Russell first read Chen Muwu's paper with the mentality of correcting students' homework.
Something looks familiar here...
Very interesting here...
Well, it should be that he combined the previous questions and thoughts.
Not bad, good, my ability to draw inferences from one example is very strong.
Then, the smile on Russell's face gradually disappeared, his expression became more and more serious, and his attitude became more and more serious.
Because he saw this paragraph in the paper:
"It is well known that mathematics is developing in a more precise direction, and has led to the formalization of most branches of mathematics, so that one can prove any theorem with only a few mechanical rules.
"Thus, one might guess that these axioms and rules of inference are sufficient to determine any mathematical problem that these formal systems can express.
“The following will prove that this is not the case.”
Chen Muwu spontaneously did the after-class exercises, which is worthy of praise.
But you can just do the questions. Why should you change the content in the textbook?
The point is, the content in the textbook is really problematic.
This is equivalent to Chen Muwu overturning all the efforts that mathematicians have been trying to make since the beginning of the century with just one paper.
Russell thought of himself again when he was young. When he was only in his early thirties, he proposed Russell's Paradox, which shocked and panicked mathematicians around the world for a long time.
It seems that it was not until a few years ago that a solution to this problem was finally proposed.
It's just that compared to the original Russell's Paradox, the tricks Chen Muwu did this time were more serious.
If we talk about Russell's paradox, it is equivalent to tearing down a load-bearing wall in the mathematics building.
Then the incompleteness theorem proposed by Chen Muwu is like using enough explosives to blow up the foundation of the building that mathematicians around the world are working so hard to build.
Russell happens to be one of them.
Is this person so ruthless when he strikes?
But Russell remembered something else.
It seems that Chen Muwu is not only a destroyer of mathematics, he has already put forward many shocking views in physics and astronomy, and even philosophy has not been spared.
The key is that after repeated verification, everyone found that these scientific views are actually correct and are not nonsense, let alone nonsense.
The same goes for the incompleteness theorem this time.
Because Chen Muwu had been asking him for advice on this issue before, Russell only read the paper from beginning to end and was able to judge that everything written in this paper was correct.
But after all, this is a new view that is very different from the current mainstream view. To be on the safe side, Russell not only checked the calculation himself, but even called Ramsey from King's College.
He asked Ramsey to also look at the mathematics and logic used in this paper to see if there were any errors that he had not yet discovered.
"Professor Russell, is this paper really written by Dr. Chen from Trinity College?"
The look on Ramsey's face was one of shock and disbelief, as was the look on his mind.
As a member of the Cambridge Apostolic Society, Ramsay witnessed the whole process from this year onwards when Chen Muwu, who had always been a quiet member of the society, suddenly became interested in mathematics and logic.
In discussions at social gatherings, he often talked about the plan of the German mathematician Hilbert.
Ramsey thought at the time that Chen Muwu was interested in the plan to standardize mathematics.
It seems that physicists are doing the same thing. Einstein, who proposed the theory of relativity, is also trying to unify all the laws of physics by unifying the two basic forces of interaction, gravity and electromagnetism. Come together?
This made Ramsey think that Chen Muwu wanted to do the same work as Einstein, but before that he thought of mathematics for inspiration.
As a result, he saw a copy of the paper Russell gave him.
What kind of inspiration are you looking for here? They are clearly here to cause trouble!
But the key point is that what he did was justified and could not be refuted.
"Professor Russell, maybe it's because my level is limited, but I really didn't find any mistakes in this paper."
"I think so too."
"So...does Dr. Chen's paper directly deny the grand plan proposed by Professor Hilbert?"
"Although I hate to admit it, I have to say that it is indeed the case."
After confirming that the contents of the paper were correct, Russell first took up his pen and wrote a reply to the editorial board of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
He said in it that the content of the paper that the editorial department asked to review was all correct and no one needed to be modified. It could be published in its entirety.
After the official business was completed, Russell wrote a letter in German to Professor Hilbert in Germany.
It started with simple greetings, and then began to introduce to him the core ideas of Chen Muwu's paper, and regretfully told Hilbert that he started with the twenty-three questions in 1900 and ended up with Hilbert's formal preparation in 1922. The special plan was about to be declared a failure after Chen Muwu's paper was published.
