All odd numbers are prime.
I'd provide the proof, but my email system doesn't support margins.
---
William Stuart ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
"Don't rush me sonny. You rush a miracle man you get rotten miracles."
--Miracle Max, "The Princess Bride"
On Thu, 22 Oct 1998, Kevin Edge wrote:
> Date: Thu, 22 Oct 1998 16:47:51 GMT
> From: Kevin Edge <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: Mersenne: The EDGE CONJECTURE
>
> THE EDGE CONJECTURE
>
> There are a finite number of primes.
>
> All the proofs that there are an infinite number of primes, are based
> on the rather rash and unsupported assumption that numbers behave in
> the same way for enormous numbers as they do for tangible everyday
> numbers. This is clearly ridiculous as no one has seen, comprehended
> and become familiar with a really huge number, in its wild
> unabbreviated state, to be able to verify its behaviour under the
> basic mathematical operations such as addition, division etc.
>
> Newtonian mechanics appeared totally accurate and satisfactory and was
> unchallenged for many years, but was eventually found to break down
> for very large masses, distances and velocities. In a similar way, I
> suggest that beyond a certain finite, but as yet unapproached, limit
> arithmetic breaks down into quite different behaviour.
>
> To a young child, whose arithmetical understanding and manipulation is
> limited by her 10 fingers and thumbs, numbers beyond 10( the number
> beyond which there are insufficient fingers to set up a one to one
> correspondence with the numbers involved) are mysterious and have
> unknown behaviour. This sense of excitement at the unknown properties
> of large numbers is shown when children talk with wonder of "What is
> one million plus two million?". It seems incredible to them
> that two such huge numbers can be tamed by the same logic as 1+2=3.
>
> I venture that, at the point beyond which no direct correspondence
> can be found for a number, i.e. the number of elementary particles in
> the universe, all arithmetic breaks down.
>
> Numbers are too often treated coldly and impersonally, without regard
> for their different characters. Who could possibly consider that 4,
> with its familiar properties and real world affinities, has a similar
> character to the rather anonymous, less frequently encountered 71?
> Numbers so huge and powerful as to be unimaginable may well simply
> shrug off arithmetical convention and behave as they choose, returning
> unexpected results to simple operations. They may consider being prime
> as being a number without ancestors and may choose to disassociate
> themselves from such outlandishness and the accompanying social
> stigma.
>
> All newly discovered primes such as those found by GIMPS, merely raise
> the lower limit at which this may happen. Beyond this limit, who knows
> what strange behaviour may occur? All conventional proofs and logic
> mean nothing. In such an environment an entity such as a superodd
> factor which is a factor of all odd numbers, in the same way that 2 is
> a factor of all even numbers, could feasibly exist.
>
> The rest of you are free to continue your vain search for an ever
> larger prime, beyond which you always know that there are more.
> Personally, I will continue to contribute, but with the higher, more
> concrete, goal of helping to find THE FINAL PRIME NUMBER.
>
> #\o \
> # ) |
> #/o /
>
> I have a brilliant proof of the above, but my email software does not
> support margins.
>
> -----------------------------------
> Kevin Edge - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> -----------------------------------
> The opinions herein are my own and,
> unless explicitly stated,
> may not represent those of MDIS.
> ================================
>
