My IQ has been increasing year by year.

Chapter 435 Page Number

When Van Enlou's statement was posted, the debate outside had already been going on for several days.

Initially, many people weren't arguing about the paper itself.

That's the question.

It is Chen Zhuo.

She is fifteen years old.

Hodge wondered why these words were placed on the same line as a teenager who was not yet of legal drinking age.

Some emails are forwarded around, but the body of the email only contains one sentence.

That's impossible.

Someone replied very quickly afterward.

Why is it impossible?

Then someone else replied.

Because that's Hodge.

Woolley read quite a few of these letters on the first day.

By the second day, he didn't look at it much anymore.

Not because they are completely meaningless, but because they have no way to go on.

A single statement like "impossible" won't create a flaw in a paper, nor will it break the proof of a single line.

The real change began after the third day.

On the mailing list, some people are no longer just copying the subject line.

Someone started pasting page numbers.

Page 5, definition 2.1.

Page 17, Lemma 3.4.

Page 41, Appendix II.

Some people also posted Chen Zhuo's article on constants from three years ago, asking whether the truncation constant in that article had actually been re-invoked.

The argument suddenly became ugly.

It also became useful.

Because from that day on, those who could keep arguing couldn't just have headlines in their hands anymore.

In Cambridge, in Professor Gray's small conference room, the window was slightly ajar.

The wind in early May blew in from outside, carrying a hint of dampness, and gently turned the edges of a few sheets of photocopying paper on the table.

There was more than just Chen Zhuo's Hodge preprint spread out on the table.

There were also several other old articles nearby.

constant.

The entire Hodgkin scratch.

Discrete structures and normal functions.

The young postdoctoral researcher initially only printed Hodge's paper, thinking that one paper was already thick enough.

The next day, he finished the paper on constants.

On the third day, he went to the printing room again and brought back Chen Zhuo's previous few articles.

The printing press staff asked him:

"Want more?"

The postdoctoral researcher watched the printer spit out sheets of paper one by one and sighed.

"I don't want it either."

"Then why fight?"

"Because it seems that he didn't start proving Hodge from this point onwards."

The people in the printing room didn't understand.

The postdoctoral researcher didn't explain either.

When he returned to the meeting room with the stack of papers, Gray was writing page numbers on the blackboard.

It's not written in order.

Instead, it is written column by column.

Section 6 of the Hodge preprint.

Section 4 of the paper on constants.

The last part of the yearbook.

Appendix II.

The young postdoctoral researcher placed the newly printed paper on the table.

"Are we reading a research paper, or compiling a table of contents for him from the past three years?"

Someone nearby chuckled softly.

Gray didn't laugh.

He put down the chalk and glanced back at the paper on the table.

"Find them all first."

The postdoctoral researcher asked:

"Find what?"

"Things he used."

The room fell silent.

That statement wasn't too harsh.

But everyone understood.

On issues of this level, the most useless thing is to have opinions too quickly.

That's too quick to say it's right.

You spoke too quickly and made a mistake.

It's too quick to say it's impossible.

They're all worthless.

What's truly valuable is the ability to point to a particular page and say, "This doesn't connect to the previous page."

Or you could point to another page and say, "Here we go."

In this small conference room in Cambridge, someone mentioned Chen Zhuo's age on the first day.

No one mentioned it the next day.

It's not because they forgot.

It's because once the page numbers are spread out, age becomes less useful.

One cannot prove Hodge by being fifteen years old.

We cannot let a lemma that is already written down disappear just because we are fifteen years old.

The discussions in Paris were even less pleasant.

Professor Le Maire placed Chen Zhuo's preprint on the table, turning the first page over and the second page over as well.

He didn't read the summary for long.

They also did not comment on the topic.

He flipped it directly to the middle.

The young lecturer next to him, watching his hand movements, hesitated for a long time before finally asking:

"You already know where to look?"

Le Maire did not look up.

"I know what I hate the most."

The young lecturer was unsure whether he should respond.

After a while, Le Maire stopped on a certain page and pressed the paper down with his pencil.

"This is it."

The young lecturer went over to take a look.

There weren't any particularly exaggerated sentences on that page.

There was no declaration.

There wasn't a summary that was fancy enough to be included at the beginning of the report.

It consists of just a few lines of definition, followed by a lemma, and then further deductions.

The young lecturer glanced at it for a few seconds.

"Is this part wrong?"

"not yet."

"Then why do you hate it?"

Le Maire finally looked up at him.

"Because if it's not wrong, we'll have to repeat many of the things we said before."

The office fell silent for a moment.

Students passed by outside the window, their laughter drifting in through the glass before fading away.

The young lecturer looked down and reread that page.

He certainly understood what those words meant.

What can be most unsettling in mathematics is sometimes not a blatantly absurd paper.

Absurd things are easy to deal with.

Glance at it, close it, and put it aside.

The real problem is a possibility.

It doesn't try to please you.

Don't follow the path you're used to.

Unfortunately, you can't find a place to get rid of it right away.

Le Maire picked up a pencil and drew a small question mark in the margin of the page.

After finishing the painting, he dug out Chen Zhuo's previous article.

