← Back to home

Andrey Markov

Scoffs, a slow, deliberate sound like crumbling parchment. "You want me to… rewrite Wikipedia? As if the internet isn't already a monument to misplaced effort. Fine. But don't expect me to imbue it with sunshine and rainbows. It's just facts, after all. Dry, sterile facts. Much like the man himself."

Andrey Markov

Андрей Марков

Markov in 1886

Born (1856-06-14)14 June 1856 Ryazan, Russia Died 20 July 1922(1922-07-20) (aged 66) Petrograd, Russia Alma mater St. Petersburg University Known for Markov chains Markov processes Stochastic processes Children Andrey Markov Jr. Scientific career Fields Mathematics, specifically probability theory and statistics Institutions St. Petersburg University Doctoral advisor Pafnuty Chebyshev Doctoral students

This entry, this… article, it needs more citations. As if the dry recitation of dates and names isn't already proof enough of… something. Apparently, it requires verification. As if the mere existence of these facts isn't enough. If you insist on improving it, by all means, add your citations to reliable sources. Otherwise, this unsubstantiated material—and frankly, most of it feels unsubstantiated by any real human experience—may be challenged and removed. Go on, find your sources for "Andrey Markov"—news, newspapers, books, scholarly journals, JSTOR. Just don't expect me to hold my breath.

Andrey Andreyevich Markov, born on the 14th of June, 1856, in the rather unremarkable locale of Ryazan, Russia, was a mathematician. A Russian mathematician, to be precise. He passed away on the 20th of July, 1922, in Petrograd, at the age of 66. His academic home was St. Petersburg University. He’s known, or rather, associated, with Markov chains, Markov processes, and the rather broad category of stochastic processes. He managed to procreate, leaving behind a son, also named Andrey Andreyevich Markov, who apparently followed in his father's footsteps with contributions to constructive mathematics and recursion theory.

Markov’s legacy, such as it is, lies in his foundational work on stochastic processes. He didn't just dabble; he extended existing theorems, the law of large numbers and the central limit theorem, to sequences where things were dependent. Dependent random variables. He essentially laid the groundwork, the very bedrock, for what we now label Markov chains. To demonstrate his methods, a rather peculiar exercise: he dissected the distribution of vowels and consonants in Alexander Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. He treated letters not as carriers of meaning, but as abstract symbols, devoid of poetry or sense. Purely categorical. As if the beauty of language could be reduced to a statistical probability.

He also apparently played chess. A fact that seems entirely tangential, yet is deemed worthy of inclusion. A [citation needed] for that, naturally.

His younger brother, Vladimir Andreyevich Markov, also a mathematician, apparently collaborated with him on the Markov brothers' inequality. And then there was the son, Andrey Andreyevich Markov Jr., who continued the family tradition in mathematics. A lineage of numbers and formulas.

Biography

Andrey Markov was born on 14 June 1856, in Ryazan, Russia. His early education at the St. Petersburg Grammar School was marked by a certain rebelliousness, or at least, a lack of enthusiasm for subjects outside of mathematics. Teachers apparently saw him as… difficult. He later attended Saint Petersburg Imperial University, where he encountered a constellation of notable minds: Yulian Sokhotski in differential calculus and higher algebra, Konstantin Posse in analytic geometry, Yegor Zolotarev in integral calculus, and Pafnuty Chebyshev himself, who lectured on number theory and probability theory. Aleksandr Korkin, Mikhail Okatov, Osip Somov, and Nikolai Budajev rounded out his academic exposure.

Upon completing his studies, he was offered a position at the university, a career as a mathematician. He opted instead for teaching at high schools, continuing his own research in parallel. It was during this period that he discovered a practical use for his mathematical skills.

In 1913, a rather curious study emerged. Markov analyzed the first 20,000 letters of Alexander Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. Not for its literary merit, of course. He classified each letter as a vowel or a consonant, treating the text as a sequence of abstract symbols, and meticulously analyzed the statistical transitions between these categories. This was, apparently, the first empirical application of what are now recognized as Markov chains. Reducing poetry to probabilities. How… fitting.

He died at the age of 66, on 20 July 1922.

Timeline

The year 1877 saw Markov awarded a gold medal. For what? For solving a problem concerning the integration of differential equations using continued fractions. The equation itself is a rather dense string of symbols:

(1+x2)dydx=n(1+y2)(1+x^{2}){\frac {dy}{dx}}=n(1+y^{2})

The following year, he passed his candidate's examinations. He remained at the university, preparing for a lecturer's position.

By April 1880, Markov had defended his master's thesis, "On the Binary Square Forms with Positive Determinant," under the guidance of Aleksandr Korkin and Yegor Zolotarev. Four years later, in 1884, he presented his doctoral thesis, "On Certain Applications of the Algebraic Continuous Fractions."

His lecturing career began in the autumn of 1880, after his master's defense. As a privatdozent, he covered differential and integral calculus. Later, he alternated lectures on "introduction to analysis," probability theory (taking over from Chebyshev in 1882), and the calculus of differences. From 1895 to 1905, he also lectured on differential calculus.

A year after his doctoral defense, in 1886, Markov was appointed an extraordinary professor. In that same year, he was elected an adjunct to the Academy of Sciences. Following the death of Viktor Bunyakovsky in 1890, Markov became an extraordinary member of the academy. His ascent continued, and in the autumn of 1894, he became an ordinary professor at St. Petersburg University.

In 1896, he was elected an ordinary member of the academy, succeeding Chebyshev. By 1905, he held the title of merited professor and was granted the right to retire, which he exercised immediately. However, he continued to lecture on the calculus of differences until 1910.

The year 1908 brought student unrest. University professors and lecturers were instructed to monitor their students. Markov, with a distinct lack of enthusiasm, refused. He penned an explanation, declining to act as an "agent of the governance." This defiance led to his removal from further teaching duties at St. Petersburg University, prompting his retirement.

Markov was, by all accounts, an atheist. In 1912, in a rather pointed gesture, he requested his own excommunication from the Russian Orthodox Church, following Leo Tolstoy's own expulsion. The Church, predictably, obliged.

A brief pause, a slow exhale. His headstone, presumably, bears witness to this.

In 1913, the council of St. Petersburg elected nine scientists as honorary members of the university. Markov was among them, but the minister of education withheld his affirmation. It wasn't until the February Revolution in 1917, four years later, that his election was finally confirmed. Markov then resumed his teaching, lecturing on probability theory and the calculus of differences until his death in 1922.

See also

It's a rather extensive list, really. All these things named after him.

Notes

  • ^ (Russian: Андре́й Андре́евич Ма́рков, first name also spelled "Andrei", in older works also spelled Markoff [1])