natanzon). A little bit outside of these areas is a very interesting paper by M. Karoubi Produit cyclique d'espaces et operations de Steenrod.

It is very tempting but a little bit dangerous to compare the style of two great mathematicians or of their schools. I think that it would be better to compare papers from both schools dedicated to one area, geometry and to leave conclusions to a reader of this volume. The collaboration of these two schools is not new. One of the best mathematics journals Functional Analysis and its Applications had I.M. Gelfand as its chief editor and V.I. Arnold as vice-chief editor. Appearances in one issue of the journal presenting remarkable papers from seminars of Arnold and Gelfand always left a strong impact on all of mathematics. We hope that this volume will have a similar impact. Papers from Arnold's seminar are devoted to three important directions developed by his school: Symplectic Geometry (F. Lalonde and D. McDuff), Theory of Singularities and its applications (F. Aicardi, I. Bogaevski, M. Kazarian), Geometry of Curves and Manifolds (S. Anisov, V. Chekanov, L. Guieu, E. Mourre and V. Ovsienko, S. Gusein-Zade and S. Natanzon). A little bit outside of these areas is a very interesting paper by M. Karoubi Produit cyclique d'espaces et operations de Steenrod.

The Seminar has taken place at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, since 1990 and it has become a tradition, starting in 1992, that the Seminar be held during July at IHES in Bures-sur-Yvette, France. This is the second Gelfand Seminar volume published by Birkhauser, the first having covered the years 1990-1992. Most of the papers in this volume result from Seminar talks at Rutgers, and some from talks at IHES. In the case of a few of the papers the authors did not attend, but the papers are in the spirit of the Seminar. This is true in particular of V. Arnold's paper. He has been connected with the Seminar for so many years that his paper is very natural in this volume, and we are happy to have it included here. We hope that many people will find something of interest to them in the special diversity of topics and the uniqueness of spirit represented here. The publication of this volume would be impossible without the devoted attention of Ann Kostant. We are extremely grateful to her. I. Gelfand J. Lepowsky M. Smirnov Questions and Answers About Geometric Evolution Processes and Crystal Growth Fred Almgren We discuss evolutions of solids driven by boundary curvatures and crystal growth with Gibbs-Thomson curvature effects. Geometric measure theo retic techniques apply both to smooth elliptic surface energies and to non differentiable crystalline surface energies."

This Seminar began in Moscow in November 1943 and has continued without interruption up to the present. We are happy that with this vol ume, Birkhiiuser has begun to publish papers of talks from the Seminar. It was, unfortunately, difficult to organize their publication before 1990. Since 1990, most of the talks have taken place at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Parallel seminars were also held in Moscow, and during July, 1992, at IRES in Bures-sur-Yvette, France. Speakers were invited to submit papers in their own style, and to elaborate on what they discussed in the Seminar. We hope that readers will find the diversity of styles appealing, and recognize that to some extent this reflects the diversity of styles in a mathematical society. The principal aim was to have interesting talks, even if the topic was not especially popular at the time. The papers listed in the Table of Contents reflect some of the rich variety of ideas presented in the Seminar. Not all the speakers submit ted papers. Among the interesting talks that influenced the seminar in an important way, let us mention, for example, that of R. Langlands on per colation theory and those of J. Conway and J. McKay on sporadic groups. In addition, there were many extemporaneous talks as well as short discus sions."

