IUBio

Time Magazine: Man of the Millennium

Paul Hsieh qed at pobox.com
Mon Sep 28 05:33:54 EST 1998


In article, claw at ozemail.com.au says...
> qed at pobox.com (Paul Hsieh) wrote:
> 
> [big snip]
> 
> >Andrew Wiles spent 7 years in virtual solitude working by himself to 
> >prove Fermat's last theorem after hundreds, if not thousands of 
> >mathematicians before him tried and failed.  When I think about all the 
> >other achievments of man, I can't think of one that compares in total 
> >depth and intensity.  I think that this proof is the ultimate 
> >intellectual trophy of man kind.
> 
> Andrew Wiles is an amazing mathematician, but I think you are
> falling victim to the recency effect, whereby more recent events
> appear to be more important by their immediacy. This is the same
> reason that most "Best Ever" polls of music, novels, films, or
> whatever, are heavily slanted towards works that appeared
> recently.
> 
> And although Wiles' proof is an amazing piece of work, there are
> plenty of others who have worked on problems for years.

7 years?  With all other mathematicians for centuries being rebuffed?  I 
think you underestimate his conviction and the incredible amount of work 
that was done in those seven years.  I mean any other sane human being 
would have stopped after a short while and concluded that they would 
never solve the mountain of work in their lifetime; that is if the 
approach were even correct in the first place!  It was a tremendous leap 
of faith, as well as a tremendous accomplishment.

I mean who are you going to compare against?  Edison?  According to some 
history books, he spent a few years searching for what ended up being 
Tungsten.  But the truth is, he commissioned lots of people to do that 
actual hunting, and he did not envision that amount of time it would take 
to find it from the outset.  Furthermore, I don't think he expended a lot 
of mental energy looking for it.

> [...] And the
> other problem is that Fermat's Last Theorem is a bit of a "trophy
> proof" in that it has little interest beyond the historical.

His proof of Fermat's Last Theorem was a trivial consequence of a much 
more important result that he proved (Takizawa-Yumi conjecture.)  Sort of 
comparable to the Grand Unified Theory in physics.  "Fermat's Last 
Theorem" was really just a headline grabber.

> Other great mathematicians, such as Gauss and Pascal not only
> provided great proofs and amazing insights, their work has
> *applications*.

Ah yes, but at the same time they are dime a dozen (Jacobi, Galois, 
Newton, Hilbert, Cauchy, ... etc.)  What Wiles did, I don't think has any 
direct comparison among them.
 
> In short, much as I admire Wiles, I wouldn't even shortlist him
> for the Man of the Millennium.

Fine, I'll respect your opinion.

--
Paul Hsieh
qed at pobox.com
http://www.pobox.com/~qed



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