I am looking for the author who originally researched a generalization of the Fibonacci numbers, which Koshy, in Chapter 7 his book Fibonacci and Lucas Numbers with Application refers to as the generalized Fibonacci sequence. This simple generalization enables one to consider Fibonacci-like sequences with arbitrary starting values. As a result, the Fibonacci and Lucas … Read more
How does a mathematician know if what they are trying to show or what they are working on has already been shown by someone else, or has already been extensively studied etc.? What if instead someone has already proven a much stronger result, for which their result is just a special case so though while … Read more
I stumbled upon something called The Morton Number, I wonder if anyone knows about it? I found out that it is related to Rose Katherine Morton, I know she was an american mathematician, but very little information on the web about her. So i started a wikipedia page (waiting for review), so people can contribute … Read more
In texts of Hilbert’s speech to the ICM in Paris in 1900, all 23 problems are listed. However, Wikipedia claims that he only presented 10 in his speech, and the others were published later. I know in general to consider Wikipedia less reliable, but can anyone shed any light on this? Answer See: Jeremy Gray, … Read more
“In 1723, received his Master of Philosophy with a dissertation that compared the philosophies of Descartes and Newton. At this time, he was receiving Saturday afternoon lessons from Johann Bernoulli, who quickly discovered his new pupil’s incredible talent for mathematics.[5] Euler was at this point studying theology, Greek, and Hebrew at his father’s urging, in … Read more
From V.I. Arnold’s Experimental Mathematics: Not having achieved what they desired, they pretended to desire what they had achieved. –M. Montel Who is M. Montel? Is he related to the French mathematician Paul Montel. Or is it the same person? Does M. stand for Monseigneur? Answer The “Montel” cited by Arnold is almost surely Paul … Read more
There was a joke (highly sophisticated, non-elementary) proof of a famous mathematician showing that a certain two-digit number (like 43 or 83 but I forgot what) is prime. Could you remind me of a number/mathematician or provide a link? Answer There is a famous story about Alexander Grothendieck, one of the foremost mathematicians of the … Read more
When a great mathematician dies, they often leave plenty of unpublished and incomplete works in their manuscripts. As we assumed that they were a really good mathematician, most of the ideas in these documents could be very interesting and helpful to others in the community even if they are sketchy or incomplete. Question: What to … Read more
Closed. This question is opinion-based. It is not currently accepting answers. Want to improve this question? Update the question so it can be answered with facts and citations by editing this post. Closed 2 years ago. Improve this question I’m reading the excellent autobiography of Norbert Wiener on its couple of books (Ex-Prodigy: My Childhood … Read more
Please name some published/preserved notebooks of famous (or not so famous) mathematicians, which you think reflect their learning or thinking process. Notebooks which contain mistakes are highly requested. Answer Well, Ramanujan’s notebooks contain quite a few mistakes. However, he didn’t generally provide proof along with his theorems, so it’s really just a list of theorems. … Read more
