Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Fermat's Last Theorem and the Simpson's TV Show

There was recently an article in Science News on the mathematics of the Simpson's. One of the throw away jokes is 178212 + 184112 = 192212.

Read more here if you are interested.

Tuesday, June 13, 2006

Another False Proof: E. E. Escultura

I must admit that I have a fascination with false proofs. Perhaps, that is why I am so interested in Fermat's Last Theorem.

Because of the many false proofs out there and because so many people are unable to tell the difference between mathematics and pseudomathematics, I have started a new blog track: False Proofs.

This past week I was honored with a long, blog comment from Mr. E. E. Escultura who believes that he has found a flaw in the real number system. The flaw according to Mr. Escultura is the axiom of trichotomy and the solution is to avoid using nonterminating decimals. If you are interested, you can find the details here as well as links to the many other blogs that have features Mr. Escultura's ideas.