I see opportunities everywhere there are enough people who think outside the box, said Jan Slovák

As a mathematician, he focuses on geometric analysis and its applications. He is the guarantor of the new study program in Data Analytics. He was involved in the founding of CEITEC and was the founding director of the Center for Technology Transfer. Throughout his life, he has been interested in the development of Masaryk University and Czech science in general.

As a mathematician, he focuses on geometric analysis and its applications. He is the guarantor of the new study program in Data Analytics. He was involved in the founding of CEITEC and was the founding director of the Center for Technology Transfer. Throughout his life, he has been interested in the development of Masaryk University and Czech science in general – for which Jan Slovák was awarded the Gold Medal from Masaryk University in January this year. How did he come to mathematics? Did he prefer his role in management or teaching? And how is it possible that he never won any mathematics olympiad?

Some children know from a young age what they want to be. In contrast, Jan Slovák did not have a clear idea that he would dedicate his life to mathematics for quite a long time. He didn’t even consider the possibility of studying it at university – in fact, he didn’t think he would even get into high school. “Since childhood, I heard that with my father's cadre profile, which did not please the regime, I would probably not get into any high school,” recalls Jan Slovák.

In the end, he did get in, and then to university – because “the comrades made a slight organizational mistake back then,” laughs the professor, a long-time director of the Institute of Mathematics and Statistics at the Faculty of Science at Masaryk University and a prominent figure in Czech science.

How did your relationship with mathematics develop from childhood?

Thanks to the care of my parents, I managed to enrol in a selective primary school in Antonínská Street with foreign language instruction. My class was extremely well put together, and the teaching staff was excellent. After 1970, things improved even more because during normalization, expelled people from Brno’s high schools moved to this school, and it was very well-equipped. It was the first Czech secondary school with excellently equipped offices. So, when I transferred to Elgartova High School at the age of 15, I felt a cultural and performance decline. I do not mean this as criticism of Elgartova, but rather as praise for my primary school. I provoked teachers with a logical approach to things right from the first grade.

Did you have a dream job as a child?

As a child, I did not have any dream job. During the time when dreaming about a career was premature, it was the relaxed 60s, the years 1967, 1968. After that, my parents prepared me for the likelihood that with my father’s personnel profile, which did not please the regime, I probably would not be able to attend any secondary school. So, I just got used to enjoying things with my friends that brought me joy. I did not really think about a career.

How do you remember your high school years at Elgartova School in Brno?

Recently, we had an anniversary, and I was invited to contribute to the almanac. I had the pleasure of reflecting on those years and thinking about them. I felt that the motto on their website really rang true: that the school is not just the building, but the community of current, former, and future students, communicating with each other, along with teachers. This was excellently achieved at Elgartova. They very nicely fulfilled my idea of what a high school should be: to develop cultural awareness and insight into various disciplines, without pushing or tailoring education in a way that prepares students directly for careers in particular fields like chemistry or physics. I navigated through Elgartova without any problems, and I was trying to devote myself more seriously to music. I was preparing a bit for opera singing and working as an accompanist on the piano. Because of this, I even missed my only chance to win the Mathematical Olympiad. I was invited to the central round, but at that time, I was a member of a jazz accompanying ensemble and performing concerts in Poland. By the time I was a mature teenager, it was clear to me that there were two paths in life. The first was to become the owner of a red worker’s booklet and a loyal communist, and to strive for a career in the political sense of the word. Because back then, what a career meant was a political career. The second path was to accept that life could be beautiful even without a career and simply engage in things that make sense. I was relieved when I realized there was nothing to think about because the communists did not want me among them anyway:-D.

How did you get into studying mathematics at our Faculty of Science (now SCI MUNI)?

I applied for mathematics because at that time, the central planning body made a mistake. Around 1979, they were introducing computing centres with Soviet copies of IBM computers. They created the job position of “mathematical analyst,” which actually meant “programmer.” However, because of this, they almost tripled the target numbers for admissions into the mathematical analysis study programme, even though it had nothing to do with programming. Universities had a big problem fulfilling these target numbers. So, it could be expected that they would accept even creatures like me, with a poor personnel profile.

How do you remember your time studying at SCI MUNI, at the Mathematics (currently the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, SCI MUNI)?

During my university studies, I took semi-professional involvement in the music scene much more seriously. The fact that I am a mathematician today is coincidental and, at the same time, the result of the care I received at the faculty at that time. We were very fortunate because there were no evil communists here. Of course, some people were expelled or removed, and some were sidelined. It can’t be said that the best had the greatest space. Jarek Vosmanský, who took care of mathematics at the Faculty of Science, was excellent. He was very organized and did everything he could when he saw talent, to pave the way for them. I was suddenly invited to join the Mathematical Institute of the Academy of Sciences. For this purpose, I had to quickly finish my studies. I returned from skiing three weeks after the start of the semester and found out that I already had an individual study plan since the beginning of the previous semester. And I was supposed to finish my studies two semesters earlier in four months. It was a bit problematic, but it was a fun challenge, so I accepted it.

