
Proof Checking: Not Line by Line - furcyd
https://rjlipton.wordpress.com/2020/06/13/proof-checking-not-line-by-line/
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hliyan
Not an expert by any stretch of the imagination (took higher math only as part
of an undergraduate engineering curriculum), but as I understand, this still
applies to Andrew Wiles proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem:

> A proof that only has many small steps but no global picture is hard to
> motivate.

Wiles' proof is considered a 'modern proof' in that some of the constructs he
used int he proof (modular elliptic curves I believe) did not exist in the
time of Fermat. A proof involving them while certainly not fitting the margins
where Fermat scribbled his famous claim, would also not meet his criteria of
'elegant'.

I wonder the search for his version of the proof still continues?

~~~
ameliaquining
AFAIK, not really, because most historians of mathematics consider it highly
unlikely that Fermat's purported proof (if it existed at all) was correct. In
fact, in all likelihood it has been "rediscovered" many times by the hordes of
people who put forth incorrect proofs during the three and a half centuries
before Wiles finally cracked it.

