
New Erdős Paper Solves Egyptian Fraction Problem - vinchuco
https://www.simonsfoundation.org/uncategorized/new-erdos-paper-solves-egyptian-fraction-problem/#
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sigil
_When he said someone had "died," Erdős meant that the person had stopped
doing mathematics. When he said someone had "left," the person had died._

Since he's still coauthoring papers, I prefer to think that Erdős has merely
left.

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dpflan
If you want to explore Egyptian Fractions more, here is a paper focusing on
the Erdős-Graham problem [1.]: "On a Coloring Conjecture about Unit Fractions"
by Ernest Croot [2.]

[1.]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s%E2%80%93Graham_prob...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s%E2%80%93Graham_problem)

[2.] [http://arxiv.org/abs/math/0311421](http://arxiv.org/abs/math/0311421)

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gruturo
Getting an Erdős number of 1, 20 years after his death?

I feel compelled to post the relevant XKCD:
[https://xkcd.com/599/](https://xkcd.com/599/)

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kzrdude
Is Erdos unproportionally celebrated? I'd love to know why he's so popular.

~~~
petke
"The Man Who Loved Only Numbers: Story of Paul Erdos and the Search for
Mathematical Truth"

Is a humorous non-mathematical book about him. Erdos was a funny and strange
man. He was the most prolific co-writer of math papers.

He didn't have a home, but would just pack his bags and sleep over at other
mathematicians couches around the world. He would ask about their math
interests and problems. Erdos often had some great insights and unusual
perspectives about it. He would talk about math with them non stop, until they
could take no more. The other mathematician would often write a paper about
what they had discussed, and Erdos would be sent on his way to the next
mathematician.

When he discovered or heard about some very beautiful proof. He would say this
proof was "from The book". As in the book that God wrote. He also called God
the supreme fascist.

Erdos dint sleep much and didnt care about things that where not math. He
couldn't tie his shoes, liked to tell silly jokes, and was a virgin. He was
also on amphetamines most of the time.

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aswanson
My only question is why hasn't there been a movie made about him yet.

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ramblerman
Well he sat around all day and did math.

Without a backdrop of world war 2 or a terrorist code that needs to be
cracked, it wouldn't be very captivating.

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david_ar
> After 1971 he also took amphetamines, despite the concern of his friends,
> one of whom (Ron Graham) bet him $500 that he could not stop taking the drug
> for a month.[18] Erdős won the bet, but complained that during his
> abstinence, mathematics had been set back by a month: "Before, when I looked
> at a piece of blank paper my mind was filled with ideas. Now all I see is a
> blank piece of paper." After he won the bet, he promptly resumed his
> amphetamine use.

So there's that