After writing these two letters, Russell felt both relieved and lost.
Relaxingly, he completed the task assigned by the editorial department, and what Chen Muwu overturned was not his own views.
What's disappointing is that this is, after all, a major failure in mathematics.
Although it has not reached the level of using paradox to trigger the third mathematical crisis, its destructive power is only much more than Russell's paradox.
I don’t know what Professor Hilbert’s thoughts will be after receiving the letter and seeing the official version of the paper. For his old age, whether his spirit can withstand such a blow.
Russell suddenly wanted to chat with Chen Muwu again. Was it because he had realized that mathematics could not be complete, so he came to ask him about those questions?
He first went to the room of Chen Muwu, who was also at Trinity College, but was told that Dr. Chen left the college early in the morning and went to the Cavendish Laboratory.
But when Russell went to the Cavendish Laboratory and inquired around, he found that no one could tell clearly where Chen Muwu had gone when he was not in the laboratory.
Even the director of the laboratory, Rutherford, was a little vague. He called his assistant Chadwick in front of Russell.
The latter only said something vaguely. Dr. Chen left in a hurry after receiving a telegram. No one could tell where he went.
Rutherford and Chadwick ignored him because they did not want to tell Russell that Chen Muwu went to the place where the particle accelerator was developed.
The two of them were so eager for Russell to stop pestering him and leave quickly that no one asked what Russell's purpose was in coming to find Chen Muwu this time.
Most of the people in the Cavendish Laboratory were like this, because everyone knew that Chen Muwu was very close to Russell during this period, and he was engaged in mathematics without doing his job.
In the entire laboratory, there was only one person with a keen sense, and he noticed that something was unusual.
It is true that Chen Muwu and Russell are very close, but every time they say that the former comes to the latter's office to ask questions.
Only this time, Russell found Chen Muwu and found him in the Cavendish Laboratory for the first time.
There must be something else hidden behind this.
"Hello, Professor Russell, I am Crowther, the resident science and technology reporter of the Manchester Guardian. May I ask what business you have come to see Chen Muwu in the Cavendish Laboratory this time?"
Russell thought to himself that he really deserves to be a reporter, his sense of smell is very sensitive.
Now, there is no need to hide the matter. Even if he doesn't say it today, the whole UK and even the whole world will know about it in a few days after the paper is published in "Transactions of the Natural Science".
"I'm really here to see Dr. Chen. He made an interesting discovery in a paper, so I thought I'd come over and have a chat with him."
"What kind of paper is it? Mathematics? What is his discovery? Can you tell me briefly?"
Russell readily agreed to this request, followed Crowther into the conference room of the Cavendish Laboratory, and briefly talked about Chen Muwu's "small" discovery.
After a long time, Crowther said goodbye to Russell and looked at the notes in his notebook. He felt that Dr. Chen's "little" discovery was a little too big.
It's big, but a little hard to report.
Perhaps it is because mathematics is too highbrow and mathematicians think highly of themselves. From a long time ago, mathematics has never been as popular as physics.
In addition, the two industrial revolutions that promoted social progress were both based on theoretical knowledge of physics, so physicists in newspapers are more famous than mathematicians.
In the 19th century, the media celebrity of physics was Faraday.
At the beginning of the 20th century, another top figure in the world emerged, Einstein.
The theory of relativity is undoubtedly one of the most top-notch physics disciplines in media public opinion at the beginning of the 20th century.
Quantum mechanics can't beat it, nor can low-temperature physics, which mobilized national enthusiasm in the UK some time ago.
Although Chen Muwu has been frequently published in British newspapers because of physics, astronomy, and last year's most popular low-temperature physics, he was even dubbed "smarter than Einstein" by reporters with ulterior motives. .
But if you randomly interview passers-by on the streets of the UK and ask them who is the smartest person in the world, at least half of them will give the answer Einstein.
Of course, the answer given by the remaining half was not Chen Muwu, but Newton.
"Dr. Chen of Cambridge University Proved Hilbert Wrong."
