André Weil

A new exhibition, available to view in the Institute's Mathematics – Natural Sciences Library and Shelby White and Leon Levy Archives Center, takes a critical look at the notion that mathematics is a single, true, "universal language". The displays probe what it takes to construct meaning in mathematical discourse, while highlighting groundbreaking work by IAS scholars such as Shiing-Shen Chern, Robert Langlands, and Edward Witten.

"Within mathematics, there is a vast and ever expanding web of conjectures, theorems and ideas called the Langlands program. That program links seemingly disconnected subfields. It is such a force that some mathematicians say it—or some aspect of it—belongs in the esteemed ranks of the Millennium Prize Problems, a list of the top open questions in math. Edward Frenkel, a mathematician at the University of California, Berkeley, has even dubbed the Langlands program 'a Grand Unified Theory of Mathematics.'"