Geometric topology

proceedings of the Geometric Topology Conference held at Park City, Utah, Febr. 19-22, 1974

BY HERMAN GLUCK li INTRODUCTION • Are closed surfaces rigid? Euler
thought so, and conjectured in 1766, "A closed spacial figure allows no changes,
as long as it is not ripped apart" [6], and expanded on this in letters to Lagrange
in 1770. But the conjecture has not yet yielded, and is surely one of the oldest
and most beautiful unsolved problems in geometry in the large. What is the
evidence in its favor? The experimental evidence is of two sorts. Most cardboard
models of ...