Speaker: Geir Agnarsson, George Mason University

Title: Fermat's Last Theorem, history and proof

Abstract: For more than 360 years Fermat's Last Theorem (FLT for short) has been called a "theorem" rather than a "conjecture" throughout the years, even way before Andrew Wiles, with the aid of Richard Taylor, managed to finally prove it in 1995. This perhaps reflects the general wish among mathematicians to have a proof of FLT, which has been named "the hardest mathematical riddle". Few other mathematical problems (i) are as easily understood as the FLT, (ii) are as impractical, (iii) have kept so many mathematicians busy for such a long time, and (iv) have generated so much new mathematics as FLT, especially in number theory and algebraic geometry. -- In this talk we discuss its history and give a brief glimpse of the idea of how FLT was finally proved. This talk is suited for an audience with minimal mathematical background.

Place: Science and Technology Building I, Room 242

Refreshments will be served before the talk at 3:00 p.m. in Room 222.

Department of Mathematical Sciences
George Mason University
4400 University Drive, MS 3F2
Fairfax, VA 22030-4444
http://math.gmu.edu/
Tel. 703-993-1460, Fax. 703-993-1491