How did you spend your years at the Mathematical Institute of the Academy of Sciences?

It was a very dignified workplace, then led by Ivan Kolář, an excellent differential geometer. I engaged in mathematics as my profession while also pursuing music. It was curious that as a mathematician, I was not allowed to travel anywhere outside Poland, Eastern Germany, etc. Whereas as a musician, I had a different service passport from the Ministry of Culture and spent 5-8 weeks a year in France, Italy, Germany, and similar countries, on top of paid leave from my main job. Which is probably hard for today's generation to understand…

How did you enjoy trips abroad as a musician during the totalitarian era?

I mainly travelled with the Brno Madrigalists. We were a highly esteemed ensemble, recording for radio stations and invited to major festivals. When the Archbishop of Salzburg established a new tradition, the Festival of Sacred Music, we were the first ensemble to have a grand opening concert in Salzburg Cathedral. Being at concerts and seeing people’s enthusiasm was a far more interesting life mission than trying to come up with technical details in mathematics and lecturing on them at a local seminar, when there were only a few people worldwide who might potentially be interested.

And what did you enjoy after the revolution in November 1989? Did you take advantage of the opportunity to travel as a mathematician as well?

Thanks to an invitation to the University of Vienna, where I worked as a professor from 1991 to 1992, I had the opportunity to experience academic life, and I was happy to return to Brno at MUNI afterward. In Vienna, I wanted to build on joint results with Ivan Kolář and Peter W. Michor aimed at modernizing the foundations of geometric analysis through lectures. At that time, I was particularly fascinated by an article related to the mathematical essence of Roger Penrose’s gravitational theory (editor’s note: Nobel Prize winner). So, I decided that my lectures would focus on this phenomenon and direction. The goal of the semester lectures was to bring the audience to a point where they could read this article. I started lecturing and realized that I had to learn much more than I had imagined, which was quite daunting:-D I guess I hit upon a very interesting area because I may have had only three students in the lecture hall, but there were about fifteen other people at the level of associate professor or professor in mathematics or physics. I understood that this is normal for academics at real universities.

Mathematics is seen as a universal language. Are you teaching people to use it or are you developing it?

This brings us to a much broader topic even with the question formulation. Namely, that mathematics itself is a way of thinking that attempts, through common sense, to identify or predict connections and describe them. Just like philosophy, it requires a specific language, with conventions and interpretations, i.e., understanding what each part means. Looking at the history of mathematics, we could try to see it – or learn to see it – as the development of this language. At the point when mathematics progressed far enough, the famous Brno native, Kurt Gödel, proved that mathematics as a language cannot be perfect. That it is not possible to create a language in which we can indisputably determine whether every given statement is true or false. In fact, mathematics is about consistent formulations and understanding the relationships between consequences and causes.

As a mathematician, I learned to use and subsequently develop our language. The basic language of my Vienna lectures was based on the so-called Klein’s Erlangen Program, which Felix Klein outlined in 1872, with the aim of incorporating necessary symmetries when creating mathematical models. My goal was to convey Penrose’s models of the universe in the context of so-called conformal Riemannian geometries to my audience. This required mastering the language of representations of symmetry groups and Cartan’s extension of Klein’s Program.

So, what is your contribution to this area of ​​mathematics?

The topics I lectured on were technically too complex for me. Therefore, together with my newly acquired collaborators, especially Andreas Cap, Vladimír Souček, and Mike Eastwood, I tried to generalize the issues a lot. Surprisingly, this is one of the functioning approaches in mathematical research – if you can’t handle it, try to generalize it more:-D Over the next ten years, this led to the theory of so-called parabolic geometries. In this sense, we created new mathematical tools that allow for a unified way of working with a large class of Cartan geometries. These are now called “parabolic geometries.“

Are there any practical applications of this theory that readers encounter?

A particularly hot topic in mathematics right now is how to utilize anticipated symmetries in coding neural networks for artificial intelligence (AI) so that the system does not have to learn what is expected but rather it is encoded in how the system is built. For example, when we have a system that recognizes what is in an image using a camera, it must be independent of how the object moves or rotates. The system learns this during training, but it takes a long time and is computationally very demanding. This can be accelerated by orders of magnitude if the system is built in such a way that these symmetries are automatically included. Similarly, this is seen in mathematical models in technical and natural sciences. When creating such models, we can start from anticipated symmetries, which determine the tools we have at our disposal. Parabolic geometries provide a set of tools that allow us to handle frequently occurring types of such symmetries in a unified manner.

Actually, you devoted yourself intensively to mathematical research from 1991 to 1998. Then you had less and less time for it because you were more involved in the development of MUNI. How is the theory of parabolic geometries developing?

Parabolic geometries came to wider recognition after our successful publication in the Annals of Mathematics (arguably the most prestigious mathematical journal published by Princeton University) in 2001. Since then, they have become one of the widely developed areas of mathematics, with special conferences dedicated to them. For example, the Abel Symposium in 2019 was largely devoted to them. This symposium is chosen annually by the same committee that awards the Abel Prize, which is somewhat akin to the Nobel Prize in mathematics. Recently, I have been returning to work in this area, so I hope I will not have to decline almost all invitations to professional events anymore.

