Correspondence about the Prandtl Medal

Here is correspondence (in reverse order) with the Organizers of the conference during which the Prandtl Medal issued by ECCOMAS will be given, to me. My request to connect a scientific discussion to the award ceremony, which I posed when accepting to receive the Medal, has finally been taken up to consideration by the Organizers and I am now awaiting the result: Medal + Scientific Discussion, or No Scientific Discussion + No Medal?

It is interesting to note that the reason to give the Medal to me is presented in general unspecific  terms, but it is made very clear that the Medal is not a decoration for "work showing that Prandtl was wrong".  What kind of "decoration" is then the Medal?

Recall that when Einstein received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics (in 1923) for his "discovery of the Law of Photoelectricity", it was explicitly stated by the Prize Committee that the Prize was not given for Einstein's main contribution to physics, his Special/General Theory of Relativity, nor for his derivation of the Law of Photoelectricity. Sometimes Prize Committees have difficult problems to resolve.  

Note that despite the expressed view of Prof Ramm that "a basic element of science is rational dispute", the schedule for the opening ceremony is so tight (2 full hours) that it is "impossible raising any scientific discussion on one particular award during this ceremony". The conclusion can only be that the Medal is not awarded because of scientific reasons.I now have to think over if I am the right person for the Medal.


Also note that I am kindly informed that I have to pay myself for the Congress Banquet. In fact, I am not sure that I am invited at all. Sometimes awardees have difficult decisions to deal with.




Saturday July 19 11.06 PM


Dear Professor Johnson, 

the sole intention of ECCOMAS to select you as the awardee of the 2014 Ludwig Prandtl Medal was to acknowledge your outstanding and sustained contribution in the field of Computational Fluid Dynamics. 

Your argument "... that Prandtl has had a devastating negative influence on 20th century fluid mechanics" has nothing to do with this intention. 

The award ceremony would certainly not be the proper forum for publicly voicing your criticism of Prandtl's boundary layer theory, because it would leave no room for instant counter arguments from the auditorium and, thus, would violate a fundamental principle of a fair scientific dispute. 

Therefore, we kindly ask you to withdraw your condition to use the award ceremony for such a criticism. Should you feel unable to do so, we request that you consider not to accept the medal. 

If you do not respond to this mail we understand that you will not attend the award ceremony on Monday Morning and that you have decided not accepting the medal. 

With best regards, 

Ekkehard Ramm, Pedro Diez, Ferdinando Auricchio, Josef Eberharsteiner- President, Vicepresidents and Secretary of ECCOMAS Eugenio Oñate, Xavier Oliver, Antonio Huerta - Chairmen of WCCM-ECCM-ECFD 2014

Saturday July 19

Dear Professors and Organizers:

I certainly did not expect to be given the Prandtl Medal, but once being chosen as Medalist I expect a fair and correct reception. I thus expect that the following statement of mine (in bold) will be read at the award ceremony, by myself or by the person presenting my person and work:

The famous Danish physicist Niels Bohr said: “How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress.” And yes, to give the Prandtl Medal to me is a paradox, or a contradiction, and as such a starting point for making progress.

The contradiction is that my work together with Johan Hoffman has shown that Prandtl’s boundary layer theory, Prandtl’s main contribution as the named Father of Modern Fluid Mechanics, is not in accordance with observations and thus incorrect as scientific theory. Our evidence consists of computational solutions of the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations as the basic model describing slightly viscous turbulent flow, combined with slip boundary condition as a model of observed small skin friction, which does not generate any no-slip boundary layers, but nevertheless

agree with observations of separation, drag and lift for a wide range of problems.

We conclude that separation, drag and lift  in slightly viscous flow do not originate from thin no-slip boundary layers, in direct contradiction to Father Prandtl. 

Our work breaks the spell of Father Prandtl asking for impossible computational resolution of thin boundary layers beyond the capacity of thinkable computers, and thus opens a wide range of new possibilities for many users of CFD. I will present some of these possibilities in the session Advanced Methods in CFD I following this award ceremony. 

I see no rational reason that this statement by me as chosen Medalist cannot be made at the award ceremony.

I further expect that a link to the abstract text I have sent will be put up on the conference web page announcing my talk, together with a link to the following related post on my professional blog:

http://claesjohnson.blogspot.se/2014/07/breaking-spell-of-prandtl-from.html

I further remind you, for the third time, that I want my first name to be presented as Claes and not the double name Claes-Göran, which still occurs on the talk web page. 

Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.

Best regards,

Claes Johnson

Friday July 18

Dear Professor Johnson,

we already mentioned earlier that a very short award ceremony will take place following the tradition in our associations. This includes a brief introduction of the awardees and a short summary of their major work. Again we would like to point out that it is not possible to enter into a scientific discussion in this ceremony. 
However, despite the short notice the organizers found a way for you to express your view in a subsequent CFD session, waived your registration, and include the abstract in the online version of the program. Moreover, your talk will be announced in the ceremony.

We would regret if this arrangement does not meet your expectations and you decide to decline accepting the medal.

With best regards

Ekkehard Ramm, Pedro Diez, Ferdinando Auricchio, Josef Eberharsteiner- President, Vicepresidents and Secretary of ECCOMAS
Eugenio Oñate, Xavier Oliver, Antonio Huerta - Chairmen of WCCM-ECCM-ECFD 2014

Friday July 18

To the Organizers of IACM-ECCOMAS 2014

Please acknowledge the reception of my letter of yesterday which is enclosed below. I need an answer 

by tomorrow to decide if I will be able to accept to receive the Medal or not. 

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson

Friday July 18

To the Organizers of IACM-ECCOMAS 2014

When I accepted the receive the Prandtl Medal I stated that my work during the last 20 years has led me to a very critical view of Prandtl's legacy as the Father of Modern Aerodynamics. The evidence I have gathered over the years together with my coworkers, shows that separation, lift and drag of slightly viscous flow do not originate from thin no-slip boundary layers, which is in direct contradiction to Prandtl's boundary layer theory as his signum. Prandtl has made CFD of slightly viscous flow into an impossibility by demanding computational resolution of thin boundary layers beyond the capacity of any thinkable computer. I have thus found that Prandtl has a had a devastating negative influence on 20th century fluid mechanics. With this my experience I will only be able to accept the Medal if these my views are made very clear at the award ceremony and I will be given a fair chance to present my evidence to the community thereafter.

So far these conditions have not been met: I have been informed by the Organizers that in no way is the Medal a "decoration for showing the Prandtl was wrong". Moreover, I have only been given the possibility to express my view in one of 49 parallel sessions to a very small group of people. My repeated request to put up link to an abstract and related post on my professional blog has not be effected.

In short, I can only accept to receive the Prandtl Medal if is made very clear at the award ceremony and in open discussion accessible to the community thereafter and through relevant links on the conference web site, that my work in CFD, if anything, shows that "Prandtl was wrong", in fact seriously wrong both in science and politics.

I hope the Organizers understand that my message is good news for computational science, and bad news only for traditional non-computational fluid mechanics following Father Prandtl, and then will use the occasion to advance CFD.    

So I ask the Organizers to seriously consider my renewed statement of my conditions for being able to accept the Medal and inform me before Sunday July 20 about the result. The case is unusual and must be handled accordingly.

Open discussion allowing established text book truths to be scrutinized and confronted with new evidence is a crucial element of science, which always has to be protected from limitation by politics of science, and politics.

Sincerely

Claes Johnson 

Thursday July 17

Dear Claes,

I am very happy to tell you that I have been able to negotiate with the provider, as a special attention to you, that a link will be introduced connected to the title.

However, it is mandatory that the abstract follows strictly the conference template.

Please send us asap the abstract within the template I am adjoining.

Best regards,

Antonio

Wednesday July 16

Dear Antonio:

Since the printed program is out and web abstracts appear to be closed, I suggest as a service to the scientific community that you put up a link on the minisymposium web page presenting the title of my talk, to the following post on my blog: 

http://claesjohnson.blogspot.se/2014/07/breaking-spell-of-prandtl-from.html

where anyone interested can find the slides of my talk and the text of the abstract. Please inform me if this is not feasible and if so the reason why.

Best regards,

Claes

Tuesday July 15

Dear Antonio

I suggest that you simply put up a link to the abstract from the page where my talk is announced.

Thank you,

Claes


Tuesday July 15

Dear Claes,

The printed program is already out. So there is nothing we can do to include your talk. 

