From all-round academic master to chief scientist - Chapter 168 Cayman’s Jealousy

Time passed quickly, and the news that David Cayman narrowed the gap in the weak-form twin prime conjecture to 128 spread throughout the mathematics community, but his remarks in the interview afterwards also set off a discussion in the mathematics community. .

Most of the seniors who valued Lin Xiao criticized Cayman’s behavior. Although he did not slander Lin Xiao, his behavior of belittling Lin Xiao’s achievements and using Lin Xiao to promote himself was still a bit excessive.

Especially the mathematicians here in France, since Lin Xiao is now attending university here in France, of course they have to speak up for Lin Xiao.

However, not everyone expressed criticism. On the contrary, they helped Cayman promote his results. Some people even claimed that even if Cayman’s results were not as good as Lin Xiao’s sieve circle method, its importance was worth it. Praising.

…

David Cayman’s office at Stanford University.

“How is the situation outside now?”

“Not bad? Haha, thank you very much.”

Cayman put down the phone with a calm smile on his face.

Seniority is indispensable everywhere, even in mathematics, this situation still exists.

Although most mathematicians are happy to see the emergence of a young mathematical genius like Lin Xiao, there are still a few who are a little unimpressed by the sudden appearance of such a young man.

Their rigidity and stubbornness, or jealousy, make them dislike the presence of such a person in their field.

After all, colleagues are all enemies.

Such is the case with Cayman.

He has been studying issues in the field of number theory, especially Goldbach’s conjecture and the twin prime conjecture. As for the Riemann conjecture, it was too rare, so he did not study it.

He has been researching Goldbach’s conjecture for many years. Although he has not made any breakthrough, he still believes that he has a chance to succeed, so he has persisted for more than ten years.

Until now, he is already forty years old, which is already a bit old, but whenever he is worried about his age, Andrew Wiles will become his role model, since everyone can be at forty years old. If he succeeds later, why can’t he succeed himself?

So he never gave up. In this way, his hard work is worthy of praise. It is probably because of this hard work that he can now become a mathematics professor at Stanford University.

However, just last year, he suddenly received news that a young man had emerged from that backward country on the other side of the Pacific Ocean and had completely solved Goldbach’s conjecture, and other well-known mathematicians in the world recognized him. There is no problem in the proof process, so this problem that has troubled the world for hundreds of years and wasted Cayman’s time for more than ten years has become a theorem.

When he learned the news, Cayman couldn’t believe it at first. Goldbach’s conjecture was actually proved by someone else first?

He even thought it was an April Fool’s joke on him.

However, when he found the paper and read it from cover to cover, he realized that more than ten years of his energy had been wasted.

Then, according to his graduate students, that day their professor directly activated the Desktop Cleaning Master skill.

After that, Cayman became jealous of Lin Xiao.

At the same time, he also focused his original efforts on studying Goldbach’s conjecture on the twin prime conjecture.

Even though he was jealous of Lin Xiao, he still found inspiration from Lin Xiao’s paper, and now, a year later, he made a breakthrough.

Although he used Lin Xiao’s sieving circle method, Lin Xiao proved Goldbach’s conjecture, which caused his more than ten years of work to come to nothing, making him unwilling to mention Lin Xiao at all, nor to admit that he The success has a lot to do with Lin Xiao’s round sieving method.

Hence, what he said in the interview that day.

Although many big figures in the mathematics community criticized his words and deeds after that, many people also supported him.

Although those who support him are not well-known figures in the mathematics community, it is not the case that anyone with a high status in the mathematics community can tell a person to leave.

It was impossible for Stanford University to expel him. The paper he sent out, at least, raised his status within the school to a higher level.

Moreover, people at the Los Angeles Times will try their best to speak for him.

He doesn’t care what the “Los Angeles Times” has in mind, as long as it’s good for him anyway, and with this big media helping him speak, there are still many people who praise him among ordinary people.

So no matter how you think about it, Cayman doesn’t think there will be any problem.

Now, he might as well continue to study how to use his own method to completely prove the twin prime conjecture.

Thinking that he could prove a question in Hilbert’s eighth question, Cayman couldn’t help but feel excited. As long as he could complete the proof of this question, what honor would he not be able to win in the future in mathematics?

Even if he is over 40 years old and cannot win the Fields Medal, maybe like Wiles, the International Mathematical Union will award him a Fields Special Medal?

And even if it doesn’t work, they will definitely get the Cole Number Theory Award from the American Mathematical Society, right?

