One of the world's renowned mathematicians, John Nash, who was the subject in 'A Beautiful Mind' passed away with his wife in a taxi accident in New Jersey.
- May 25, 2015
AceShowbiz - John Forbes Nash Jr., a Noble Prize-winning mathematician who inspired film "A Beautiful Mind", and his wife Alicia were killed in a taxi accident on the New Jersey Turnpike. Both of them were passengers in the incident which happened on Saturday, May 23.
Police reported that the crash happened at 4:30 P.M. The taxi where the two were in tried to pass another car in the center lane but the driver lost control so that it crashed into guard rail. It hit so hard that the Nash couple were ejected from the taxi. The police officer said that they apparently didn't wear seatbelts.
The taxi driver was flown to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital immediately to get treatment for his injury while the couple was pronounced dead at the scene. John was 86 while his wife was 82.
John and his wife had just arrived from Norway after receiving Abel Prize for Mathematics, thanks to his work with his colleague Louis Nirenberg on nonlinear partial differential equations. Nirenberg was surprised after hearing the news about their deaths as he flew back with them from Norway. He said that John was a "wonderful mathematician."
Having learned of the news, Russell Crowe who portrayed the mathematician in "A Beautiful Mind" tweeted, "Stunned...my heart goes out to John & Alicia & family. An amazing partnership. Beautiful minds, beautiful hearts."
The President of Princeton University, Christopher Eisgruber, paid tribute to the couple as he said, "John's remarkable achievements inspired generations of mathematicians, economists and scientists who were influenced by his brilliant, groundbreaking work in game theory."
Best known for his work on game theory, John received the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1994 alongside his colleagues, John Harsanyi and Reinhard Selten. He was also known for his struggle with schizophrenia.
