The Wonders of Arithmetic from Pierre Simon de Fermat. Youri Veniaminovich Kraskov
them, there is a keyword directly indicated how he have solved this problem. It so happened that for centuries the science world vainly tormented itself in search of the FLT proof, but Fermat himself was never looked for it and simply had declared that he had it discovered!13
It is possible also to remind to opponents ingeminating about Fermat’s deliberate refusal to publish his works that for example, Descartes had received permission to publishing from Most Reverend cardinal Richelieu himself. It was impossible for Fermat and there is even a written (!!!) testimony about it (see text on P. Fermat’s tombstone: “Vir ostentationis expers … – He was deprived the possibility of publication …”. See Appendix VI Pic. 93 – 94). Nevertheless, even being in such conditions, he had prepared the publication of Diophantus’ “Arithmetic” with the addition of his 48 comments, one of which got a name the “Fermat’s Last Theorem”.
The publication was supposed to appear in honor of the historically significant event – the foundation of the French Academy of Sciences, in which preparation Fermat himself participated through the correspondence with his long-time colleague from the Toulouse parliament Pierre de Carcavy who became the royal librarian. The royal decree of the creation of the French Academy of Sciences was prepared by Carcavy and the all-powerful Finance Minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert submitting it to the signing by Louis XIV. However, the Academy of Sciences was established only in 1666 i.e. a year after the Fermat's death.
Mathematicians are very famous for how they are strict pedants, formalists and quibblers, but as soon as it comes to the FLT, all these qualities immediately disappear somewhere. Fermat's opponents ignoring well-known facts, called him either a hermit (this is a senator from Toulouse!) or a prince of amateurs (this is one of the founders of the French Academy of Sciences!), and this despite his contribution to science comparable to its importance only with a couple or triple of the most prominent scientists in the history of science!
They also did not fail sarcastically to point out that no one would have known about Fermat if the greatest mathematician of all times and peoples Leonhard Euler had not become interested in his tasks. But just this magic name has played a cruel joke with them. Their boundless belief in Euler's innovatory researches was too blind to notice that it was namely thanks to him science received such a powerful blow, from which it cannot recover up to now!
Mathematicians not only have believed Euler, but also warmly supported him that algebra is the main mathematical science, while arithmetic is only one of its elementary sections.14 Euler's idea was really excellent because his algebra, which gained new possibilities through the use of "complex numbers" was to be a most powerful scientific breakthrough that would allow not only to expand the range of numbers from the number axis to the number plane, but also to reduce the most of all calculations to solving algebraic equations. 15
The need for "complex numbers" mathematicians explained very simply. To solve absolutely any algebraic equations, you need (not so much!) to make the equation x2 + 1 = 0 become solvable. 16 In Russian this is called: "Don’t sew the tail to a mare"! This equation is not at all harmless since it has nothing to do with practical tasks, but undermines the fundamentals of science very substantially. Nevertheless, the devilish temptation to create something very spectacular on empty place turned out to be stronger than common sense and Euler decided to demonstrate the new mathematical possibilities in practice.
Pic. 16. Leonhard Euler
The FLT, which Euler could not to prove, would be perfect for demonstrating the possibilities of a new wonder-algebra. However, the result turned out to be more than modest. Instead of a general proof of FLT, only one particular case for the 3rd power was proven [8, 30]. More ambitious was seemed the proof of other Fermat’s theorem about the only solution in integers of the equation y3 = x2 + 2 [36] because it was a very difficult task and like FLT, none of the mathematicians could solve it. Despite the fact that the very possibility of solvability of any algebraic equation has not yet been proven, these Euler's demonstrations were perceived by hurrah. It only remained to find a solution to the problem called the “Basic Theorem of Algebra”. In 1799 the real titan of science Carl Gauss coped brilliantly with this task presenting proof even in 4 different ways!
The scientific community greeted all these "achievements" with a storm of applause while the unholy was also so glad that it is impossible to imagine.
