Chapter 36: An Unexpected Storm
On this morning, just after a rain, the air was exceptionally fresh, and the sun from the mountains had just shed its first beam through the cracks in the woods, Wang Yinan came to Grothendieck's hut.
Yesterday's discussion benefited him a lot, chaos and order, it turns out that a series of operators can be perfectly unified, and Wang Yinan's experience in modern programming languages allows him to see problems from unexpected angles, so that Grothendieck can supplement the missing steps in his theory.
"Maybe today we can extend the theory of algebraic geometry to the theory of computability and correctness, so that although the neural network cannot be understood in nature, it should be functionally able to be simulated and decomposed", Wang Yinan thought very attentively, and casually pushed open the small wooden door.
There was no one in front of the blackboard, and Grothendieck would probably stand there, writing and drawing on the blackboard with chalk, or writing hard.
There was no one on the chaise longue at the table, and the old man often rested here, smiling like a child in his sleep.
There is no shadow standing and looking at the distant mountains by the window, whenever this time, Wang Yinan always waits quietly on the side, because in the near future, most of the old man will have whimsical ideas that he should not have at his age, which makes Wang Yinan breathtaking.
"Professor", Wang Yinan shouted loudly, but no one answered for a long time.
Wang Yinan walked around the room, the miracle didn't happen, he didn't see the old man, at this time Yang Lihan also walked in, she and Wang Yinan looked around the small building together.
After walking all over the town, they didn't find any trace of the old man, and when they returned to the small building, Wang Yinan sat at the table dejectedly, at this time, he found a note on the table, which was pressed by chalk, and only a small corner was exposed, so he and Yang Lihan didn't find it before.
"Sure enough, it's a guy who doesn't pay attention to details", Wang Yinan secretly complained, "This must be left by the missing guy."
Wang Yinan took out a sticky note, and there were just a few lines of words on it:
"I hear the call of God, children, don't try to come to me",
"The previous manuscript, as well as the content of our recent conversation, I grant Wang Yinan full authority to dispose of it at will",
"Nature is with you", the last sentence of Grothendieck did not use the usual "Godbeithyou" in English, but "Naturebeithyou", obviously Wang Yinan's words still had a great impact on him.
"Let's go", Wang Yinan said to Yang Lihan, "The old man should be completely secluded this time, he wants to wait for the day to come alone."
"You go back, I have other things to deal with", Yang Lihan said to Wang Yinan,
"We'll see you again".
For this mysterious woman who has no end in sight, Wang Yinan's intuition is to stay away from her, but so far, Yang Lihan is still full of kindness to him, at least in the matter of Grothendieck, it can be regarded as a great help to Wang Yinan.
Of course, Wang Yinan's feeling is not wrong, this woman is a symbol of trouble.
Wang Yinan nodded, "Goodbye then."
Before leaving Europa, Wang Yinan went to CERN to visit Professor Higgs, who won the Nobel Prize for the Standard Model, and Professor Witten, who is known as Einstein's successor.
These two big bulls publicly announced that they would nominate Wang Yinan/Li Wenjing as the Nobel Prize candidates for the next year in the next few months.
Theoretical physicists are at least half mathematicians, otherwise you wouldn't be able to read even basic papers. Higgs and Witten, as top theoretical physicists, are of course also top mathematicians, and Witten became Fields Medal winners for their contributions to low-dimensional topology.
Wang Yinan introduced his latest superconductivity achievements to them, and finally, vaguely mentioned Grothendieck's discovery, of course, with the use of, "What if, it is found that the logical and formal systems of human beings cannot fully describe the natural world".
Their acceptance exceeded Wang Yinan's expectations, and later, Wang Yinan finally figured out that even quantum can be accepted both here and there, and even the space we live in is ten-dimensional.
So physicists are thorough pragmatists, and if they found that the existence of God could simplify physical theory, they would not hesitate to declare that God must exist!
After leaving Zurich, Wang Yinan hesitated for a long time, and instead of returning to China directly, he returned to the south of Bali and came to the IHES Institute founded by Grothendieck.
Although Grothendieck was far away from his beloved mathematics because of his anti-war and disillusionment with human society, his dedication to truth and natural insight allowed him to make great discoveries at such an advanced age.
Wang Yinan felt that he was very likely to be the last person in the world to communicate with the great soul of Grothendieck, so he also had the obligation to tell the entire Blue Star about his discovery, believing that human civilization was not fragile enough to be destroyed by a single paper.
