mathematics

Georg Alexander Pick

Georg Alexander Pick is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Georg Alexander Pick rather than just read about it. In short: Georg Alexander Pick (10 August 1859 – 26 July 1942) was an Austrian Jewish mathematician who was murdered during The Holocaust. He was born in Vienna to Josefa Schleisinger and Adolf Josef Pick and died at Theresienstadt concentration camp.

Key takeaways

Georg Alexander Pick belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Georg Alexander Pick to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Georg Alexander Pick from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Georg Alexander Pick (10 August 1859 – 26 July 1942) was an Austrian Jewish mathematician who was murdered during The Holocaust. He was born in Vienna to Josefa Schleisinger and Adolf Josef Pick and died at Theresienstadt concentration camp. Today he is best known for Pick's theorem for determining the area of lattice polygons. He published it in an article in 1899; it was popularized when Hugo Dyonizy Steinhaus included it in the 1969 edition of Mathematical Snapshots. He was described as follows: "Pick was a bachelor ... uncommonly correct in clothes and attitude."

Education and career Pick studied at the University of Vienna and defended his Ph.D. in 1880 under Leo Königsberger and Emil Weyr. After receiving his doctorate he was appointed an assistant to Ernst Mach at the Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague. He became a lecturer there in 1881. He took a leave from the university in 1884 during which he worked with Felix Klein at the University of Leipzig. Other than that year, he remained in Prague until his retirement in 1927 at which time he returned to Vienna. Pick headed the committee at the (then) German university of Prague, which appointed Albert Einstein to a chair of mathematical physics in 1911. Pick introduced Einstein to the work of Italian mathematicians Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro and Tullio Levi-Civita in the field of absolute differential calculus, which later in 1915 helped Einstein to successfully formulate general relativity. Charles Loewner was one of his students in Prague. He also directed the doctoral theses of Josef Grünwald, Walter Fröhlich, and Saly Struik. Pick was elected a member of the Czech Academy of Sciences and Arts, but was expelled after Nazis took over Prague. After retiring in 1927, Pick returned to Vienna, the city where he was born. After the Anschluss when the Nazis marched into Austria on 12 March 1938, Pick returned to Prague. In March 1939 the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia. Pick was sent to Theresienstadt concentration camp on 13 July 1942. He died there two weeks later.

See also Nevanlinna–Pick interpolation Pick matrix Pick's theorem

References

External links Georg Alexander Pick at the Mathematics Genealogy Project

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Georg Alexander Pick

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Georg Alexander Pick claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Georg Alexander Pick before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Georg Alexander Pick ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Georg Alexander Pick

In research: Georg Alexander Pick appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Georg Alexander Pick in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Georg Alexander Pick is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1859 births, 1942 deaths, Austrian Jews who died in the Holocaust, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Georg Alexander Pick outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Georg Alexander Pick in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Georg Alexander Pick means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Georg Alexander Pick out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Georg Alexander Pick in simple terms?

Why does Georg Alexander Pick matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Georg Alexander Pick?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Georg Alexander Pick.