Pic. 17. Karl Friedrich Gauss
Yeah, this was need to be seen how the whole civilized scientific world has driven itself into a dead end! It is obvious that for science, which does not rely on arithmetic, there are no reasonable restrictions and the consequences will be sad – from the dominance of algebra, arithmetic will become so difficult that witlings will call it a science for the elitist mathematicians where they can demonstrate the sharpness of their mind! But the scientists themselves unsuspecting and full of the best intentions, continued to advance science forward to new heights, but so diligently that they either inadvertently or due to a misunderstanding… simply have lost the Fermat's Golden Theorem (FGT)! But this was one of the most impressive discoveries of Pierre Fermat in arithmetic, of which he was very proud.
Pic. 18. Joseph Lagrange
It was so happened that the third in the history royal mathematician Joseph Lagrange together with his predecessor the second royal (and the first imperial!) mathematician Leonard Euler, have proven in 1772 only one special case of FGT for squares and became famous for all the world. This remarkable achievement of science was called the “Lagrange's Theorem about Four Squares”. Probably it is good that Lagrange didn’t live after two years until the moment when in 1815 still very young Augustin Cauchy presented his general proof of the FGT for all polygonal numbers. But then suddenly something terrible happened, the unholy appeared from nowhere and put his "fe" in. And here isn't to you any world fame and besides, you get complete obstruction from colleagues.
Pic. 19. Augustin Cauchy
Well, nothing can be done here, academicians did not like Cauchy and they achieved that this general proof of the FGT was ignored and did not fall into the textbooks as well as no one remembers the Gauss' proofs of 1801 for triangles and for the same squares, nevertheless in the all textbooks as before and very detailed the famous Lagrange's theorem is given. However, after Google published a facsimile of the Cauchy proof of FGT [3], it became clear to everyone why it was not supported by academics (see pt. 3.4.2).
Pic. 20. Marie-Sophie Germain
In the meantime, scientists from around the world inspired by these grand shifts, have so perked up that they wanted overcome the very FLT! They were joined by another famous woman very well known among scientists and mathematicians Marie-Sophie Germain. This talented and ambitious Mademoiselle proposed an elegant way, which was used by at once two giants of mathematical thought Lejeune Dirichlet and Adrien Legendre to prove … only one special case of FLT for the fifth power.
Another such giant Gabriel Lame managed to do the almost impossible and get proof of the highest difficulty … of another particular case of FLT for the seventh power. Thus, the whole elitist quad of the representatives from the high society of scientists was able to prove whole two (!) particular cases of FLT [6, 38].
Pic. 21. Lejeune Dirichlet
Pic. 22. Adrien Legendre
Pic.
The text of the last FLT phrase: “
It is curious that the Russian-language edition this fundamental work of Euler was published in 1768 under the title "Universal Arithmetic" although the original name "Vollständige Anleitung zur Algebra" should be translated as the Complete Introduction to Algebra. Apparently, translators (students Peter Inokhodtsev and Ivan Yudin) reasonably believed that the equations are studied here mainly from the point of view of their solutions in integers or rational numbers i.e. by arithmetic methods. For today's reader this 2-volume edition is presented as a Chinese literacy because along with the highly outdated Russian language and spelling, there is simply an incredible number of typos. It is unlikely that today's RAS as the heiress of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, which published this work, understands its true value, otherwise it would have been reprinted a long time ago in a modern and accessible form.
Here there is an analogy between algebra and the analytic geometry of Descartes and Fermat, which looks more universal than the Euclidean geometry. Nevertheless, Euclidean arithmetic and geometry are the only the foundations, on which algebra and analytical geometry can appear. In this sense, the idea of Euler to consider all calculations through the prism of algebra is knowingly flawed. But his logic was completely different. He understood that if science develops only by increasing the variety of equations, which it is capable to solve, then sooner or later it will reach a dead end. And in this sense, his research was of great value for science. Another thing is that their algebraic form was perceived as the main way of development, and this later led to devastating consequences.
Just here is the concept of a “number plane” appears, where real numbers are located along the x axis, and imaginary numbers along the y axis i.e. the same real, only multiplied by the “number” i = √-1. But along that come a contradiction between these axes – on the real axis, the factor 1n is neutral, but on the imaginary axis no, however this does not agree with the basic properties of numbers. If the “number”