1162 The Award From the Institut de France

“… To Landon Clay and his wife Lavinia Clay, to the Clay family, to the members of the Riemann family, and to all of the mathematicians who came to this historic occasion.

“At a Paris conference 23 years ago, the Clay Mathematics Institute announced awards for anyone that could solve the seven most famous problems in the world. Even though mathematicians are more excited about mathematics than fame and fortune…

“That doesn’t mean it is not important.

“It’s a list of the great unsolved problems of the 20th century. It creates enthusiasm for mathematics. It attracts children and students to be interested in the ever-evolving mathematics and math-related problems.”

“It didn’t matter whether they were interested in mathematics or the million-dollar prize money.”

The Institut de France.

The large auditorium was packed with people.

Because this was the award ceremony for Riemann’s hypothesis, almost all of the top French mathematicians, as well as members of major mathematical organizations, were invited to be here.

This place was once the center of mathematics in Europe and even around the world. Countless mathematicians dreamed of the opportunity to speak here.

Even though the glory of this place had faded due to the decline of the European mathematics community, some things still remained unchanged.

Professor Carlson stood at the podium. After pausing for a moment, he spoke in a solemn and serious tone.

“Niels Henrik Abel once wrote in his memoir that in order to solve a difficult problem, it has to be written clearly…

“It has to be written in the correct expression.

“What we know is often not as simple and understandable as we think. Behind every theorem that we all know is the hard work of countless scholars across centuries. This constant progression is precisely how our field advances.”

“We have come a long way. Professor Lu Zhou’s work has revealed the mystery behind the zero-point distribution of the Riemann function and the profound mathematical meaning behind it, that is, the unity of algebra and geometry. The birth of this theory has restructured algebraic geometry and has even redefined our understanding of numbers and geometry.

“It might take us decades or even longer to build on top of his foundation. We have already taken the first step, so I’m certain the second step will eventually come.”

The award speech was finally over.

Professor Carlson bowed in midst of the thunderous applause.

Lu Zhou walked on to the stage and accepted the million-dollar check from Professor Carlson. He smiled professionally and shook Carlson’s hand.

“Thank you.”

The money was nice of course.

However, compared to the billion-dollar fusion construction site he visited yesterday, a million dollars was pocket change. But regardless, there was no such thing as having too much money.

Professor Carlson was finally able to give out this important reward. He had a look of relief on his face.

He felt like he was in a unique situation.

He wanted to give money, a million dollars no less, but he was having a rather difficult time.

Professor Carlson shook Lu Zhou’s hand and spoke with excitement.

“Do you want to do an acceptance speech? Just talk about how you feel.”

Acceptance speech?

When Lu Zhou heard Professor Carlson’s words, he had an awkward look on his face.

“I already gave a speech last time… So, I think there’s no need for another one.”

Surrounded by a wave of applause, Professor Carlson was the only one that heard what Lu Zhou said.

Lu Zhou watched the old man’s face turn red due to the increase in blood pressure. He suddenly felt lucky that his words were drowned out by the applause and that he was far away from the microphone…

…

In the evening, there was a banquet at the Collège de France; the Société Mathématique de France and the Clay Mathematics Institute jointly hosted a dinner party. Even if some mathematicians didn’t attend the award ceremony during the day, all of them attended the night banquet.

Lu Zhou met a lot of his old friends at dinner.

One of them was Professor Helfgott, who worked at the École Normale Supérieure.

This Peruvian French number theorist provided him with a lot of help when he was researching Goldbach’s conjecture. Particularly, the proof of the weak Goldbach conjecture provided him with a lot of inspiration for combining the sieve method and the circle method.

After solving Goldbach’s conjecture, Lu Zhou barely published papers in the field of number theory, so the two had not kept in touch. However, they were still great friends.

Professor Helfgott was quite enthusiastic and chatted with Lu Zhou for a long time. Lu Zhou also asked a lot about Professor Grothendieck’s life and some rumors about Professor Abel.

“Hypothetically speaking.”

Helfgott: “Yeah?”

Lu Zhou poured himself a glass of champagne and said, “… If there are aliens in this universe, if they’re a completely different species, how should we communicate with them?”

Professor Lu Helfgott froze for a second, then gave Lu Zhou a strange look.

“You discovered aliens?”

Lu Zhou paused for a second and smiled.

“Of course not! Just a hypothetical question. Why would you think that?”

Helfgott smiled and said, “Because every time you ask a question, it seems that you’ve already solved half of the question. You’re not a person who would give other people the opportunity to rob you of the glory, am I right?”

Uh?

Am I?

Lu Zhou thought about it carefully and realized that Helfgott was right.

In his own opinion, he worked hard for his achievements. However, in the eyes of others, the age-old mathematical propositions only took him a few months or weeks to solve.

Helfgott smiled and took a sip of wine. He pondered for a second before answering the question.

“If I had to communicate with an alien for the first time… I think mathematics is the way.”

Lu Zhou raised his eyebrows.

“Oh yeah?”

What a coincidence.

“The key to communication between the two civilizations is finding a common language. Say, for example, the cup in my hand. If they don’t use a cup as a container and don’t drink liquids, then this cup makes no sense to them,” Helfgott said as he put down the cup. He thought for a while and continued, “Science is about studying the problem of the world. The problems we face might be different from theirs, but the tools we use to solve problems should be the same.

“Whether it’s the natural sciences or applied technology, they’re all closely related to mathematics.

“So, I think mathematics should be the common language.”

Lu Zhou: “If you’re an alien, and you wanted to see how intelligent I am, what would you do?”

Helfgott leaned back on his chair and smiled.

“Me? I’ll give you two big prime numbers first… Of course, I’d give you the multiple of these two prime numbers. If you can find the two prime numbers, then…”

“Interesting idea…” Lu Zhou smiled and said, “Then what?

Helfgott: “Then? Use the distance between to form a measurement system? What about the periodic table of the elements? Doing this systematically is a discipline. I remember it is called alien linguistics. I think there’s a Paris professor researching this area…

“Basically, I think if we can achieve basic communication, then everything will be fine. Maybe we can even exchange knowledge. Once the cultural exchange begins, we will be able to understand each other.”

Helfgott paused for a moment, shrugged, and spoke.

“If they decide to contact us and find us, they probably already have a certain understanding of us and might have been observing us for a while. Whether through electromagnetic wave signals or space capsules, if they really want to communicate with us, they will definitely find a way.”

Lu Zhou spoke with a smile.

“Honestly, you should be a science fiction writer.”

Helfgott smiled.

“Thanks for the compliment, but science fiction isn’t as interesting as mathematics. I’ll leave the opportunity to others!”

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