Greetings, everybody!
My real name (which I've kept more or less a secret until now) is Stephan T.
Lavavej. I'm a senior in high school, and I recently had to write an Extended
Essay for the International Baccalaureate program. Now that I've just turned
it in, I don't need to worry about getting "help" from outside sources. So,
as promised, I have made my Extended Essay available on the Internet.
Its location is:
http://members.aol.com/stl137/private/mersenne.zip
(Please see notes below about distributing this address and my name)
Its title is "Mersenne Primes: Development through History, Ongoing Work, and
a New Conjecture". That mostly sums up what it discusses. Extended Essays
are required to be approximately 4000 words long; this is NOT a simple report
for math class. I hope that there is something of interest in the paper for
everyone, be it the somewhat detailed history of Mersenne primes, the
description of the GIMPS work, or the discussion of my conjecture. My
conjecture has been discussed on this list, but the paper includes graphs and
detailed explanations of what I did. If anything, read it for the predictions
of the 40th, 50th, and 60th Mersenne primes!
Some miscellaneous things: The file is in .ZIP format. Once unzipped,
Microsoft Word 97 will view it (I use no weird fonts, only Times New Roman).
I have virus-checked the .DOC file with Norton Antivirus 2.0 (with the latest
virus definitions update), but those more paranoid than me can scan it too.
The URL provided is in my private directory; as such, please do not post it
on publicly available websites. Feel free to send the URL to interested
acquaintances. Likewise, please do not link my AOL screen name with my real
name Stephan Lavavej publicly, but feel free to use it on this list and in
personal E-mails.
Of course, *grin* I would like nothing better than to see my conjecture in
_Unsolved Problems in Number Theory, 3rd Edition_ by Richard K. Guy. (I can
dream, can't I?) Mentions of my conjecture in (for example) the Mersenne FAQ
are okay as long as they doesn't mention my screen name ("Stephan Lavavej
conjectures that..." is absolutely okay.) I figured that a determined enough
wacko could find out my real name anyways, you see.
I should at least repeat my acknowledgements on this list:
"Thanks to G. Woltman and S. Kurowski for sparking this journey, to Wolfram
Research and Texas Instruments for producing their excellent mathematical
tools, and special thanks to A. Lee for help in debugging this paper."
Also, without the invaluable assistance of L. Wiman, I would not have
understood the difference between approximation double-squigglys and
asymptotic single-squigglys "~". Without the Mersenne mailing list, it would
have taken me much longer to write the section about my conjecture. (I based
that section on an E-mail I sent the list. Why do work twice?) :-D
I hope you enjoy reading my paper!
Stephan "Now you know what those initials stand for" Lavavej
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