At two o 'clock sharp.
Lu Zhou, who was wearing a suit and leather shoes, walked onto the podium. The lecture hall, which was originally noisy because of the whispering, instantly quieted down.
No one maintained discipline. Everyone stared at the person on the podium. Some were suspicious, some were expectant, and some were expressionless.
If it was someone else, their legs would have gone soft from being stared at by so many big shots, let alone talking about math problems.
However, Lu Zhou, who was standing on the podium, looked calm. He was not intimidated by the stares.
He had already prepared himself mentally when he was offstage.
Not to mention, this was not his first time in a situation like this.
"Thank you all for coming to Princeton from all over the world to listen to my research on Goldbach's conjecture."
As usual, Lu Zhou expressed his gratitude to the scholars who were invited to the report. He then began to talk about his report.
"My report will be divided into two parts. One part will be about the Group Structure Method I used to prove Goldbach's conjecture, and the other part will be about the proof of Goldbach's conjecture.
"I believe everyone has read my thesis before coming here. I will briefly explain the tedious steps in the thesis in a PowerPoint presentation. As for my explanation, I will mainly focus on the key steps as well as thinking and train of thought. "
"Also, I will try to save as much time as possible for the Q&A session."
It was common practice in the academic world to preview the thesis before the academic report began. It was also a necessary etiquette. During the Q&A session, if one stood up and asked questions that were written in the thesis or were irrelevant, it would be considered a very rude and unprofessional thing.
For the big names in the audience, these kinds of questions would not appear.
Similarly, the parts that were clearly written in the thesis did not need to be shown in a PowerPoint presentation. After all, everyone's time was precious. They did not come to Princeton just to look at the slides.
After the opening remarks, Lu Zhou went straight to the point.
"The so-called Group Structure Method is the abbreviation of the 'Holistic Structure Research Method of Group Theory'. The core idea is to use the concept of cyclic groups to study infinite problems. Based on the theorem that the multiplication group of integers modulo p is always a cyclic group, we can obtain … "
While explaining, Lu Zhou's laser pointer wandered around the white screen.
[… Let the finite group G and | G | = p1α1p2α2 … · · piαi, where pi is a prime number and αi is a positive integer. Let p ∈ π (G) and define deg (p) = | {q ∈ π (G) | p ~ q) |
The number of times deg (p) is called vertex p. Redefine C (G) = …]
Compared to the second half of the Goldbach's conjecture, the Group Structure Method was more important. This was because only by understanding this part of the content would the people in the lecture hall understand what he was doing.
Therefore, Lu Zhou explained this part in great detail, trying his best to explain every point clearly.
The people sitting in the audience, regardless of whether they were invited scholars or uninvited students, all listened very carefully.
Especially James Maynard. He sat in the middle of the venue with his arms crossed and listened very attentively.
He was also researching prime number problems, and he was one of the leading British mathematicians in the field of analytic number theory. As one of the popular candidates for the Fields Medal, he originally planned to use the twin prime number problem to win the 2018 Fields Medal. However, he did not expect that Lu Zhou would beat him to it. He was so angry that he burned the manuscript.
It could be said that he came all the way from the UK to find fault with his competitor.
However, that was what he said …
The more he read, the more thought-provoking his expression became.
This Chinese scholar's logic was so rigorous that not only did he not find any problems, but he also could not help but applaud …
Sitting next to him was his PhD student, also a British guy named Evan.
The British guy looked at the lines of text flashing on the screen, and he began to have trouble keeping up with the pace.
Finally, he could not help but ask quietly.
"Professor, what is his Group Structure Method talking about?"
Maynard stared at the powerpoint meticulously and remained silent.
He could answer this question, but he could not answer it.
First of all, he did not want to be distracted and miss any details. Second of all, he was afraid that if he opened his mouth, he would not be able to help but express his praise for this ingenious method … Just the day before yesterday, he said on his personal blog that this 50-page thesis was useless and that he would expose this Chinese scholar's trick at the Princeton report.
However, even if he did not want to admit it, he had to admit that the gap between him and his opponent was not just a Fields Medal …
Whether it worked or not, that was the reality of mathematics.
On the other side of the lecture hall, two old men sat in the corner of the venue in a low-key manner. They watched the report while chatting with each other.
"I didn't expect that in the few years that I left, the Princeton Institute for Advanced Study has another genius." Andrew Wiles looked at the young man on stage and nodded with approval. "Not bad, he has half of my charm."
After returning to his alma mater, Oxford, in 2011, Andrew Wiles rarely returned to the Princeton Institute for Advanced Study. The position of head of the mathematics department at Princeton was given to another genius, Charles Fefferman.
He was referring to the most important mathematics lecture of the 20th century that was held at the Newton Institute 23 years ago. More than two hundred mathematicians listened to this lecture. Although only a quarter of them could fully understand the Greek letters and calculations on the blackboard.
As for the remaining three-quarters, they traveled thousands of miles to England just to witness history.
It was the same now.
Although Goldbach's conjecture was more like an intelligence test than Fermat's last theorem, the fact that Goldbach's conjecture was included in Hilbert's eighth question of the twenty-three questions showed its importance in the field of number theory and mathematics.
Solving it might not change the world like the Millennium Prize Problems, nor could it change mathematics like Fermat's Last Theorem. However, the tools created when solving this problem were invaluable to the entire mathematics community.
There was no doubt that everyone here was witnessing history.
"Oh," said Deligné with a smirk. He then said, "I don't know who was the one that apologized to the New York Times and even wanted to return the champagne."
Wiles coughed lightly and casually glossed over this dark history. "Only when a person is faced with a desperate situation can inspiration burst forth. I just forced myself into a dead end and then came back from the dead end … As far as the results are concerned, I did it. "
Deligné said, "Didn't you say it was performance art last time?"
"Okay, my dear friend, let's change the topic," said Wiles. He looked at the content on the screen and said, "I don't know much about Goldbach's conjecture. From your point of view, does his thesis prove it?"
Deligné: "You should ask Ivaniec and Faltings this question. They are the experts in analytic number theory. I only dabbled in prime numbers. Of course, after reading his thesis, I'm more optimistic. "
If he was not optimistic, he would not have arranged this report for Lu Zhou. Instead, he would have suggested that it be revised.
Wiles said, "Faltings is here too?"
"It's not that he's here," said Deligné. He paused for a second and said, "No one wants to miss it —"
Suddenly, there was a whisper of surprise in the venue.
It was a surprise.
At the same time, it was also a compliment.
Deligné and Wiles stopped talking and looked at the stage.
After a while, Wiles smiled and said, "It seems that our worries were unnecessary."
Deligné looked at the calculations on the screen and finally had a smile on his face.
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