Thinking about it further, what about the Craford Prize, the Abel Prize, and the Wolf Prize in Mathematics?

You can always get one, right?

For those who study pure mathematics, wealth and wealth are nothing.

Purist scholars like to constantly challenge difficult problems, but more mathematicians like those honors and titles. After all, mathematicians are also human beings, and of course they hope to get these honors to highlight themselves.

That’s not much to say, and for Cayman, he was just that kind of mathematician.

Thinking that he would have the opportunity to win these world-renowned awards, he became even more motivated to solve the twin prime conjecture.

However, at this moment, he suddenly received a message from someone from the Los Angeles Times. The other party just sent him a Facebook link and asked him to read it. It was Lin Xiao’s response.

“That young man actually responded?”

He snorted in his heart, what could Lin Xiao respond to?

Object?

So what if I object?

Could it be possible to deny his proof and say that he proved it wrong?

He sneered. His proof process had been peer-reviewed and published in the Journal of the American Mathematical Society, one of the top four journals in mathematics. There could be no errors.

In addition, he didn’t hear about Lin Xiao’s achievements in mathematics in the past year. He only heard that he went to study theoretical chemistry again and came up with something.

However, in his opinion, this is completely self-destructive, leaving pure mathematics alone and going to study applied fields?

This seemed a bit silly to him.

“I want to see what you can say.”

With this thought in his mind, he clicked on the link.

However, after seeing the content inside, he was stunned.

Lin Xiao neither protested nor showed any anger, but the content made Cayman feel cold.

[I have read the proof process of Professor Yikaman. This is a good new method. It proves to us that Mr. Zhang Yitang’s work can still be improved. However, it is still regrettable that this method cannot be used. We get the final result. According to my derivation, this method will be trapped by the number 36. My derivation process is attached below. (click to download)】

Seeing this, Caiman suddenly panicked.

His method cannot completely prove the twin prime conjecture?

How could this happen?

At this time, his heart was a little confused, but he hoped that this was just Lin Xiao’s mistake. He didn’t believe that his method could only narrow the number range to 36.

Although it has been reduced to 36, which is already a very good result, it is always only a weak form of conjecture, and it does not really prove the twin prime conjecture anyway.

Without truly proving the twin prime number conjecture, we can never claim to have won this pearl of mathematics.

So, with a faint panic in his heart, he downloaded the attachment with trembling hands, and then entered it.

Soon, as he read it from beginning to end, his heart felt cold again.

Because he could not find any errors or omissions, the entire derivation process was as rigorous and harmonious as Lin Xiao’s original paper proving Goldbach’s conjecture.

Cayman didn’t believe in evil and read it from beginning to end again, but still couldn’t find even a single punctuation error.

He slumped in his chair. Although he was unwilling to admit it, as Lin Xiao’s proof process showed, his method was still just a “remnant book” for proving the twin prime number conjecture.

“Can I still not succeed? No, no, how can I surrender? By the way, my method can continue to be improved!”

Thinking of this, he cheered up again. Since he couldn’t complete the final proof, he could just continue to improve his method.

Now that Lin Xiao has pointed out the limitations of his method, he now has the opportunity to improve it, which just saves him time.

Cayman regained his energy and quickly printed out Lin Xiao’s paper.

Looking at the printed paper, the content in it could be published to a regional journal. However, Lin Xiao posted it directly on Facebook instead of Arxiv. Only if it is posted on Arxiv, it is copyrighted. The effect is that papers posted on social platforms like Facebook are not recognized by the academic community and may be stolen.

Thinking of this, Cayman felt a little annoyed. Does Lin Xiao think this paper is not worthy of posting on arxiv or posting it in one area?

“Young man, it seems I have to let you know that no matter whether you are a genius or not, you should keep your temper when you are young.”

With a cold snort, he was about to continue to study his method in depth, but at this time, his phone rang again, and it was also a call from the Los Angeles Times.

After connecting the phone, he heard the person on the other side say: “Professor Cayman, you should have read the response of the Chinese mathematics genius I just asked you to read, right? Is his proof process correct?”

Cayman said: “Although I have to admit that my method still has limitations as he said, but now that he has pointed out the shortcomings in my method, I now have every opportunity to continue to improve my method and then Complete the final proof.”

“Oh? If that’s the case, then I wish you success. However, before that, we may need to interview you. You need to respond to the statement of the Chinese mathematics genius.”

“There is no need to call him a mathematical genius.” Cayman said: “Before tonight, you can come and interview me. I will continue my research starting tomorrow.”

“OK.”