Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[Jon MW]

My degree dissertation was "The Use of Prime Numbers in Mathematics Through History", if I can find a copy I could link to it - it's a really interesting read. Honest.

It's sub title was, "A Brief History of Prime", although apparently I'm not the only one who has thought of this idea.

If you didn't number the pages in your dissertation 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc I'll be disappointed.

No, I got into enough trouble as it was.

I can't remember the percentage but it got a "2:1" grade - the feedback I got was that I could have got a "first" grade if I had a bit more mathematical rigour and a bit less puns and gags. 

[kinboshi]

My degree dissertation was "The Use of Prime Numbers in Mathematics Through History", if I can find a copy I could link to it - it's a really interesting read. Honest.

It's sub title was, "A Brief History of Prime", although apparently I'm not the only one who has thought of this idea.

If you didn't number the pages in your dissertation 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc I'll be disappointed.

No, I got into enough trouble as it was.

I can't remember the percentage but it got a "2:1" grade - the feedback I got was that I could have got a "first" grade if I had a bit more mathematical rigour and a bit less puns and gags. 

Pah!  Rigour is over-rated, especially when there are gags and puns to be made.

So anyway, the Riemann hypothesis...

[Jon MW]

My degree dissertation was "The Use of Prime Numbers in Mathematics Through History", if I can find a copy I could link to it - it's a really interesting read. Honest.

It's sub title was, "A Brief History of Prime", although apparently I'm not the only one who has thought of this idea.

If you didn't number the pages in your dissertation 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc I'll be disappointed.

No, I got into enough trouble as it was.

I can't remember the percentage but it got a "2:1" grade - the feedback I got was that I could have got a "first" grade if I had a bit more mathematical rigour and a bit less puns and gags. 

Pah!  Rigour is over-rated, especially when there are gags and puns to be made.

So anyway, the Riemann hypothesis...

That pretty much covers it.

[Laxie]

It's all so much clearer now. 

[12barblues]

Can you explain the Riemann hypothesis in stupid layman's terms?

'The Music Of The Primes' by Marcus de Sautoy covers this in as near to layman's terms as you are going to get.  Excellent book by the guy who did the recent BBC series on the history of maths and has just been appointed as Prof. for public understanding of science or some such title, taking over from Richard Dawkins.

[kinboshi]

Can you explain the Riemann hypothesis in stupid layman's terms?

'The Music Of The Primes' by Marcus de Sautoy covers this in as near to layman's terms as you are going to get.  Excellent book by the guy who did the recent BBC series on the history of maths and has just been appointed as Prof. for public understanding of science or some such title, taking over from Richard Dawkins.

 

Off to check it out now...

[Karabiner]

My degree dissertation was "The Use of Prime Numbers in Mathematics Through History", if I can find a copy I could link to it - it's a really interesting read. Honest.

It's sub title was, "A Brief History of Prime", although apparently I'm not the only one who has thought of this idea.

If you didn't number the pages in your dissertation 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc I'll be disappointed.

Is 1 not a prime number then

[RED-DOG]

See now what I don't get is why not being dividable by anything except one and itself makes a prime number special. Sure, it makes it different, but why is it special? Is it more useful than other numbers?

16 can be divided in all sorts of ways, isn't that better?

[ariston]

My degree dissertation was "The Use of Prime Numbers in Mathematics Through History", if I can find a copy I could link to it - it's a really interesting read. Honest.

It's sub title was, "A Brief History of Prime", although apparently I'm not the only one who has thought of this idea.

If you didn't number the pages in your dissertation 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc I'll be disappointed.

No, I got into enough trouble as it was.

I can't remember the percentage but it got a "2:1" grade - the feedback I got was that I could have got a "first" grade if I had a bit more mathematical rigour and a bit less puns and gags. 

Pah!  Rigour is over-rated, especially when there are gags and puns to be made.

So anyway, the Riemann hypothesis...

That pretty much covers it.

if it does cover it go claim your million.

I've only read the last couple of pages on here but I presume this conversation tangent has already covered the Beal conjecture? Far easier problem for people to get their heads round imo.

[gatso]

My degree dissertation was "The Use of Prime Numbers in Mathematics Through History", if I can find a copy I could link to it - it's a really interesting read. Honest.

It's sub title was, "A Brief History of Prime", although apparently I'm not the only one who has thought of this idea.

If you didn't number the pages in your dissertation 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc I'll be disappointed.

Is 1 not a prime number then

no, a prime number needs to be divisible by exactly 2 whole numbers. 1 is only divisible by 1 number which also happens to be 1

[kinboshi]

See now what I don't get is why not being dividable by anything except one and itself makes a prime number special. Sure, it makes it different, but why is it special? Is it more useful than other numbers?

16 can be divided in all sorts of ways, isn't that better?

Prime numbers have been a very important part of cryptography.  That's one practical use for them.  The cicadas also find them useful .

[RED-DOG]

Prime numbers have been a very important part of cryptography.

And the other numbers haven't?

[RED-DOG]

Oh and err 

[kinboshi]

Prime numbers have been a very important part of cryptography.

And the other numbers haven't?

The reason prime numbers are so useful is explained here:

 http://www.claymath.org/posters/primes/

[Jon MW]

See now what I don't get is why not being dividable by anything except one and itself makes a prime number special. Sure, it makes it different, but why is it special? Is it more useful than other numbers?

16 can be divided in all sorts of ways, isn't that better?

Perfect Numbers are also special.

They are numbers whose positive divisors are also their sum.

E.G.
6 is a perfect number because
6 = 1 + 2 + 3 = 1 x 2 x 3

Perfect Number's aren't useful at all.

But the prime numbers weren't useful until relatively recently.

All the numbers are interesting, some are more interesting than others, they get studied because they are interesting not because they are useful.