newsletter - New Zealand Mathematical Society

interests include spatial statistics, spectral analysis and extreme value methods with applications to
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NOTES FROM A FORDER LECTURER
When Henry George Forder first arrived from England in 1934 to take up his chair in what was then
Auckland University College, it was as the sole professor, with just one lecturer, Keith Bullen, to assist
him. By his retirement in 1955, the College had grown to six staff, Forder had built up an outstanding
library, and had attracted the first few intrepid international mathematical visitors to New Zealand. All of
which is a far cry from the modern Auckland, whose thriving mathematics department, with a staff of
over 50, is very much on the international circuit.
Something of the changes which have taken place in New Zealand can be judged by the fact that during
his whole 21 year tenure, Forder only twice travelled to meet colleagues from elsewhere in the country.
Forder lecturers, on the other hand, have to organise themselves so as to give lectures at all seven New
Zealand universities in the space of 3 –4 weeks. This somewhat daunting undertaking is, fortunately,
amply aided by immense New Zealand hospitality. It is not often that one has the chance to visit so many
institutions in such quick succession, each with, as here, its own unique character.
Times have changed from even a decade ago; email, telephones and aeroplanes have created a world in
which nowhere is very far from anywhere else. Contacts with the outside world are many and strong and
most mathematicians travel regularly to visit overseas colleagues. Even so, by the time you get to
Dunedin (Gaelic for Edinburgh) you become aware that you have come pretty far, a quieter and more
relaxed world than the sprawling modern metropolis which is Auckland.
Forder lecturers traditionally give some public lectures and I have to thank various of my hosts,
particularly Graeme Wake in Christchurch, for organising very well attended evening events. In
Wellington I was interviewed for local radio: the interviewer was so interested in the hot news of how the
parallel postulate led to the discovery of non-Euclidean geometry that I had to repeat it on air. Sales of
Indra's Pearls appear to be up in the southern hemisphere and a pleasing Kleinian fractal appeared on the
cover of the December 2003 Canterbury Mathematics Association Newsletter.
Despite the many years in his adopted country, Forder's loyalty remained with the LMS, so much so that
on his death in 1981, he made the very generous bequest which now funds the lectureship. This
occasioned a certain amount of discussion during my travels: it is a tribute to the growth and development
of the New Zealand mathematics scene that only 25 years later, it is almost impossible to imagine such a
bequest not being made directly to the NZMS. There was much talk about the recently founded New
Zealand Institute for Mathematics and its Applications, directed by Vaughan Jones and Marston Conder.
Unlike most of the institutes now springing up around the world, NZIMA does not have any fixed
location, but exists as a moving organism with maximum flexibility to promote mathematics in any form.
Perhaps this is wise: a hot topic was which of New Zealand's many and spectacular tourist spots would be
the venue for the next conference. Characteristically for New Zealand, they have taken as their logo an
elegant mathematical version of the graceful and ubiquitous tree fern.
In fact I find it impossible to think about New Zealand without rhapsodising about its natural beauty. I
regularly had the sensation of driving straight into a magnificent picture postcard. New Zealand is also a
very educational experience. Having parted company from the rest of the world some 70 million years
ago, it is an object lesson in how things might have been different: there didn't have to be mammals,
(birds could have evolved to take their place); there didn't have to be deciduous trees (New Zealand trees
aren't exactly evergreen either, but something in between). Sitting as it does on the fault line between the
Pacific and Australian plates, the country is an open text book on geology: volcanoes, geysers,
earthquakes, you name it, they have it. And just in case you feel homesick, New Zealand fascinatingly
also sports a full range of English weeds and garden birds. (We may yet find ourselves reimporting song
thrushes: you see more of them there in a week than here in a year.)
New Zealanders have justifiably much pride in this extraordinarily beautiful and unique country.
Mathematics of all kinds is flourishing and I would encourage anyone who has the chance to go there to
do so, perhaps taking advantage of the programmes of the NZIMA, about which you can find more at
www.nzima.auckland.ac.nz.
Caroline Series
Warwick, February 2004
MATHEMATICS-IN-INDUSTRY STUDY GROUP, AUCKLAND, JANUARY 2004: REPORT