 We're at ICTP with Professor Ken Ono, a renowned number theorist. He gave a beautiful basic notion seminar yesterday, which will soon be posted on this YouTube channel. But maybe we can start with a more general question. I think it's a mystery to many people outside of mathematics what it means to do math. And I think that's a hard question to address, but perhaps you could tell us what motivated you to study math, and in particular, number theory. Oh boy. Well, the first part of that question is easy for me to answer. My father is a mathematician. He was a professor at Johns Hopkins for many years. And so I've been around people doing math my entire life. But I have to say, growing up as a kid, the last thing I wanted to be was a mathematician. And so I spent many years thinking that I would try to do something else only to complete the circle and end up pursuing an undergraduate degree at the University of Chicago in mathematics. And well, here I am. You know, I think it's a lovely lifestyle. I like the challenge of solving problems. I like these personal challenges. And so I think that's more or less how it started. What drew you, in particular, to number theory as a topic? Well, so then it was also pretty simple. My father was a number theorist. And so growing up, I learned about Gauss. My father taught me Fermat's little theorem when I was in elementary school. I even knew the proof of Fermat's last theorem in elementary school because my father taught it to me in a beautiful way. And so for me, mathematics was number theory for most of my, most of my childhood. And so once I decided I wanted to go into mathematics, I guess that background and exposure to number theory just made it the natural place to go. And you're here visiting this week in conjunction with the Ramanujan Prize ceremony. Oh, yes, it's been lovely. We just gave the prize to Professor Zhu. He works in algebraic geometry and absolutely deserving winner. He gave a wonderful lecture this morning and he is now a world leader in the field. The prize is working. And this prize is an annual award given to a young researcher in mathematics. And perhaps we could talk about the man after whom this prize is named. Ramanujan. Yes. I just pointed out that we have a tendency to mispronounce his name in the Western world. Right. It's often pronounced Ramanujan. So Ramanujan is how I would pronounce it. And if you were to go to the lush villages of South India, you'll hear something else, probably much closer than my pronunciation, Ramanujan, than Ramanujan. So I say Ramanujan. So who was Ramanujan? Wow. I made a film about Ramanujan called The Man Who Knew Infinity. I want Ramanujan as do the other producers of the film. We want him to be a household name for many reasons. And let me highlight just two of them. In science, science usually proceeds by the work of thousands slowly adding to a body of knowledge. That's what I do. That's what most of us do who are professional scientists. But every once in a while, someone will come along with ideas that are so revolutionary that they drive forward, really propel forward fields. Often this doesn't happen until long after they're no longer alive. So think Einstein. Think Newton. And for me in number theory, I think we should add Ramanujan to this list. Ramanujan left behind three shabby notebooks. We're still studying them today. It's a hundred years after his death. And the lecture I gave yesterday is a testament to how it might take a hundred years to understand that Ramanujan's formulas are only glimpses of big theories. Theories called Umbral Moon Shine, or the Ramanujan conjectures, which play a central role in the Langlands program. Even the proof of Ramanujan's last theorem, which makes use of the theory of Galois representations, Jean-Pierre Serre, when he was formulating what should be the basic ground rules of this theory, he took suggestions from Ramanujan's formulas. And all of these recent discoveries, none of us could have imagined if we were alive in 1915 would be the future of Ramanujan's work. So Ramanujan, I think, should be a household name because of his scientific contributions, his suggestions to us, the mathematicians of his future. But there's another reason why I think he should be a household name, because in Ramanujan, what do we have? We have a man who was a two-time college dropout. That's not what you typically expect of important scientists. We have a man who was Indian who lived at a time when his family, his neighbors, he was an Indian who was subjugated by British colonists. He was a man who died very young at the age of 32. Everything about this man speaks of how you have in him an example of a role model who overcame tremendous disadvantages. Had Ramanujan never been brought into the light, all of the science that I've just discussed would have never happened, or at least not would have happened in a very different way. And for young students, young postdocs, young professors, young people, we get a lot of hope from that story. And I don't think you need to appreciate as mathematics to recognize that we have a lot to thank Ramanujan for, because, well, he succeeded despite his disadvantages. And I worry today about our educational systems, which are very inelastic. And it's good for us to remember his story, because, well, I think it's important for us to seek out similarly talented people, the visionaries. And instead of making them succeed within our inelastic systems, let's try to find a way to bring them into the light so that, well, for the benefit of all science. And you called him yesterday a true genius. He had no formal mathematical training. That's right. Well, before Hardy. Before Hardy. But he's sort of, this correspondence with the English mathematician Hardy really brought him into the Society of Mathematicians, and I think it is still difficult today for many people in developing countries, and without necessarily the mathematical infrastructure or network that perhaps more developed countries share. Right. So I think places like ICTP or the IMU are doing a wonderful job of developing programs that are global. So in fact, the point of the Ramanujan Prize is to reward excellent research by a researcher who comes from a developing nation. But there are many other activities that ICTP and the IMU