"This child is bad."

The young lecturer was taken aback.

"bad?"

"He hammered the most important nails in other places beforehand."

Le Maire flipped through the old papers, his tone devoid of any joking.

"If you only read this article, you'd think he jumped."

"and then?"

"Then go read the previous article."

He pushed the old paper over.

"You find him waiting for you there."

The atmosphere in Bonn was completely different.

In a small discussion room, the blackboard was covered with writing.

There were many young people, so those who couldn't find a seat simply stood.

A coffee cup sat on the window, a coat was draped over the back of a chair, and printed papers and several open books were piled on the table.

Someone wrote a large "Chen Zhuo" in the upper left corner of the blackboard.

The person next to it wiped it off.

"Writing things is worse than writing a name."

"Isn't this a thing?"

"Stop talking nonsense and write down the page numbers."

So what remained in the top left corner of the blackboard was a string of page numbers.

Hodge preprint, page 32.

The paper on constants is nineteen pages long.

The annual paper is 43 pages long.

Appendix, page 21.

A bespectacled doctoral student stood in front of the blackboard, looking at the page numbers, and suddenly said:

"He's not patching up the hole."

Someone in the back row asked:

"What is that?"

The doctoral student turned around, still holding the chalk in his hand.

"He changed the route."

This statement silenced the discussion room for a moment.

Soon someone else spoke up:

"Don't shout slogans yet, finish writing that line on page thirty-two."

The doctoral student was momentarily speechless.

He turned back and rewrote that line of derivation on the blackboard.

I stopped writing halfway through.

It's not that I can't continue writing.

He suddenly realized that his somewhat excited remark earlier might not have been entirely wrong.

Chen Zhuo did not simply fill in every pitfall on the old path.

He laid something that didn't really look like a road next to it.

It was very narrow at first.

Very strange.

It even makes you feel like you shouldn't have gone this way.

But once you get to a certain place, if you look back, you'll find that the road has long since bypassed the most difficult rock in the old terrain.

The doctoral student pressed the chalk onto the blackboard, and a small piece of chalk broke off.

The person next to him handed him a new one.

"continue."

He said.

"Don't just stand there."

In the Chicago night, the light was still on in an old professor's office.

It was already very quiet outside.

The cleaner pushed her cart past the end of the corridor, the wheels making a very soft sound as they rolled over the floor.

In the office, only one lamp was on on the desk.

Chen Zhuo's preprints were not spread out in a pile.

It was placed neatly in the center of the table.

The old professor only read two pages a day.

I read two more pages the next day.

Someone came to ask him during the day:

Where are you looking?

He replied:

"It's still ahead."

"Did you spot the problem?"

The old professor did not look up.

"I'm not qualified to say that."

The visitor was stunned.

The old professor put down his pen and looked up at him.

"I'm not reading the news."

The man didn't ask any more questions.

After the door closed, the office became quiet again.

The old professor flipped back to those two pages.

The first time, he looked at the definition.

The second time, he looked at the restrictions following the definition.

On the third time, he went to look up an inconspicuous note in Chen Zhuo's old articles.

The note is very short.

It's so short that many people would probably just skim through it the first time they read it.

He stayed there for a long time.

At 11 p.m., he finally wrote the first line of annotation in the margin.

That's not right.

It's not wrong either.

Just two words.

To be investigated.

Then he turned the paper back to the first page and looked at it again.

Similar things happened in many places during the same week.

It's very noisy in some places.

In some places, it was so quiet it was as if nothing had happened.

Some people were saying it was impossible in the morning, but by the afternoon they were looking for a printer.

Some people refused to express their opinion, but postponed their classes by a day.

Some young people got too excited and were told by the professor to go back to the next page.

Some people didn't believe it at first, but by the third day, they deleted the very first "impossible" email.

Because the word "impossible" is no longer sufficient.

The real trouble has moved off the screen and into a thick stack of papers.

It turned into pencil marks.

It becomes a question mark in the margin.

It becomes a bookmark sandwiched between old papers and new preprints.

Van Enlou also quickly sensed the change.

Woolley was the first to sense it.

Because the contents of my email inbox started to change.

The first two days were filled with congratulations and inquiries.

Can an interview be arranged?

Will Chen Zhuo give a public explanation?

Will the Madrid Report change its title?

Is it possible to obtain a clearer version of the manuscript?

There are also a lot of questions about the lack of page numbers.

Woolley separated the letters, and the more he separated them, the more annoyed he became.

By the fifth day, the other stack had gradually thickened.

The stack of letters didn't have any fancy openings.

I won't write exaggerated congratulations.

Some were even quite impolite.

But they have page numbers.

It is defined.

It has a lemma number.

Some people even listed the citations from Chen Zhuo's previous articles.

When Woolley first carried that stack into Cyril's office, his arms felt heavy.

"This batch is different."

He said.

Cyril looked up from behind the table.

He took the top letter.

I read two lines, then flipped to the next page.

Then I picked up the second one.

The third letter.

The fourth letter.

The only sound in the room was the rustling of pages turning.

After a while, Cyril placed the top few letters on his right.

"Keep these."

Woolley asked:

"What about the others?"

