Allen Poapst wrote:
> Hi, my name is Allen Poapst, attending Brock University, St. Catharines ON,
> Canada. I was searching up prime sequence formula on the internet, and
> happened to find your name and e-mail.
>
> Some sort of GIMPS 10,000$ thing, I have no clue what this is, is it a
> reward for finding the formula?
>
It's a reward for the first 10 million digit prime. It's actually
offered by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, not GIMPS, although GIMPS
is probably the leading contender to win it (your idea notwithstanding.)
> If so, I have found a formula for the prime sequence which I am trying to
> get published through the university I am attending. Yes I know this is a
> hotmail account and an informal letter, but it is just for inquiry purposes.
>
> Though the formula I have works in the following manner:
>
> f(x) = x....
>
> x f(x)
> 2 1
> 3 2
> 5 3
> 7 4
> 11 5
> 13 6
> . .
> . .
> . .
> 200,000,093 -> 11,078,945th prime (using my program that simulates my
> formula, this calculation on my notebook takes 11 seconds)
>
Well, it takes 11 seconds to get to a 9-digit prime. You can probably
imagine it'd take quite a while to get a 10-million digit prime,
although I won't speculate on how long that might be.
> etc... until infinite, although I have only tested my formula to
> approximately 5 million, using a computer simulation, the logic of the
> formula makes sense for all numbers, since I found a pattern that my formula
> exploits. So if you give a prime number into my formula, it will pop out
> where it is in the prime sequence, though I have not found a formula that
> works the other way around, where you give the position in the sequence and
> the formula pops out the prime number.
>
> A professor that is helping me publish my formula at the university I am
> attending says that he knows of no formula that is known for what I have
> found.
>
> Can you confirm this? And also would my formula acctually be worth 10,000$,
> that would be great if it was actually worth money.
>
I've never heard of such a formula, and its existence would probably
have far reaching consequences in terms of our current understanding of
the distribution of the primes. Since it sounds like you aren't an
expert mathematician, I hope you'll forgive me for being a little
skeptical about your discovery. Maybe it's an astonishing coincidence,
maybe it's in some way trivial (in which case someone on this list is
likely to point that out if so.) Really it's hard to say much without
knowing anything about your discovery. But, if it really is a formula of
the nature you describe, I'll eat my hat post pictures thereof to this
very mailing list.
> A response ASAP would be appreciated, and thank you for your time, I am
> really excited about this formula if it is unknown and I discovered it.
>
Well I suppose I would be too, but don't get too optimistic. Certainly I
think it's rather unlikely that you'll be collecting the money.
> Thank you,
>
> Allen Poapst, Brock University
>
Thanks,
Soo Reams
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