"All through both volumes [Functions & Graphs and The Methods of Coordinates], one finds a careful description of the step-by-step thinking process that leads up to the correct definition of a concept or to an argument that clinches in the proof of a theorem. We are ... very fortunate that an account of this caliber has finally made it to printed pages... Anyone who has taken this guided tour will never be intimidated by n ever again... High school students (or teachers) reading through these two books would learn an enormous amount of good mathematics. More importantly, they would also get a glimpse of how mathematics is done." -- H. Wu, The Mathematical Intelligencer The need for improved mathematics education at the high school and college levels has never been more apparent than in the 1990's. As early as the 1960's, I.M. Gelfand and his colleagues in the USSR thought hard about this same question and developed a style for presenting basic mathematics in a clear and simple form that engaged the curiosity and intellectual interest of thousands of high school and college students. These same ideas, this development, are available in the following books to any student who is willing to read, to be stimulated, and to learn. Functions and Graphs provides instruction in transferring formulas and data into geometrical form. Thus, drawing graphs is shown to be one way to "see" formulas and functions and to observe the ways in which they change. This skill is fundamental to the study of calculus and other mathematical topics. Teachers of mathematics will find here a fresh understanding of the subject and a valuable path to the training of students in mathematical concepts and skills.Contents Preface Foreword Introduction Chapter 1 Examples Chapter 2 The Linear Function Chapter 3 The Function y =] x ] Chapter 4 The Quadratic Equation Chapter 5 The Linear Fractional Function Chapter 6 Power Functions Chapter 7 Rational Functions Problems for Independent Solution Answers and Hints to Problems Marked with the Sign

"All through both volumes [Functions & Graphs and The Methods of Coordinates], one finds a careful description of the step-by-step thinking process that leads up to the correct definition of a concept or to an argument that clinches in the proof of a theorem. We are ... very fortunate that an account of this caliber has finally made it to printed pages... Anyone who has taken this guided tour will never be intimidated by n ever again... High school students (or teachers) reading through these two books would learn an enormous amount of good mathematics. More importantly, they would also get a glimpse of how mathematics is done." -- H. Wu, The Mathematical Intelligencer The need for improved mathematics education at the high school and college levels has never been more apparent than in the 1990's. As early as the 1960's, I.M. Gelfand and his colleagues in the USSR thought hard about this same question and developed a style for presenting basic mathematics in a clear and simple form that engaged the curiosity and intellectual interest of thousands of high school and college students. These same ideas, this development, are available in the following books to any student who is willing to read, to be stimulated, and to learn. The Method of Coordinates is a way of transferring geometric images into formulas, a method for describing pictures by numbers and letters denoting constants and variables. It is fundamental to the study of calculus and other mathematical topics. Teachers of mathematics will find here a fresh understanding of the subject and a valuable path to the training of students in mathematical concepts and skills. Contents Preface Foreword Introduction PART I Chapter 1 TheCoordinates of Points on a Line 1. The Number Axis 2. The Absolute Value of Number 3. The Distance Between Two Points Chapter 2 The Coordinates of Points in the Plane 4. The Coordinate Plane 5. Relations Connecting Coordinates 6. The Distance Between Two Points 7. Defining Figures 8. We Begin to Solve Problems 9. Other Systems of Coordinates Chapter 3 The Coordinates of a Point in Space 10. Coordinate Axes and Planes 11. Defining Figures in Space PART II Chapter 1 Introduction 1. Some General Considerations 2. Geometry as an Aid in Calculation 3. The Need for Introducing Four-Dimensional Space 4. The Peculiarities of Four-Dimensional Space 5. Some Physics Chapter 2 Four-Dimensional Space 6. Coordinate Axes and Planes 7. Some Problems Chapter 3 The Four-Dimensional Cube 8. The Definition of the Sphere and the Cube 9. The Structure of the Four-Dimensional Cube 10. Problems on the Cube

This book is about algebra. This is a very old science and its gems have lost their charm for us through everyday use. We have tried in this book to refresh them for you. The main part of the book is made up of problems. The best way to deal with them is: Solve the problem by yourself - compare your solution with the solution in the book (if it exists) - go to the next problem. However, if you have difficulties solving a problem (and some of them are quite difficult), you may read the hint or start to read the solution. If there is no solution in the book for some problem, you may skip it (it is not heavily used in the sequel) and return to it later. The book is divided into sections devoted to different topics. Some of them are very short, others are rather long. Of course, you know arithmetic pretty well. However, we shall go through it once more, starting with easy things. 2 Exchange of terms in addition Let's add 3 and 5: 3]5=8. And now change the order: 5+3=8. We get the same result. Adding three apples to five apples is the same as adding five apples to three - apples do not disappear and we get eight of them in both cases. 3 Exchange of terms in multiplication Multiplication has a similar property. But let us first agree on notation.

