Technology and Engineering Atlas
Things this atlas does not know. Each entry is a question that specialists
have posed and not settled, recorded with what would actually resolve it and which
expertise the answer needs.
These are kept deliberately, rather than quietly omitted. An atlas that shows
only what it is sure of implies a confidence it has not earned, and the gaps are often where
the interesting work is. Several sit exactly where two fields fail to meet: identifying the
hyssop of the Hebrew Bible needs a botanist and a philologist of Biblical Hebrew, and neither
one settles it alone.
Grouped by the field an answer needs. A question sitting between two disciplines appears under both, which is why the group counts add up to more than the number of questions.
Filter By Specialty 99 fields, 1 selected
Showing 1 of 608 questions, filtered to 1 specialty.
History of Mathematics 1
57
Did Alexander Grothendieck really offer 57 as an example of a prime number?
Open 57
Why It Is Open The anecdote is very widely told and 57 is called the Grothendieck prime because of it. Its literal veracity is disputed within mathematical folklore, and the tellings do not agree on the setting or the wording.
What Would Settle It A first-hand account from someone present, or a contemporary written record of the exchange.
Expertise Needed History of mathematics, and oral history of the Grothendieck circle.
Question posed in
Comme Appele du Neant, As If Summoned from the Void: The Life of Alexandre Grothendieck, Allyn Jackson, Part 2, page 1196.
Oral History 1
57
Did Alexander Grothendieck really offer 57 as an example of a prime number?
Open 57
Why It Is Open The anecdote is very widely told and 57 is called the Grothendieck prime because of it. Its literal veracity is disputed within mathematical folklore, and the tellings do not agree on the setting or the wording.
What Would Settle It A first-hand account from someone present, or a contemporary written record of the exchange.
Expertise Needed History of mathematics, and oral history of the Grothendieck circle.
Question posed in
Comme Appele du Neant, As If Summoned from the Void: The Life of Alexandre Grothendieck, Allyn Jackson, Part 2, page 1196.