He wrote the title on the paper, and after thinking about it for a while, Crowther drew another horizontal line on it.
He felt that not many British newspaper readers knew that there was a German mathematician named Hilbert, even though he is now the world's leading figure in mathematics.
"Dr. Chen overturned the edifice of mathematics", "Dr. Chen rebuilt the foundation of mathematics"...
These topics are too big, and it is easy for Chen Muwu to be the target of criticism.
And for ordinary people who can't even do multiplication, no one cares whether the mathematical foundation has been subverted. As long as one plus one still equals two, and one pound can still be exchanged for 240 pence, then their daily life It will not be affected.
We were all graduates of Trinity College and were in the Cavendish Laboratory together. Crowther didn't want to push Kapitsa's friend to the forefront.
He suddenly had an idea and thought of how the British media reported last year on the Royal Institution's progress in low-temperature physics.
"Under Russell's guidance, Cambridge University doctoral students shattered the Germans' unrealistic mathematical dreams."
Blunting his achievements in mathematics, focusing on Russell and Cambridge University, two British elements, and then targeting Hilbert's German identity.
Crowther felt that he had chosen a good news headline, which would definitely help the "Manchester Guardian" sell well.
Just as he thought, the newspaper that published this news report not only published it before the "Journal of Natural Science" that published Chen Muwu's paper, but it was also quickly reprinted by other newspapers.
For those of you who don't know math, Britain beat Germany again.
But for those who understand mathematics, everyone is looking forward to the publication of the latest issue of "Hui Bao".
Crowther's report gave Chen Muwu's paper the same treatment as that of famous writers.
The book hasn't even been released yet, but the preview information in the newspaper has already made people eagerly await it.
News travels even faster than international letters travel across Europe.
Before Hilbert received Russell's letter to him, Crowther's report had already been reprinted in German newspapers.
Of course, the title was changed to something more normal. Although the Germans are rigorous, they are not so rigorous that they join the British in belittling Germany.
In Berlin, Einstein saw the news in the Berliner Zeitung.
Whether it is Chen Muwu or Hilbert, these two are his old acquaintances.
The former was, in his eyes, a misguided student.
In his eyes, the latter was an enemy who had reconciled.
Einstein originally respected Hilbert, a German scientific predecessor, until the summer of 1915, a few months before he proposed the general theory of relativity.
From June 28th to July 5th, Einstein was invited by Hilbert to visit the University of Göttingen for a week. During this period, he gave six lectures, all of which introduced his theory of general relativity. Research.
Then Hilbert's interest was attracted to the general theory of relativity by Einstein's report.
At that time, Einstein's research on general relativity had reached the final stage, and there was only one remaining goal, which was to give a specific form of the gravitational field equation mathematically.
Einstein had already mathematicalized abstract physical concepts, and Hilbert happened to be a mathematician. The two men almost announced at the same time that they were the first to write the field equation.
Einstein gave a report to the Prussian Academy of Sciences on November 25 of that year, and submitted the paper on the same day, which was published a week later on December 2.
But Hilbert gave his report at the University of Göttingen on November 20. He pointed out that judging from the date of the report, Hilbert was five days earlier than Einstein.
However, his paper was published less than half a year later, on March 31, 1916, nearly four months later than Einstein.
Both men claimed to be the first to discover the general theory of relativity and have continued to argue about it.
It was not until a long time later that Hilbert voluntarily gave in and admitted that Einstein was the discoverer of general relativity.
So Einstein also wrote to Hilbert, hoping to shake hands with him and make peace.
The two men reconciled on the surface, but no one could tell whether they had truly let go in their hearts.
After the reconciliation, Hilbert once said something very arrogant: "Every kid on the street in Göttingen understands what four-dimensional geometry is better than Einstein. But despite this, Einstein still did it (general relativity), and mathematicians didn’t.”
When I saw in the newspaper that Chen Muwu actually defeated the arrogant Hilbert in mathematics, Einstein's beard lifted up a little unconsciously, and his face was even brighter with a smile.
This Chinese guy is essentially good. It would be better if he could give up his unrealistic and naive ideas about quantum mechanics.
(End of chapter)