are actively developing, including the formation of institutes in Africa. I am part of an initiative called the Spirit of Ramanujan Initiative, where we're seeking to find younger talent before they have started to do their independent research. We want to cultivate that talent. And of course, we live at a time where the internet is a wonderful thing. And so we hope to find many Ramanujans. Recently, you were both a producer and a mathematical consultant for the film The Man Who Knew Infinity. Yeah, it's crazy. I can't believe I mentioned that. How was it combining mathematics and Hollywood? These don't mix very well. And so I'm glad they don't mix well, because I meant I had a job for you. So there's several things that I'd like to say about that. First of all, Matt Brown, who is the writer-director of the film The Man Who Knew Infinity, he is an intellectual. He read Robert Canagall's famous book The Man Who Knew Infinity on Ramanujan and wrote a lovely screenplay. And his film is about the story of two very different men, the Indian Ramanujan and the elite Cambridge professor in Hardy. And he was fascinated by how two very different men could work together, the mentoring of Ramanujan, the genius of Ramanujan, and so forth. That's really the story of the film. But I'm delighted that Matt wanted to get the science right. Maybe one of the first films, maybe the first film where the attention to the detail in mathematics and the science was almost equally as important as portraying the human story. So that's where I came in. And yeah, so the mathematical formulas in the film, the mathematics in the screenplay, I'm responsible for that. It was fun thinking through what to choose from, and I participated in the rehearsals which was hard work. Jeremy Irons, who is, he's a British icon. He really elevated the level of our project. He helped us work the script in a way that made it possible for him to really play a perfect Hardy. Hardy was in his 30s at the time, and Jeremy is certainly much older. But apart from that, I think Jeremy was the perfect G.H. Hardy, and it was a wonderful time for me working with Dev Patel, who was our Ramanujan, and Jeremy Irons, who was our Hardy, to tell the story. And I think as any truly expert actor will tell you, they really need to feel and understand the story before they can play their part. And so we spent days in rehearsal working the script so that they understood the film and the story. And that's an experience that I can't believe I actually had. It was an opportunity to help mold something artistic when beforehand I would have never thought that anyone would care what a mathematician thought about arts and storytelling. So yeah, it was wonderful. And there is sort of sometimes a fear and detachment from math in society. And I think this is even sometimes in the education system. Do you think that sort of math in pop culture can help shape or change this attitude? It's funny that you mentioned this. The question you asked was asked of Jeremy just last Friday at the White House. We screened the film at the White House as part of an event on education in math and science. And I spoke there along with Jeremy. And the question you asked was asked of him, and he gave the most beautiful answer. He started by saying I always thought of mathematics as a cold subject and an inhuman subject. And then he went on to say that because of this film, he began to see that mathematics is like an art. It is like poetry. And when put to good use is important for solving the world's problems. And having these famous Hollywood actors not just buy into this, but begin to support the effort. And Jeremy did not have to go to the White House to talk about math education. But he's done it. He didn't have to participate in these television shows promoting math and science. But he's been a wonderful trooper. He's been on many national television programs. He was on a show with Neil deGrasse Tyson called Star Talk Promoting Math and Science. And so what better evidence can I offer than saying that we've got a world-class Hollywood actor taking time out encouraging people to study math and science, just like he was encouraged to study film and theater as a young boy? I think that's great. I hope it goes some way, but I think this will be a challenge for mathematicians and scientists moving forward. So, speaking of pop culture, there is a common perception of a mathematician as a man, a lonely man in a room scribbling symbols, not much socializing, and this is not true of mathematicians in general. And as a young mathematician, it's very refreshing to meet someone like you two who I know has a variety of interests. Not only are you now in the movie business, but you're a serious athlete. So maybe you could speak to maintaining this balance in life. Well, balance in life. Physical exercise for me is a need. If one of the first things I think when I wake up in the morning is when am I going to get my workout in? I think I would be very unhappy if I didn't exercise. And this is something that goes back to when I was in my early teens. I used to race bicycles, I loved it, and I still run almost every day now, and so for me it's a physical need, but it's also a scientific need. That's when I do some of my best work. When I'm cycling, mountain biking or running, there's no cell phone with me, I don't have to read email, and a one-hour trail run alone with my thoughts is really valuable. So that is important to me. Having students, I love having students, and I don't like the word student, because a student is taught by a teacher or professor. I don't call me a professor, I don't call me a teacher. Dear friends, you share so much in a real intimate time with your students, and it's an opportunity. One of the great things about being a professor is that you spend a lot of time around young people who are in the active phase of becoming who they will become. What more exciting time in life is there than to participate in that? And so yeah, for me, sitting alone in a room with a yellow pad of paper, that sounds awful, that sounds cold and uninviting and uninteresting. So we should do everything we can to show that mathematics doesn't have to be done that way. Okay, well thank you very much for your time. Okay, alright, thank you very much. Thank you. Yeah.