In a sense, trigonometry sits at the center of high school mathematics. It originates in the study of geometry when we investigate the ratios of sides in similar right triangles, or when we look at the relationship between a chord of a circle and its arc. It leads to a much deeper study of periodic functions, and of the so-called transcendental functions, which cannot be described using finite algebraic processes. It also has many applications to physics, astronomy, and other branches of science. It is a very old subject. Many of the geometric results that we now state in trigonometric terms were given a purely geometric exposition by Euclid. Ptolemy, an early astronomer, began to go beyond Euclid, using the geometry of the time to construct what we now call tables of values of trigonometric functions. Trigonometry is an important introduction to calculus, where one stud ies what mathematicians call analytic properties of functions. One of the goals of this book is to prepare you for a course in calculus by directing your attention away from particular values of a function to a study of the function as an object in itself. This way of thinking is useful not just in calculus, but in many mathematical situations. So trigonometry is a part of pre-calculus, and is related to other pre-calculus topics, such as exponential and logarithmic functions, and complex numbers."

2012 Reprint of 1963 Edition. Exact facsimile of the original edition, not reproduced with Optical Recognition Software. Gelfand was a Soviet mathematician who made major contributions to many branches of mathematics, including group theory, representation theory and functional analysis. The recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the Order of Lenin and the Wolf Prize, he was a Fellow of the Royal Society and a lifelong academic, serving decades as a professor at Moscow State University and, after immigrating to the United States shortly before his 76th birthday, at the Busch Campus of New Jersey's Rutgers University. He is known for having educated and inspired generations of students through his legendary seminar at Moscow State University. This treatise is devoted to the description and detailed study of the representations of the rotation group of three dimensional space and of the Lorentz group. These groups are of fundamental importance in theoretical physics. The book is also designed for mathematicians studying the representations of Lie groups. For them the book can serve as in introduction to the general theory of representations.

The second in a series of systematic studies by a celebrated mathematician I. M. Gelfand and colleagues, this volume presents students with a well-illustrated sequence of problems and exercises designed to illuminate the properties of functions and graphs. (See below for details of other books in this series.) Since readers do not have the benefit of a blackboard on which a teacher constructs a graph, the authors abandoned the customary use of diagrams in which only the final form of the graph appears; instead, the book's margins feature step-by-step diagrams for the complete construction of each graph. The first part of the book employs simple functions to analyze the fundamental methods of constructing graphs. The second half deals with more complicated and refined questions concerning linear functions, quadratic trinomials, linear fractional functions, power functions, and rational functions. Unabridged republication of edition published by The M.I.T. Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1969. Foreword. Introduction. Problems for Independent Solution.

Dedicated to the memory of Chih-Han Sah, this volume continues a long tradition of one of the most influential mathematical seminars of this century. A number of topics are covered, including combinatorial geometry, connections between logic and geometry, Lie groups, algebras and their representations. An additional area of importance is noncommutative algebra and geometry, and its relations to modern physics. Distinguished mathematicians contributing to this work: T.V. Alekseevskaya V. Kac A.V. Borovik A. Kazarnovsky-Krol C.-H. Sah* M. Kontsevich G. Cherlin A. Radul J.L. Dupont A.L. Rosenberg I.M. Gelfand N. White The Gelfand Mathematical Seminar volumes stimulate the birth of significant ideas in contemporary mathematics and remain invaluable reference material. * indicates deceased contributor (Production: please ensure that appropriate symbol be incorporated onto the final back cover design)

The first systematic theory of generalized functions (also known as distributions) was created in the early 1950s, although some aspects were developed much earlier, most notably in the definition of the Green's function in mathematics and in the work of Paul Dirac on quantum electrodynamics in physics. The six-volume collection, Generalized Functions, written by I. M. Gelfand and co-authors and published in Russian between 1958 and 1966, gives an introduction to generalized functions and presents various applications to analysis, PDE, stochastic processes, and representation theory. The main goal of Volume 4 is to develop the functional analysis setup for the universe of generalized functions. The main notion introduced in this volume is the notion of rigged Hilbert space (also known as the equipped Hilbert space, or Gelfand triple). Such space is, in fact, a triple of topological vector spaces $E \subset H \subset E'$, where $H$ is a Hilbert space, $E'$ is dual to $E$, and inclusions $E\subset H$ and $H\subset E'$ are nuclear operators. The book is devoted to various applications of this notion, such as the theory of positive definite generalized functions, the theory of generalized stochastic processes, and the study of measures on linear topological spaces.

