5
$\begingroup$

I stumbled across a website by a chap called Tom Ballard in which he presents his proof of FLT based on elementary techniques: http://www.fermatproof.com

The style is rather 'non-standard', shall we say, and makes it difficult to assess. I have checked through it and have a couple of points to investigate further, but certainly the first part on pythagorean triples is interesting, and correct.

Has anybody else seen it and put in some effort to see if it is correct?

  • 2
    What exactly are you asking for?2012-02-08
  • 2
    I have not really read any details, but the fact that he mentions that his approach to pythagorean triplets is new, which has been confirmed by many "math people", and the fact that he at some point goes into detail of what a "reduction ad absurdum" proof involves, makes me very skeptical.2012-02-08
  • 2
    I do get, on average, about two purpoted elementary proofs of FLT in the mail every year. All of them start with considerations about Pythagorean triplets (none of them seems to be aware of the fact that conics are rational curves, though) and go very wrong right away. This one, at least, has some nice pictures.2012-02-08
  • 0
    Let's be clear, I do understand that the writing style of the author is very bad (I have a PhD and understand how to write good mathematics). But I have put in some effort to struggle through his reasoning and have not so far found any major problem in his approach.2012-02-08
  • 1
    Voting to close. Please see this: http://meta.math.stackexchange.com/questions/2290/is-it-ok-to-ask-about-the-correctness-of-preprints-of-crank-friendly-topics. If you have any specific mathematical points you want to discuss, please post that. A blanket "is it correct?" type of question is liable to be closed.2012-02-08

1 Answers 1