Abstract
The first thing that comes to mind in reviewing a new book by Marston Morse on the calculus of variations is that he wrote a book, The calculus of variations in the large, forty years ago. The early book gave the foundations of what is now called Morse theory. The publication of a new book by Morse on the same subject presents an occasion to give some personal perspectives on how this mathematics has developed in the last few decades. I say “personal perspectives” and indeed, I, myself, have been involved in, and inspired by, Morse’s mathematics. For example, three of my papers contain the word Morse in the title. Another mathematician much influenced by Morse, Raoul Bott, was my adviser, and even work of Morse (but not variational theory) suggested to Bott the thesis problem he gave me (leading eventually to my work in immersion theory).
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References
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© 1980 Springer-Verlag New York Inc.
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Smale, S. (1980). Book Reviews. In: The Mathematics of Time. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-8101-3_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-8101-3_7
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
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