Probability, Earthquakes and Travel Abroad

Abstract

When I was 12 years old, my parents emigrated from England to New Zealand, and this, perhaps, was the single most important event in my early life. The more relaxed atmosphere in the New Zealand schools, and the opportunity this gave for reading and study outside the pressure of competition, led, I am sure, to a greater success than I could have achieved in the tenser, more status-conscious environment of England. It also seemed to pave the way for the travel opportunities which are one of the great privileges of being an academic. From that time on, without any tremendous effort on my part, opportunities for travel have arisen which have allowed me to remain based in New Zealand, while living and working for periods in Australia, Britain, Russia, India, Japan and elsewhere. These opportunities have come about not through being an explorer, a journalist, an interpreter even, but through being a mathematician, and that at a modest level. Whatever dreams of adventure I may have had as a child, I never thought that such opportunities could come, of all things, from a career in mathematics. Be a mathematician and see the world? It may sound an unusual slogan, but in fact there can be few disciplines, if any, where mutual understanding is so independent of race, politics, culture or religion, and (with a few exceptions, perhaps) recognition of important work is so freely acknowledged on an international basis. Be this as it may, from those early days onwards, while other interests have come and gone, mathematics and travel have remained the dominant concerns of my working like.