Imaginary numbers back in the news
Two of the most mathematically-adept Ig Prize winners — Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling — go on trial today in Houston, Texas. A CBS News report today says:
Lay and Skilling, almost literally, are the last men standing; the last Enron executives at the center of the scandal who have not pleaded guilty, had their own trials, or cut their own deals with the feds. They are both poster boys for what the company did for the City when times were flush, and then did to the City as it all unraveled.
The pair were honored in 2002, when that year’s Ig Nobel Economics Prize was awarded to:
The executives, corporate directors, and auditors of Enron, Lernaut & Hauspie, Adelphia, Bank of Commerce and Credit International, Cendant, CMS Energy, Duke Energy, Dynegy, Gazprom, Global Crossing, HIH Insurance [Australia], Informix, Kmart, Maxwell Communications, McKessonHBOC, Merrill Lynch, Merck, Peregrine Systems, Qwest Communications, Reliant Resources, Rent-Way, Rite Aid, Sunbeam, Tyco, Waste Management, WorldCom, Xerox, and Arthur Andersen, for adapting the mathematical concept of imaginary numbers for use in the business world.