John Nash, the Nobel Prize winner who was the main inspiration for the movie that was awarded four Oscars and multiple other wins and nominations, “A Beautiful Mind”, died with his wife in a car crash in New Jersey.
According to State police Sergeant Gregory Williams, 86-year-old John Nash and his 82-year-old wife Alicia Nash were traveling by taxi when the accident occurred.
The crash took place on Saturday, the 23rd of May, at around 4:30 p.m., not far from the township of Monroe. The taxi tried to pass another car but lost control in the attempt and hit a guard rail. It also crashed another vehicle in the process.
Both Nash and his wife were ejected from the car and killed, probably because they were not wearing any seatbelts.
It is ironic that this accident occurred while a national campaign was going on, aiming to impose regulation on people driving or traveling without their seatbelts on.
The driver of the car was taken to the hospital. However, his condition was not reported to be critical. A passenger from the other vehicle that the taxi crashed into was also taken to a hospital, as he suffered from pain in his back and neck.
John Forbes Nash, Jr. was a brilliant mathematician who is mostly known for his work in game theory, partial differential equations and differential geometry.
His work provided important understanding of various factors that have proved very useful in domains like economics, artificial intelligence, computing, accounting, evolutionary biology or politics.
He won the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 1994 and the Abel Prize in 2015.
He suffered from paranoid schizophrenia, whose first signs developed in 1959. He received treatment in various hospitals and he managed to control the mental illness eventually. By 1980 he showed fewer signs of the disease and was able to continue his work.
His early life, his struggle and recovery represented inspiration for Sylvia Nasar’s biographical book called “A Beautiful Mind”, which later turned into the very popular movie with the same title, starring academy-award winner Russell Crowe.
Alicia was his wife and long-term friend. They got married in 1957 but his illness altered the relationship greatly, leading to their divorce in the early ’60s. However, the two remained in touch and decided to remarry in 2001.
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