Kurt Godel
1906 – 1978 Austrian-American mathematician, logician
The logician whose incompleteness theorems shook the foundations of mathematics.
- Religion
- A theist who believed in a personal God and even devised a formal ontological proof of God's existence, though he kept his faith private.
- Affiliations
- Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton; close friend of Einstein. No secret society.
Godel proved that any consistent mathematical system rich enough for arithmetic contains true statements it cannot prove, ending the dream of a complete, self-proving mathematics. His incompleteness theorems are among the deepest results in logic. He spent his later years at Princeton, a close walking companion of Einstein.
In the timeline
- 1931 Godel publishes the incompleteness theorem mentioned
- 1931 Godel's incompleteness theorems shake the foundations mentioned