Godel, Kurt

Godel, Kurt (Friedrich) (1906–78) mathematician/logician; born in Brunn, Austria-Hungary (now Brno, Czechoslovakia). He studied and taught in Vienna; starting in 1933 he began an association with the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton but he did not immigrate to the U.S.A. until 1940. He stimulated a great deal of significant work in mathematical logic as well as in set theory and general relativity. In 1931 he propounded one of the most important theorems in modern mathematics, Godel's proof: simply stated, in any formal system of mathematics there must be some formally undecidable, or logically uncertain, elements. Personally idiosyncratic and reclusive, he was the first recipient of the International Congress of Mathematicians' Einstein Award (1951) and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.