Let’s now focus on your role in the development of our university. The turn of the millennium initiated a crucial decade for MUNI’s development. Let’s sum it up with acronyms: CEITEC, CTT, UKB, and VaVPI. Could you please describe how these years in MUNI’s management were a challenge for you?

At the turn of the millennium, I unexpectedly became involved in organizational roles at MUNI. Initially, as a visiting vice-dean of the Faculty of Informatics, I focused on the development of study programmes. Then, as the dean of SCI MUNI, I undertook significant reforms from 2000 to 2003 (see the chapter in the book History Written by Scientists). Since the preparation for the construction of the new Bohunice campus at MUNI was starting at that time, and most of the new spaces and extensive related renovations were planned for my faculty, many responsibilities related to UKB gradually fell to me. First, I served as the rector’s deputy, and then as the vice-rector of MUNI. I came up with the idea for CEITEC and managed the project for the first few months. Later, as the founding director of the Technology Transfer Centre, I was responsible for establishing standards for working with intellectual property. I was involved with the CTT until 2011, after which I believed I had done enough administrative work. However, I eventually spent eight years from 2015 to 2023 as the head of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics SCI MUNI.

Which of the managerial activities at MUNI was the most challenging for you, and which was the most enjoyable?

The most challenging, yet ultimately the most enjoyable, experience was when I got involved in the preparation of the Bohunice University Campus in 2001. As the dean of SCI MUNI, I represented the part of the university for which most of the pavilions were to be built. During Rector Zlatuška’s tenure, the university had just transitioned from a contributory organization to a public corporation. No one knew how to handle this new status, as everyone was still operating within the context of the previous contributory organization. The former rector, Eduard Schmidt, and the dean of MUNI MED, Jiří Vorlíček, and others had done incredible work in the previous decade: they boldly came up with the idea of building the campus and succeeded in getting it approved. They managed to get the City of Brno to agree to the idea, secure a developer to partner with the university, and assemble the necessary land. An international urban design competition was held, which laid the groundwork for what was to be built. All of this groundwork was in place when we reached the phase of starting the construction preparations. However, MUNI lacked the internal structures, personnel, and experience needed to plan and organize the construction.

What problems did MUNI, newly a public institution, face at that time? How difficult was it to arrange for the construction to even begin?

The university did not know how to write a feasibility study or communicate it with the lending bank. Services to help with this were not readily available. As a highly involved dean, I often came up with suggestions on what to do and how to do it, and I did a lot myself. Eduard Schmidt, who was the vice-rector under Rector Jiří Zlatuška at the time, asked me to become the rector’s deputy for the construction of the Bohunice University Campus (UKB) because, as he said, the academic community needed to see someone responsible wearing the right hat. This began a very complicated journey. Initially, it looked promising. But when we realized all that needed to be included in the preparations – from negotiating a loan with the EIB, dealing with the loan guarantee law, restitution disputes, and the credit bank’s view on how tenders for large public contracts should be handled – it seemed like it would take a long time before construction could start, if at all. The total cost was about 6 billion CZK. It was an enormous challenge and became increasingly complicated. I felt it was really terrible that the university had waited 80 years to get the chance to build what the founding law had promised, and then I would be the one to mess it up. So, I really tried hard; the scope was vast, and there is no space here to convey the emotions involved. But in principle, we managed to break through all the obstacles. And when I was able to hand over the responsibility for the technical preparations of the construction to the bursar, Mr. Janíček, in 2004, I felt very satisfied. (Note: You can learn more about the campus construction from the video interview.)

And how do you remember the period when you and your colleagues were developing the initial ideas for the establishment of CEITEC?

As early as 2004, in discussions with David Uhlíř (then still in Brussels at DG Research), we were putting together the concept of an internationally significant research centre. Then, as the discussion about the European Institute of Technology began to spread across Europe, my colleague Pepa Jančář (at that time my partner responsible for development at VUT) and I quickly put together the concept for CEITEC. We wanted to create something large that neither institution could encompass within itself, making it clear that we had to collaborate. Rectors Fiala and Vrbka approved this direction, and we were able to start.

The Operational Programme Research and Development for Innovation (OP VaVPI) was very important for the development of MUNI and Brno. What were your responsibilities in this programme?

At that time, it was already known that there would be structural funds, and with the then-rector Petr Fiala, we agreed that it would be beneficial to shift the preparation of CEITEC in Brno to the national level. I tried to help prepare financing schemes into which such large projects could fit. I joined a team working for the Ministry of Education under Ernst and Young. My responsibility was primarily the content part and the absorption capacity of the Czech Republic for VaVPI, which amounted to 2.3 billion euros. I believe we managed to set up VaVPI relatively well, and approximately 800 million euros eventually flowed to Brno from this programme.

Thank you for the interview.
Zuzana Jayasundera

---

Translated by Eva Čoupková