Chapter 237 Time for a Cup of Coffee

A lot of things can happen with a cup of coffee.

Just when Lu Zhou was lying flat on the bed and his consciousness entered the system space, British mathematician Andrew Granville (Andrew Granville) was browsing the Arxiv webpage at the University of Montreal, thousands of kilometers away from Princeton.

It's one of the things he does every day, sometimes after his morning run, sometimes before bed.

While most professors like to leave the job of tracking the latest research progress of their peers on Arxiv to the doctoral or master's students in the lab, Granville likes to do it himself.

While the quality of non-peer-reviewed papers on Arxiv varies, many newcomers have come up with some very creative ideas that are highly instructive...just not perfect.

After roughly reading about ten papers, Granville yawned and was about to get up and go to sleep.

However, at this moment, his personal page suddenly received an alert from a website, and it happened to come from the two tags he was concerned about—analytic number theory and prime number problems.

Granville frowned, obsessive compulsion prompted him to click on the reminder.

However, after seeing the title of the article, the corners of his mouth couldn't help curling up.

"Any even number greater than 2 can be expressed as the sum of two prime numbers"

Isn't this the Euler statement of Goldbach's conjecture?

Generally speaking, such papers would be thrown into the "General Mathematics" section, which had long been blocked by his settings.

Granville didn't know why the paper triggered the alert, but he presumed it was either a bug on the website or an oversight by the staff.

Shaking his head, just as he was about to close his laptop and go to sleep, he suddenly noticed the contributor's name.

Then……

He froze.

Lu Zhou?

Winner of last year's Cole Prize in Number Theory?

The prover of the weekly conjecture, the twin prime conjecture, and the Polignac conjecture?

What does this paper mean... This year he proved Goldbach's conjecture again?

WTF? !

Granville was stunned for an instant, and then sober for an instant!

The original drowsiness was swept away, but he didn't move, but sat on the chair and stood there for half a minute.

Then he glanced at the calendar and confirmed that it was already May, not April 1st.

The dissertation has more than fifty pages in total, but compared to the amount of information contained in the title, this is nothing at all.

"It actually solved Goldbach's conjecture...it's impossible."

Whispering in his mouth, Granville clicked on the paper, and followed the abstract of the paper, reading down line by line.

Then, he read this paper all night...

...

On the other side, the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris, far across the Atlantic, is giving a lecture on the proof of the weak Goldbach conjecture.

And the speaker, of course, is the proverb of this conjecture, Harold Helfgott.

"...The end of the round method is the weak Goldbach conjecture. We can prove that any odd number greater than 7 can be expressed as the sum of three odd prime numbers, but it is difficult to extend it to even numbers."

"Of course, my proof is far from perfect, and there is still a lot of room for improvement. But if everyone here is interested in studying this issue in depth, I still suggest that you change your mind and reconsider this issue."

The lecture is coming to an end.

Next, is the question and answer session.

Not only professors and researchers from the Ecole Normale Supérieure sat here, but also students.

After waiting for a long time, a young man stood up and spoke.

"Professor Helfgott, how long do you think it will take to solve Goldbach's conjecture?"

Helfgott thought for a moment and replied: "It depends on whether the tools we have to solve the problem exist or have never been solved before. In fact, if I could, I would even hope that it would never be solved. See what we've got What? We have improved the ancient sieve method, created the circle method and the density method, etc... I am not greedy, but maybe we can get more treasures if we pass this proposition."

The lecture is over.

There was applause from the audience, and Professor Helfgott was sent out of the lecture hall.

Without stopping here, he carried his briefcase and walked towards the office.

Pushing open the door, he walked to his seat, but before he could sit down and drink some water, his student walked towards him quickly with a look of surprise on his face.

"Professor! I saw a paper about Goldbach's conjecture on Arxiv!"

Helfgot put the briefcase on the table, his expression unchanged, and he said in an unhurried voice, "Amos, I told you many times that articles on Arxiv should be selective. Look. There's only one Perelman, and probably only one, and you should be reading the classics I've marked you, not some non-peer-reviewed shit."

Mathematics is different from computers. For the computer industry, a difference of two months for an idea may mean a difference of a century. Therefore, many people like to occupy the pit first and supplement later, so they frequently use Arxiv.

And mathematics, to be honest, just based on an idea, really doesn't mean much.

Amos looked very helpless. He knew that his boss didn't like Arxiv, but he still tried to explain: "But professor, the author of this article is the winner of the Cole Number Theory Prize last year! It's impossible for him to write a paper that is also dross. "

Helfgott froze for a moment, his expression very surprised.

It's not because of the reputation of the Cole Prize in Number Theory, this kind of reputation is already a cloud for people like him. But last year's Cole Prize winner, he knew who it was. Because at the academic exchange meeting at UC Berkeley, the young man from Huaguo left a good impression on him.

only……

Why is such a major proof of conjecture still on Arxiv?

His face straightened slightly, and Helfgott felt that he should treat this paper with caution. Such a major achievement cannot be missed because of prejudice against Arxiv.

He took out his glasses from his pocket and put them on, and he immediately said, "Print out the paper for me."

"Okay, Professor!"

Amos returned to the computer energetically and turned on the printer.

With a buzzing sound, the 50 pages of still warm A4 paper were delivered to Helfgott soon.

Professor Helfgott pushed his glasses, took out a pen from the pen holder, and looked at the contents of the thesis paper line by line.

Time passed by every minute and every second.

Amos waited for a long time, but did not get the response he expected.

Finally, he got a little anxious from waiting, and couldn't help asking in a low voice.

"Professor, is he right?"

"...I'm not sure." Professor Helfgott shook his head, put down the pen in his hand, and said carefully, "But I didn't find any obvious problems."

The proof of such a major conjecture cannot be concluded in a short time. Not only does he need time, but also colleagues who are researching this direction also need time.

Leaning back in the chair, Professor Helfgott closed his eyes and meditated for a while.

After about five minutes, he finally opened his eyes, and he seemed to be speaking to his student Amos, and seemed to be talking to himself.

"...He used a brand-new method. I can see the shadow of the sieve method on it, and I can also see the traces of the closed-track integral and the residue theorem, which obviously belong to the circle method...Of course, the most amazing , or he introduced the concept of group theory in his own theoretical framework. I have seen similar ideas in Professor Zellberg's paper, but it is not so pure. As for whether he proved it or not, I dare not To make a conclusion, I need to ask other people's opinions..."