No label defined (Q4501770)

Firstly the author looks back to his early work on the classification of von Neumann algebras and casts it in an unusual light of \textit{André Weil}'s, ``Basic Number Theory'', 3rd ed. [Springer New York (1974; Zbl 0326.12001), Reprint (1995; Zbl 0823.11001)]. After that the author explains that the problem considered leads to a natural spectral interpretation of the zeros of the Riemann zeta-function and a geometric framework in which the Frobenius, its eigenvalues and the Lefschetz formula interpretation of the explicit formulas continue to hold even for number fields. Finally the positivity of the Weil distribution is proved assuming the validity of the analogue of the Selberg trace formula. The latter remains unproved and is equivalent to RH for all \textit{L}-functions with Größencharakter. The article covers: 1. Local class field theory and the classification of factors, 2. Global class field theory and spontaneous symmetry breaking, 3. Weil positivity and the Trace formula. There are 29 refs. For the entire collection see [Zbl 1047.00015].