"Leave it for now."

Cyril picked up another letter from Paris, and his gaze paused for a moment when he saw the string of quotations attached to the margin.

"This one is for Arthur."

Woolley glanced down.

"From Paris?"

"Um."

"His tone wasn't very good."

Cyril handed him the letter.

"Tone doesn't matter."

Woolley took the letters and went out.

Someone was walking towards the large conference room with a coffee in the hallway and almost bumped into him.

The other person saw the letter in his arms and asked:

"Another interview?"

Woolley shook his head.

"no."

"congratulate?"

"No, not exactly."

The other party stopped.

Woolley said:

"page number."

After hearing this, the man actually smiled.

"finally."

Arthur was sharpening a pencil in his office when he received the letter from Paris.

He heard a knock on the door and said, "Come in."

Woolley placed the letter on the table.

"Cyril told you."

Arthur picked it up, read the first paragraph, and his lips twitched slightly.

"Le Maire?"

"It seems so."

Arthur flips to the back.

The letter was quite long, and its tone was certainly not very pleasant.

But it's not good in certain places.

The other party did not say "I don't believe it".

Which page is he referring to?

Which definition?

Which old conclusion?

If any part is not connected, the rest will be disconnected.

After reading the letter, Arthur put it down.

"Make a copy for David as well."

Woolley asked:

"Do I need to reply?"

"What's the rush?"

Arthur picked up a pencil and wrote a page number next to the letter.

"Let him suffer for a couple of days first."

Woolley didn't understand at first.

Arthur had already lowered his head and continued reading.

The same changes also occurred on Chen Zhuo's desk.

That afternoon, Woolley came in with several letters that had been selected.

Chen Zhuo was flipping through a book.

There was light coming from the window, and the desk was quiet.

Woolley put the letter down.

"The problems outside are starting to become more concrete."

Chen Zhuo looked up and picked up the top letter.

He didn't watch it quickly.

After reading it, put the letter aside.

"I didn't finish reading the first part of this letter."

Woolley paused for a moment.

"He asked very detailed questions."

"Um."

Chen Zhuo said.

"So if he looks at the next three pages, he won't need to ask any more questions."

Woolley took the letter back and put it on the other side.

Chen Zhuo then read the second letter.

This time, he paused for a little longer.

The letter came from Cambridge.

The question is short; it only asks about the connection between two articles in terms of a definition.

After reading the letter, Chen Zhuo placed it on the edge of the table.

"Keep this one."

"Take it back?"

"No need for now."

"Should we let him see it himself?"

Chen Zhuo shook his head.

Woolley looked down at the letter.

"Not replying?"

"I'll reply to the other two letters together."

Chen Zhuo said.

"They'll all ask about the same place."

Woolley glanced at him.

Chen Zhuo had already picked up the third letter.

He said this calmly.

It's like saying it will rain tomorrow, so there's no need to rush to pack away a certain piece of clothing today.

Wu Li suddenly understood why the increasing number of emails outside didn't make Chen Zhuo seem busier.

People outside are chasing them.

The faster one caught up with the one in front.

The slower ones are still behind.

Those who disagreed chased after him, fueled by anger.

A cautious person pursues things step by step.

But Chen Zhuo knew which way the road turned.

In the evening, a small blackboard appeared in the large conference room.

No new conclusions were written above.

Only four characters were written.

External problems.

Below is a series of page numbers.

The first page number is from Cambridge.

The second one is from Paris.

The third one is from Bonn.

The fourth one is from Chicago.

There are a few more that only list the city, without specifying the name.

By the time Woolley placed the last letter in its designated spot, it was already getting dark outside.

There were still people arguing in hushed tones in the lounge.

The coffee machine beeped again.

The copier is not broken.

This is one of the few good things that happened this week.

That night, Cyril took one last look at the stack of letters on his right.

It's much thicker than it was this morning.

But it's much thinner than all the congratulations, interviews, and vague questions from the previous days combined.

Thin, yet heavy.

Because this stack of papers finally stopped asking if Chen Zhuo was crazy, stopped asking if Princeton was too bold, and stopped asking if fifteen years old could prove Hodge.

They were asking for the page number.

The question is about the definition.

The question is about the lemma.

The question is about the footnotes in the previous paper.

Cyril pulled out the top few letters separately and placed them on the side of the table.

Woolley stood in the doorway and asked:

"Should we deal with these tomorrow?"

Cyril shook his head.

"Distribute them tonight."

"So urgent?"

Cyril looked up at him.

"Those things from a few days ago aren't urgent."

He patted the stack on the table.

"Don't lose this batch."

Woolley nodded, walked over, and picked up the stack of papers.

The paper isn't very thick.

But when he held it in his arms, his movements were gentler than during the day.

At the end of the corridor, the door to the large conference room was still open.

The page numbers on the blackboard looked very white under the light.

Woolley went over and placed the new letters on the long table.

This time, they were neither included in the congratulations nor in the criticisms.

They were placed next to the paper.

Because from this moment on, the sounds outside were no longer just sounds.

They became part of the reading.

缓缓

I need to take leave because my back is hurting badly for some reason and I need to rest.