However, in the online program the title of your talk with the correct name will be duly posted. Note that we recommend all attendants to use the online web-based program because it has all the last minute changes, such as your talk.

I will check to see if we can include the abstract. But I do not have many expectations because the book of abstracts was closed long time ago given the large number of attendants to the wccm-eccm-ecfd join congress.

Best regards,

Antonio

Tuesday July 15

Dear Organizers:

Could you please append the enclosed abstract of my talk to the conference program.

Could you also, please, change my first name from Claes-Göran to simply Claes in the announcement 

of my talk, as requested before.

Sincerely

Claes Johnson

Thursday July 10:

Thank you Prof Ramm for this prompt answer. I am glad to hear that you have found a slot for discussion, and I hope that this can be announced at the award ceremony.

The title of my talk is: 

Breaking the spell of Prandtl: From impossible to possible CFD. 

Best regards

Claes Johnson

Thursday July 10:

Dear Professor Johnson,

I would like to answer your questions raised in your last two mails.

As you know this is a joint meeting of three big conferences; this requires naturally some time for the opening session containing besides welcome addresses and an opening lecture also slots for the presentation of several awards of the two organizing associations.This procedure follows a long tradition in our communities.

For the ECCOMAS Awards I am in charge of this rather short ceremony. This in turn means that the presentation can address only the major scientific accomplishments of the awardees and cannot be a deep examination of certain scientific aspects.

Concerning your last mail I want to point out that I only referred to your own formulations used in a preceding mail. The fact that medals often carry the name of a famous scientific figure in history does in general not necessarily imply that the work of the awardee is directly related to that of the eponym; however it does also not exclude this connection. I repeat that ECCOMAS awards the Ludwig Prandtl medal to distinguished scientists for outstanding and sustained contribution in the field of Computational Fluid Dynamics.

The organizers have informed me that your lecture is scheduled as the last presentation in the session 

"Advanced Methods in Computational Fluid Dynamics I" ,
 Monday 21 July 2014, 11:00-13:00, room Ponent 2, Hotel Rey Juan Carlos 1. 
The allocated time is 20 minutes for presentation and questions.

I suggest that you send the title of your talk to Professor Antonio Huerta(antonio.huerta@upc.edu), with CC to me so that I can announce your talk in the award ceremony.

Best regards

Ekkehard Ramm


Thursday July 10

Dear Profs Ramm and Eberhardsteiner:

I am puzzled by not hearing from you concerning the questions I have posed and if I will be given the opportunity to express some of my views on CFD in some connection to the Prandtl Medal, or not. 

We surely agree on the importance of open scientific discussion where different viewpoints can meet,  and so I hope that you can find a slot for this, on the Monday since I am going back on Tuesday. 

Sincerely

Claes Johnson

Tuesday July 8:

Dear Prof Ramm

I have a further question concerning the award ceremony connecting to your information to me that the Medal is  

"not a decoration for "work showing that Prandtl was wrong"". Will this standpoint of the Organizers be made clear during the ceremony, or will it be hidden?

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson

Tuesday July 8:

Dear Prof Ramm:

Thank you for this information. To judge if you have chosen the right person for the Prandtl Medal, I would like 
to know how my work will be presented at the opening ceremony as background and motivation for the award: How long time is allocated for this presentation, who will give the presentation and what parts of my work will be highlighted, if any? I am further puzzled about your statement that the schedule is so tight that no scientific aspects on any award, in particular not on any 
of the two Medals, can be raised during the (2 hour) opening ceremony. Could you please explain this in more detail to me?

Sincerely

Claes Johnson 


________________________________________
From: Ekkehard Ramm [ramm@ibb.uni-stuttgart.de]
Sent: Monday, July 07, 2014 8:45 PM
To: Claes-Göran Johnson
Cc: Josef Eberhardsteiner; Antonio Huerta
Subject: Re: ECCOMAS Ludwig Prandtl Medal

Dear Professor Johnson,

we can inform you that the chairs of the joint WCCM, ECCM and ECFD 
conferences  notified us about their decision. As mentioned earlier it 
was again stated that the schedule for the opening ceremony is so tight, 
that it makes it impossible raising any scientific discussion on one 
particular award during this ceremony.

However in consideration to ECCOMAS and your request as newly Prandtl 
medalist, they will schedule your presentation during the first 
"Advanced Methods in Computational Fluid Dynamics" contributed session 
(Monday morning, 11:00 - 13:00). They  will also waive the "Reduced 
Delegate Registration (not Including Congress Banquet)".

