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Mathematicians Of The Day
3rd January
On this day in 1657, Pierre de Fermat made a challenge to the mathematicians of Europe and England. He posed two problems, involving S(n), the sum of the proper divisors of n:
1. Find a cube n such that n + S(n) is a square.
2. Find a square n such that n + S(n) is a cube.
Frenicle de Bessy found solutions to these on the day he was given the problems.
You can see the solutions at THIS LINK.
The postage stamp of one of today's mathematicians at THIS LINK was issued in 1982.
1. Find a cube n such that n + S(n) is a square.
2. Find a square n such that n + S(n) is a cube.
Frenicle de Bessy found solutions to these on the day he was given the problems.
You can see the solutions at THIS LINK.
The postage stamp of one of today's mathematicians at THIS LINK was issued in 1982.
Click on Ⓟ for a poster.
Born:
- 1777: Louis Poinsot Ⓟ
- 1788: Enno Heeren Dirksen Ⓟ
- 1912: Cora Ratto de Sadosky Ⓟ
- 1917: Yurii Alekseevich Mitropolskii Ⓟ
- 1921: Jean-Louis Koszul Ⓟ
- 1924: Clive William Kilmister Ⓟ
- 1926: David Spence Ⓟ
Died:
- 1641: Jeremiah Horrocks Ⓟ
- 1891: John Casey Ⓟ
- 1892: Heinrich Schröter Ⓟ
- 1912: Jacob Amsler Ⓟ
- 1920: Zygmunt Janiszewski Ⓟ
- 1927: Carl Runge Ⓟ
- 1960: Georges Darmois Ⓟ
- 1972: Władysław Ślebodziński Ⓟ
- 1989: Sergei Sobolev Ⓟ
- 2004: José Escobar
- 2011: Anatolii Volodymyrovych Skorokhod Ⓟ
Quotation of the day
From Jeremiah Horrocks
Hail! then, ye eyes that penetrate the inmost recesses of the heavens, and gazing upon the bosom of the sun with your sight-assisting tube, have dared to point out the spots on that eternal luminary !
