Current location - Training Enrollment Network - Mathematics courses - Essays on Mathematical Historical Stories
Essays on Mathematical Historical Stories
(1) Wolfskeil Prize Story

There was a man named Wolfskeil. He studied mathematics in college and was crazy about a beautiful girl. To his dismay, he was rejected countless times. Feeling helpless, I decided to commit suicide, decided to bid farewell to this world when the midnight bell rang, and never paid attention to earthly things again.

Wolfsker is still working hard for the rest of his life, not math, but something commercial. On the last day, he wrote a will and wrote letters to all his friends and relatives. Because of his high efficiency, he finished everything before midnight. In the remaining hours, he ran to the library to look through his math books. Soon, I was attracted by a paper by Cuomo, which explained why Cauchy and other predecessors could not do Fermat's Last Theorem. That's a great paper for mathematicians who want to commit suicide to read at the last minute. Wolfskehl found a bug in Kummer, and he proved it until dawn. He was arrogant, so everything became a thing of the past ... so he made a new will, set a large part of his property as a prize, and told the first person who proved Fermat's last theorem, 654.38 million marks. ...

This is the origin of the Wolfskeil Prize.

(2) Minkowski and Four-color Theorem

In a topology class, Minkowski proudly declared to the students: "The most important reason why this theorem has not been proved is that only some third-rate mathematicians have spent time on it so far. Let me prove it below. " This class is over, and the certificate has not been issued yet. In the next class, Minkowski continued to prove that several weeks had passed ... One cloudy morning, Minkowski walked into the classroom. It was like lightning across the sky, and the thunder was deafening. Minkowski said very seriously: "God was angered by my pride, and my proof was incomplete ..."

(3) Hilbert and Riemann conjecture

Hilbert once had a student who gave him a paper to prove Riemann's conjecture. Although there was an irreparable mistake, Hilbert was deeply attracted. The next year, the student died somehow, and Hilbert asked to give a speech at the funeral. That day, the wind and rain were rustling, and the students' families were full of grief. Hilbert began his speech, first pointing out that it is a pity that such a genius left us so early. Everyone felt the same way and cried more and more fiercely. Then Hilbert said that although this person's proof is wrong, if we follow this road, we should be able to prove Riemann's conjecture. Then, Hilbert continued to preach enthusiastically in the rain: "Actually, let's consider a univariate complex variable function …" Everyone fell down.