We will ask the organizers about the time allocated for your talk.

With best regards

Ekkehard Ramm
Josef Eberhardsteiner


Monday July 7 from me to Prof Ramm

Dear Prof Ramm

I am glad to see that we share the conviction that a basic element of science is rational dispute, and this is what I want to see in connection with the Prandtl Medal, to make it meaningful to the scientific community, and to me. With this agreement established I am sure that you can find a convenient setting for such a dispute during the meeting.

Sincerely

Claes Johnson
________________________________________
From: Ekkehard Ramm [ramm@ibb.uni-stuttgart.de]
Sent: Monday, July 07, 2014 12:47 PM
To: Claes-Göran Johnson
Cc: Josef Eberhardsteiner; Antonio Huerta
Subject: Re: ECCOMAS Ludwig Prandtl Medal

Dear Professor Johnson,

we would like you to understand that it is a very difficult logistic problem for the organizers finding a slot in an appropriate session in such a late stage. We talked to the organizers today; they will try to solve the problem today and shortly thereafter will communicate the result to you.

ECCOMAS awards the Ludwig Prandtl medal to distinguished scientists for outstanding and sustained contribution in the field of Computational Fluid Dynamics. So it is definitely neither a distinction awarded exclusively "for work in the spirit of Prandtl" nor a decoration for "work showing that Prandtl was wrong".  In other words the nominators as well as the members of the selection committee recognize the overall scientific achievements of a candidate.

A basic element of science is the rational dispute of a subject in the scientific community, even if the debate is controversial.  In history many examples occurred. In several cases substantial assumptions in theories were questioned and had to be abandoned or modified. Even if this is the case the reputation of a scientist, who had developed the original ideas, must not necessarily suffer.

With best regards

Ekkehard Ramm, President
Josef Eberhardsteiner, Secretary


Am 06.07.2014 20:54, schrieb Claes-Göran Johnson:

To the Organizers of the WCCM/ECCM/ECFD 2014 in Barcelona

During 2 weeks I have in repeated messages to Prof Eberhardsteiner tried to get into contact with the Organizers of WCCM/ECCM/ECFD 2014 in Barcelona concerning the Prandtl Medal with a request to accompany the delivery of the Medal with a scientific discussion of my work vs the work by Prandtl.

My work during the last 10 years is in direct contradiction to Prandtl's main contribution as the Father of modern fluid mechanics identifying no-slip boundary layers as the origin of separation, lift and drag in slightly viscous flow. My work, together with my coworkers Johan Hoffman and Johan Jansson, shows that computational solutions of the Navier-Stokes equations with slip without boundary layers agree with observations of separation, lift and drag in slightly viscous flow, and thus shows that Prandtl's main contribution does not agree with observations: Separation, lift and drag in slightly viscous flow do not originate from no-slip boundary layers. Our work breaks the CFD spell of Prandtl asking for computational resolution of thin boundary layers beyond the capability of any forseeable computer.

I have not been informed about the motivation to award me the Prandtl Medal. If it is supposed to honor work in the spirit of Prandtl, then the Medal has been given to the wrong person. If the motivation is that my work shows that Prandtl was wrong, then the award is very remarkable and that must be made clear together with the delivery.

So again I ask the Organizers to inform me which of these possibilities is real, so that I can decide if I am worthy of receiving the Medal. I expect to get a true response this time  and not just another letter from Prof Eberhardsteiner telling me that my request has been forwarded.

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson
________________________________________
From: Josef EBERHARDSTEINER [josef.eberhardsteiner@tuwien.ac.at]
Sent: Wednesday, July 02, 2014 11:01 PM
To: Claes-Göran Johnson
Subject: Re: ECCOMAS Ludwig Prandtl Medal

Dear Prof. Johnson,

I once more forwarded your request to the organizers of the WCCM/ECCM/ECFD Conference in Barcelona. I will immediately inform you when I receive an answer.

Best regards,
Josef Eberhardsteiner


Am 02.07.2014 um 19:44 schrieb Claes-Göran Johnson :

Dear Prof Eberhardsteiner

I have not received any response on my letter of June 27, enclosed below. I would appreciate if you could
give me some feedback.

