Slashdot Mirror
Prime Numbers Not So Random?
Jeff Moriarty writes "Some physicists believe they might have caught a whiff of a pattern in the sequence of prime numbers. This would have a huge impact across mathematics, and to people who just really like primes... or like being Prime."
Proof: All odd numbers are prime.
Mathematitian: "1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime. The rest are prime by induction."
Physisist: "1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is not but is likely to be experimental error, 11 is prime, 13 is prime..."
Engineer: ""1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime to a reasonable degree of accuracy, 11 is prime, 13 is prime..."
Computer Scientist: "1 is prime, 1 is prime, 1 is prime, 1 is prime..."
</joke>
=Smidge=
Well, the problem "How to prove that all odd numbers are prime" has different solutions whether you are a:
Mathematician: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, and by induction we have that all the odd integers are prime.
Physicist: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is an experimental error...
Engineer: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime...
Chemist: 1 prime, 3 prime, 5 prime... hey, let's publish!
Modern physicist using renormalization: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is ... 9/3 is prime, 11 is prime, 13 is prime, 15 is ... 15/3 is prime, 17 is prime, 19 is prime, 21 is ... 21/3 is prime...
Quantum Physicist: All numbers are equally prime and non-prime until observed.
Professor: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, and the rest are left as an exercise for the student.
Confused Undergraduate: Let p be any prime number larger than 2. Then p is not divisible by 2, so p is odd. QED
Measure nontheorist: There are exactly as many odd numbers as primes (Euclid, Cantor), and exactly one even prime (namely 2), so there must be exactly one odd nonprime (namely 1).
Cosmologist: 1 is prime, yes it is true....
Computer Scientist: 1 is prime, 10 is prime, 11 is prime, 101 is prime...
Programmer: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 will be fixed in the next release, ...
C programmer: 01 is prime, 03 is prime, 05 is prime, 07 is prime, 09 is really 011 which everyone knows is prime, ...
BASIC programmer: What's a prime?
COBOL programmer: What's an odd number?
Windows programmer: 1 is prime. Wait...
Mac programmer: Now why would anyone want to know about that? That's not user friendly. You don't worry about it, we'll take care of it for you.
Bill Gates: 1. No one will ever need any more than 1.
ZX-81 Computer Programmer: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, Out of Memory.
Pentium owner: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 8.9999978 is prime...
GNU programmer: % prime
usage: prime [-nV] [--quiet] [--silent] [--version] [-e script] --catenate --concatenate | c --create | d --diff --compare | r --append | t --list | u --update | x -extract --get [ --atime-preserve ] [ -b, --block-size N ] [ -B, --read-full-blocks ] [ -C, --directory DIR ] [--checkpoint ] [ -f, --file [HOSTNAME:]F ] [ --force-local ] [ -F, --info-script F --new-volume-script F ] [-G, --incremental ] [ -g, --listed-incremental F ] [ -h, --dereference ] [ -i, --ignore-zeros ] [ --ignore-failed-read ] [ -k, --keep-old-files ] [ -K, --starting-file F ] [ -l, --one-file-system ] [ -L, --tape-length N ] [ -m, --modification-time ] [ -M, --multi-volume ] [ -N, --after-date DATE, --newer DATE ] [ -o, --old-archive, --portability ] [ -O, --to-stdout ] [ -p, --same-permissions, --preserve-permissions ] [ -P, --absolute-paths ] [ --preserve ] [ -R, --record-number ] [ [-f script-file] [--expression=script] [--file=script-file] [file...]
prime: you must specify exactly one of the r, c, t, x, or d options
For more information, type "prime --help''
Unix programmer: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, ...
Segmentation fault, Core dumped.
Computer programmer: 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime, 9 is prime, 9 is prime, 9 is ...
Non-Linux Penguins ?