At the IHES Institute, Wang Yinan borrowed an office from his French counterparts and locked himself in, except for the occasional video seminar with Li Wenjing, Mr. Qiu, Professor Tao and Professor Wiles, to report on his progress and ask them for advice, Wang Yinan was isolated from the world for two weeks.
In the end, he completed all the logical chains of Grothendieck's theory, except for one or two particularly time-consuming exhaustion proofs, which were, in the words of Professor Tao, "always leave some work for others to do".
"A large number of mathematicians on the Blue Star can send a bunch of papers on these two incomplete proofs",
"Of course, the results must be self-explanatory."
This time, Wang Yinan does not need to hand over his manuscript through Professor Tao, and all journals will rush to publish the blockbuster paper of the new Abel Prize winner.
Of course, the first author of the paper handed over by Wang Yinan is the name that has disappeared from the mathematical community for decades, Grothendieck.
The title of the dissertation is,
When the Annals of Mathematics accepted the paper and published it on its official website in the form of a preprint, a real storm came.
Wang Yinan was on the plane back to China at this time, and the original plan was to take a relaxing trip to Europa, but Wang Yinan continued to use his skills to do things everywhere, and a simple lecture turned into a paper that shocked Blue Star.
The influence of this paper soon spread from the academic field to the public domain, because the mathematical tools used are not complicated, algebraic geometry and axiomatic logic systems are fields that have been developed for nearly a hundred years, and as long as you read it attentively, a master's student in a related field can understand the content of the paper.
Soon, the mathematicians who first read the paper began to recognize the hidden meaning behind the paper, and related articles and reviews began to spread from the professional field to the public.
"Logic and formal systems are not the whole of human wisdom", such an article can be regarded as more objective and polite,
The sensational title, "We still can't understand the natural world", is nihilistic,
"The existence of God has once again been proved, and only the omnipotent Lord is a solid foundation on which we can rely on, and science is obviously not good", needless to say, the royal literati of a certain organization,
"It can't be described by logic, artificial intelligence beyond human comprehension, who opened Pandora's box", this is Wang Yinan's most worried argument, once you think in this direction, panic will definitely occur,
Wang Yinan just got off the plane, turned on the phone, and found that his mobile phone was once again flooded with missed calls, in addition to Qian Zhonghua and Li Wenjing, there are many reporters' interview requests on the prestige, Wang Yinan first dialed Li Wenjing's phone, what happened in the professional field, she knows much better than Qian Zhonghua.
"You're finally back," Li Wenjing said.
"This time you can poke a big basket, that article hasn't been published yet, and it has already detonated the entire Blue Star",
"That's Grothendieck's article, not mine," Wang Yinan said lightly.
"The problem is that everyone knows that Grothendieck can't find it, and you are the corresponding author of this article on this preprint of the Mathematical Review, so I don't want you to find anyone," Li Wenjing said.
"Yuan Fang", ah no, "Wen Jing, what do you think?" Wang Yinan asked,
"What can I think, cold salad", for Li Wenjing, this article is obviously not a problem,
"Isn't it just shattering one of the illusions of human beings again, and it's not the first time anyway," Li Wenjing said.
Wang Yinan is right to think about it, Li Wenjing is a grassroots scholar like him, and he doesn't have that kind of terrifying intuition or a mathematical genius who creates a field, so he has a deep understanding of the sentence "manpower is endless", isn't this sentence said in this article, it's not a big deal.
"What about the others, what do they think?" , Wang Yinan asked,
"Personally, I think the repercussions in the non-professional field are greater, and many foreign media have over-interpreted," Li Wenjing said.
"Especially when it comes to religion, you can't talk nonsense",
Well, Wang Yinan had been prepared for this situation, but the development of things was still beyond his expectations, and that night, in Europa, Greenpeace launched a big march against artificial intelligence, the title was,
"Where is artificial intelligence, which has no logic and cannot be understood by humans, take us to?" ,
"Stop, scientists, you are destroying the world",
By the way, CERN was also affected, and the door was blocked with protesting crowds.
"You're not studying high-energy physics, you're opening Pandora's box!" , the protesters held up banners in front of CERN.
The cops are like enemies, after all, if these fanatical guys rush into CERN and the scientists inside are a little surprised, then it will be a lot of fun.
Wang Yinan looked at this posture, forget it, I'll also retreat, fortunately, in Huaguo, you know, he is still relatively safe.
He refused to be interviewed by all reporters, from Europa, from Rice Country, and of course from Japan, as well as reporters from China, at this time, it is wrong to say anything, it is better to wait for things to cool down slowly.