The first systematic theory of generalized functions (also known as distributions) was created in the early 1950s, although some aspects were developed much earlier, most notably in the definition of the Green's function in mathematics and in the work of Paul Dirac on quantum electrodynamics in physics. The six-volume collection, Generalized Functions, written by I. M. Gelfand and co-authors and published in Russian between 1958 and 1966, gives an introduction to generalized functions and presents various applications to analysis, PDE, stochastic processes, and representation theory. The unifying idea of Volume 5 in the series is the application of the theory of generalized functions developed in earlier volumes to problems of integral geometry, to representations of Lie groups, specifically of the Lorentz group, and to harmonic analysis on corresponding homogeneous spaces. The book is written with great clarity and requires little in the way of special previous knowledge of either group representation theory or integral geometry; it is also independent of the earlier volumes in the series. The exposition starts with the definition, properties, and main results related to the classical Radon transform, passing to integral geometry in complex space, representations of the group of complex unimodular matrices of second order, and harmonic analysis on this group and on most important homogeneous spaces related to this group. The volume ends with the study of representations of the group of real unimodular matrices of order two.

The first systematic theory of generalized functions (also known as distributions) was created in the early 1950s, although some aspects were developed much earlier, most notably in the definition of the Green's function in mathematics and in the work of Paul Dirac on quantum electrodynamics in physics. The six-volume collection, Generalized Functions, written by I. M. Gelfand and co-authors and published in Russian between 1958 and 1966, gives an introduction to generalized functions and presents various applications to analysis, PDE, stochastic processes, and representation theory.

The first systematic theory of generalized functions (also known as distributions) was created in the early 1950s, although some aspects were developed much earlier, most notably in the definition of the Green's function in mathematics and in the work of Paul Dirac on quantum electrodynamics in physics. The six-volume collection, Generalized Functions, written by I. M. Gelfand and co-authors and published in Russian between 1958 and 1966, gives an introduction to generalized functions and presents various applications to analysis, PDE, stochastic processes, and representation theory. The unifying theme of Volume 6 is the study of representations of the general linear group of order two over various fields and rings of number-theoretic nature, most importantly over local fields ($p$-adic fields and fields of power series over finite fields) and over the ring of adeles. Representation theory of the latter group naturally leads to the study of automorphic functions and related number-theoretic problems. The book contains a wealth of information about discrete subgroups and automorphic representations, and can be used both as a very good introduction to the subject and as a valuable reference.

The first systematic theory of generalized functions (also known as distributions) was created in the early 1950s, although some aspects were developed much earlier, most notably in the definition of the Green's function in mathematics and in the work of Paul Dirac on quantum electrodynamics in physics. The six-volume collection, Generalized Functions, written by I. M. Gelfand and co-authors and published in Russian between 1958 and 1966, gives an introduction to generalized functions and presents various applications to analysis, PDE, stochastic processes, and representation theory. Volume 2 is devoted to detailed study of generalized functions as linear functionals on appropriate spaces of smooth test functions. In Chapter 1, the authors introduce and study countable-normed linear topological spaces, laying out a general theoretical foundation for the analysis of spaces of generalized functions. The two most important classes of spaces of test functions are spaces of compactly supported functions and Schwartz spaces of rapidly decreasing functions. In Chapters 2 and 3 of the book, the authors transfer many results presented in Volume 1 to generalized functions corresponding to these more general spaces. Finally, Chapter 4 is devoted to the study of the Fourier transform; in particular, it includes appropriate versions of the Paley-Wiener theorem.

The unifying theme of this collection of papers by the very creative Russian mathematician I. M. Gelfand and his co-workers is the representation theory of groups and lattices. Two of the papers were inspired by application to theoretical physics; the others are pure mathematics though all the papers will interest mathematicians at quite opposite ends of the subject. Dr. G. Segal and Professor C-M. Ringel have written introductions to the papers which explain the background, put them in perspective and make them accessible to those with no specialist knowledge in the area.