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson
________________________________________
From: Claes-Göran Johnson
Sent: Friday, June 27, 2014 10:10 AM
To: Josef EBERHARDSTEINER
Cc: Ekkehard RAMM
Subject: RE: ECCOMAS Ludwig Prandtl Medal

Dear Prof Eberhardsteiner

Although somewhat contradictory, I accept ECCOMAS policy for Medals, and will cover the cost of travel and accommodation myself. No problem.
Am I also supposed to register and pay the conference fee?

When I accepted to receive the Medal in person I expressed a wish to accompany the delivery at the Opening Session by a scientific discussion and said
that I would be willing to contribute my view, which you forwarded to Prof Olivier. But I have not heard anything from him, and so I wonder if you
have some information about the status of this question.

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson
________________________________________
From: Josef EBERHARDSTEINER [josef.eberhardsteiner@tuwien.ac.at]
Sent: Monday, June 23, 2014 3:22 PM
To: Claes-Göran Johnson
Cc: Ekkehard RAMM
Subject: Re: ECCOMAS Ludwig Prandtl Medal

Dear Prof. Johnson,

Up to now there is no deadline fixed for the next Newsletter, this will be done in Barcelona. I will inform you when it is available.

You are right, we kindly ask you to arrange travel and accommodation by yourself. Unfortunately, no such provisions are made in the ECCOMAS budget.

Looking forward to meeting you soon in Barcelona.

Best regards,
Josef Eberhardsteiner


Am 23.06.2014 um 12:00 schrieb Claes-Göran Johnson :



Dear Prof Eberhardsteiner

Yes, I can write  4 page article on our work for the Newsletter. What is the timeline?

Am I supposed to arrange travel and accommodation myself, or will that be supported by Eccomas?

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson
________________________________________
From: Josef EBERHARDSTEINER [josef.eberhardsteiner@tuwien.ac.at]
Sent: Monday, June 16, 2014 3:00 PM
To: Claes-Göran Johnson
Cc: Ekkehard RAMM
Subject: Re: ECCOMAS Ludwig Prandtl Medal

Dear Prof. Johnson,

Thank you very much for your quick and comprehensive reply, and for raising this interesting problem in connection with Prandtl's main idea. I forwarded your wish for a platform for a scientific discussion at the joint WCCM-ECCM-ECFD 2014 conference in Barcelona to Prof. Xavier Oliver, who is the organizer of the ECFD 2014. I very much hope he can offer you a satisfactory solution.

In addition, I would like to encourage you to provide me with a 4-page article on the respective topic for the next ECCOMAS Newsletter, which should be published at the end of this year.

Once more congratulations, and best regards,
Josef Eberhardsteiner

Am 16.06.2014 um 11:13 schrieb Claes-Göran Johnson >:

Dear Profs Ramm and Eberhardsteiner

Thank you for this great honor, which I will be very happy to receive in person at the conference opening.

The award has an interesting aspect from scientific point of view in that my work (with Johan Hoffman), shows that Prandtl's main idea of the fundamental role of the boundary layer, for both separation and drag and lift, crowning him as the Father of Moden Fluid Mechanics, is incorrect. We show that separation, drag and lift originate from instability of slightly viscous flow and not from a boundary layer. The evidence comes from solving the Navier-Stokes equations with slip boundary condition, which does not give rise to any boundary layer, and we obtain results in full agreement with observations. We conclude that separation, drag and lift in slightly viscous flow does not originate from a boundary layer and thus that Prandtl's main idea is not in agreement with observations.

I would appreciate if this will be made clear to the public at the conference and I would certainly be willing to shortly expose the reasons why Prandtl was wrong.

The fluid dynamics community will not applaud the reward, since 20th century fluid mechanics has followed the Father in search of the origin of separation, drag and lift in the boundary layer. This has had a catastrophic impact on computational fluid mechanics leading to the strong belief that correct results require resolution of the boundary layer, which however is impossible even in thinkable future since quadrillions of mesh-points would be required. The result is a dead-lock of rational science. We show that drag and lift of an airplane can today be accurately computed over the entire range of angles of attack including stall, by solving the Navier-Stokes equations with slip using a couple of millions of mesh points.

The award thus brings a major scientific question to the podium and I hope it can be accompanied by a scientific discussion.

Sincerely,

Claes Johnson