Paul Erdős, nacido Pál Erdős , fue un matemático húngaro inmensamente prolífico y famoso por su excentricidad que, con cientos de colaboradores, trabajó en problemas sobre combinatoria, teoría de grafos, teoría de números, análisis clásico, teoría de aproximación, teoría de conjuntos y probabilidad.
Su vida fue documentada en la película N es un número: El retrato de Paul Erdős, hecha mientras él todavía estaba vivo, y el libro El hombre que solo amaba a los números .
Murió de un ataque al corazón el 20 de septiembre de 1996, a la edad de 83 años, mientras asistía a una conferencia en Varsovia .
Wikipedia
“No tienes que creer en Dios, pero deberías creer en El Libro.”
Dicho en una conferencia en 1985. "El Libro" se refiere a la creencia de que Dios tenía un libro donde guardaba las pruebas más hermosas de cada hecho matemático.
Original: You don't have to believe in God, but you should believe in The Book.
“Dios es el supremo fascista.”
Fuente: Schechter, Bruce. My Brain Is Open: The mathematical journeys of Paul Erdos, New York : Simon & Schuster, 1998, p. 70-71.
Frase con la que solía indicar que estaba dispuesto a trabajar en algún problema matemático.
“I don't claim that this is correct, or that God exists, but it is just sort of half a joke.”
Paul Erdős - SF means Supreme Fascist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qeWugmiGt4
Contexto: SF means Supreme Fascist — this would show that God is bad. I don't claim that this is correct, or that God exists, but it is just sort of half a joke. … As a joke I said, "What is the purpose of Life?" "Proof and conjecture, and keep the SF's score low."
Now, the game with the SF is defined as follows:
If you do something bad the SF gets at least two points.
If you don't do something good which you could have done, the SF gets at least one point.
And if nothing — if you are okay, then no one gets any point.
And the aim is to keep the SF's score low.
My Brain Is Open : The Mathematical Journeys of Paul Erdos (1998) by Bruce Schechter, p. 99
“And the aim is to keep the SF's score low.”
Paul Erdős - SF means Supreme Fascist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qeWugmiGt4
Contexto: SF means Supreme Fascist — this would show that God is bad. I don't claim that this is correct, or that God exists, but it is just sort of half a joke. … As a joke I said, "What is the purpose of Life?" "Proof and conjecture, and keep the SF's score low."
Now, the game with the SF is defined as follows:
If you do something bad the SF gets at least two points.
If you don't do something good which you could have done, the SF gets at least one point.
And if nothing — if you are okay, then no one gets any point.
And the aim is to keep the SF's score low.
“Proof and conjecture, and keep the SF's score low.”
Paul Erdős - SF means Supreme Fascist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qeWugmiGt4
Contexto: SF means Supreme Fascist — this would show that God is bad. I don't claim that this is correct, or that God exists, but it is just sort of half a joke. … As a joke I said, "What is the purpose of Life?" "Proof and conjecture, and keep the SF's score low."
Now, the game with the SF is defined as follows:
If you do something bad the SF gets at least two points.
If you don't do something good which you could have done, the SF gets at least one point.
And if nothing — if you are okay, then no one gets any point.
And the aim is to keep the SF's score low.
Though Erdős used this remark, it is said to have originated with his friend Stanisław Ulam, as reported in The Man Who Loved Only Numbers : The Story of Paul Erdős and the Search for Mathematical Truth (1998) by Paul Hoffman
Variants:
The first sign of senility is when a man forgets his theorems. The second sign is when he forgets to zip up. The third sign is when he forgets to zip down.
As quoted in Wonders of Numbers : Adventures in Mathematics, Mind, and Meaning (2002) by Clifford A. Pickover, p. 64
There are three signs of senility. The first sign is that a man forgets his theorems. The second sign is that he forgets to zip up. The third sign is that he forgets to zip down.
Misattributed
Referring to a famous statement by the French anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon that "Property is theft!", as quoted in The Man Who Loved Only Numbers (1998) by Paul Hoffman, p. 7
“We'll continue tomorrow — if I live.”
Common remark when breaking off work for the night, as quoted in "The Magician of Budapest" in The Edge of the Universe : Celebrating Ten Years of Math Horizons (2007) by Deanna Haunsperger and Stephen Kennedy, p. 111
“A mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems.”
Widely attributed to Erdős, this actually originates with Alfréd Rényi, according to My Brain Is Open : The Mathematical Journeys of Paul Erdos (1998) by Bruce Schechter, p. 155
Misattributed
Variante: A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems.
“God may not play dice with the universe, but something strange is going on with the prime numbers.”
Referencing Albert Einstein's famous remark that "God does not play dice with the universe", this is attributed to Erdős in "Mathematics : Homage to an Itinerant Master" by D. Mackenzie, in Science 275:759 (1997), but has also been stated to be a comment originating in a talk given by Carl Pomerance on the Erdős-Kac theorem, in San Diego in January 1997, a few months after Erdős's death. Confirmation of this by Pomerance is reported in a statement posted to the School of Engineering, Computer Science & Mathematics, University of Exeter http://empslocal.ex.ac.uk/people/staff/mrwatkin//kac-pomerance.txt, where he states it was a paraphrase of something he imagined Erdős and Mark Kac might have said, and presented in a slide-show, which subsequently became reported in a newspaper as a genuine quote of Erdős the next day. In his slide show he had them both reply to Einstein's assertion: "Maybe so, but something is going on with the primes."
Misattributed
“Another roof, another proof.”
His motto, as he roamed about the world, as the guest of other mathematicians, as quoted in A Tribute to Paul Erdős (1990) edited by Alan Baker, Béla Bollobás, A. Hajnal, Preface, p. ix
“I'm not competent to judge. But no doubt he was a great man.”
Response to a question by an agent of the US Immigration and Naturalization Service in 1954 as to what he thought of Karl Marx, often cited as an indication of his detachment from political sensibilities and the situations of the McCarthy era. He was afterwards denied a return visa for re-entering the US until 1959, after attending the International Congress of Mathematicians in Amsterdam; as quoted in The Man Who Loved Only Numbers : The Story of Paul Erdős and the Search for Mathematical Truth (1998) by Paul Hoffman, p. 128
“Finally I am becoming stupider no more.”
A suggestion for his own epitaph, as quoted in Variety in Religion and Science: Daily Reflections (2005) by Varadaraja Raman, p. 256
As quoted in "Ramsey Theory" by Ronald L. Graham and Joel H. Spencer, in Scientific American (July 1990), p. 112-117
“Television is something the Russians invented to destroy American education.”
As quoted in Comic Sections : The Book of Mathematical Jokes, Humour, Wit, and Wisdom (1993) by Des MacHale
“The SF created us to enjoy our suffering. … The sooner we die, the sooner we defy His plans.”
SF was an abbreviation for "Supreme Fascist" — the term Erdős often used to refer to God, as quoted in The Man Who Loved Only Numbers : The Story of Paul Erdős and the Search for Mathematical Truth (1998) by Paul Hoffman, p. 4
“If numbers aren't beautiful, I don't know what is.”
Frequent remark, as quoted in My Brain Is Open : The Mathematical Journeys of Paul Erdos (1998) by Bruce Schechter, p. 14
A standard greeting he would make when he was not contemplating some mathematical problem, as quoted in My Brain Is Open : The Mathematical Journeys of Paul Erdos (1998) by Bruce Schechter, p. 10
Said in regard to any particularly beautiful or elegant proof, referring to a mythical "book" in which God wrote the proofs for all theorems, as quoted in Philosophy of Mathematics (2008) by John Francis, p. 51
