A Man of Science and Engineering in Troubled Times Wandering in the Late Qing Dynasty

The next day, a large number of people gathered in the seminar room.

Looking at the battle, there is a bit of a confrontation between France and Germany, because the original cause of the matter was that the famous French mathematician Borrell opposed Cantor's set theory and wrote a paper with very sharp views.

At present, Cantor's mental state is very poor and he is unable to refute. Fortunately, Zemelo came out of nowhere.

Zermelo responded with several papers, and the two sides began to debate.

Then France's Borrell assembled a group of France's top mathematicians to face off against Zermelo.

Borrell was joined by Lebesgue, Rene Bell and Adama.

These people all have a certain status in the world of mathematics, but Göttingen's lineup is obviously stronger: Hilbert, Zermelo, Minkowski, Klein, Carl Runge; in addition, there are also people from the UK Russell.

Even people who are not engaged in mathematics have heard the names of this group of people.

Of course, French mathematics was also very strong in the past. Cauchy, Lagrange, Laplace, Descartes, Veda, Fourier, Galois, etc. were all considered great.

Now that France is surpassed by Germany in mathematics, it is obvious that it is not very convinced.

Moreover, Poincaré, the strongest in French mathematics at the moment, did not come, and his combat effectiveness was reduced a lot.

As for the arguments between the two sides, they initially focused on the set theory dealing with infinity. In professional mathematical terms, it is: "Use consecutive decimals to prove that the set of all real numbers is larger than the set of all integers and the set of all rational numbers, so infinity There are different levels."

Borrell's counterargument is that this would create a paradox.

Before the debate began, Li Yu said to Hilbert: "It seems that the attitudes of both parties are not at war with each other."

Hilbert said: "It's just an academic discussion. Even if we have hatred with the French, it will not hinder mathematical exchanges."

Hilbert's reputation is so good, and his consciousness is also high.

At present, many European scientists tend to be cosmopolitan, such as the famous Einstein. They are very anti-war and even despise political struggle.

Li Yu said: "That's true. It's not like the debate between science and religion back then."

Minkowski on the side spoke: "Even in the dispute between science and religion, both sides are not always red-faced. I remember many years ago, Huxley, a supporter of the theory of evolution, argued with British Bishop Wilberforce. Although there were rumors that the two sides were arguing. It’s crazy, but it’s not like that.”

Li Yu said: "Isn't this bishop like Bishop Berkeley who refuted Newton's calculus and proposed Berkeley's paradox and debated from a scientific perspective?"

Hilbert nodded: "That's it! Otherwise Huxley would not have gone out to argue with the bishop in person. I have read the records compiled by the parties. Bishop Wilberforce refuted it completely from the perspective of evolution. For example, he proposed this 'The existence of a watch implies the existence of a watchmaker' - in other words, such a complex system could not have happened by chance and required continuous evolutionary transitions."

The question raised by the bishop was indeed difficult to answer. Even before Li Yu traveled through time, those who opposed the theory of evolution still used the same point of view to refute it.

——It has been more than 100 years, but these people who oppose the theory of evolution have not yet developed new rhetoric. They keep the same words over and over again:

"Since humans were transformed from monkeys, why are there still monkeys now?"

“Why don’t humans evolve now?”

“Why is there no fossil evidence of intermediates?”

The more advanced ones would talk about the Cambrian explosion.

Don’t explain too much to them…

Why?Let me explain this phenomenon: on various platforms, you can see a lot of opposition to Darwin, but not to Morgan; you can see opposition to Einstein, but not opposition to Dirac; you can see opposition to Faraday's, but see no objection to Maxwell's.

The reason is simple: these people's theories are too profound and they don't understand them.

And even if the theory of evolution is just what they think it is, it is not the true academic theory of evolution.Same goes for relativity.

On the contrary, the bishop who asked the question was somewhat respected.

Minkowski said: "The two sides discussed it from the perspective of evolution, and did not even mention God. When I looked at the record, I once doubted whether this bishop was a real bishop."

Hilbert continued: "And after they completed their discussion, they had dinner together, and the atmosphere was relatively harmonious."

Li Yu said: "This is really amazing."

After a while, the mathematicians on the podium began to debate.

The main players on both sides are naturally Zemelo and France's Borrell.

Soon, Li Yu could feel that Zemelo was gradually gaining the upper hand.

Li Yu's mathematical level was not comparable to that of those majoring in mathematics, but Li Yu had the foresight of future generations, and he could see that the path Zemelo chose was too correct: axiomatic.

This is a powerful weapon to deal with the third mathematical crisis.

Hilbert, Klein, and Minkowski were all seniors and did not speak directly, but their appearance has proved that they are calling for set theory, not just Zermelo.

As for Russell's arrival, it was because he proposed the famous "Barber's Paradox", which almost shook the foundation of set theory and triggered the third mathematical crisis.

In fact, Zermelo himself discovered this paradox a few years before Russell, but he did not publish it.Due to language issues on both sides, the debate came to an end after nearly four hours.

Borrell did not admit it, but he no longer opposed set theory as fiercely as he did at the beginning.

It's good for everyone to get together and chat. After all, there is no such convenient way of communication as the Internet. The best way is face to face.

After the meeting, the host University of Göttingen invited Borrell and others to have lunch together.

The French did not win academically today, but at the dinner table, they were qualified to teach the Germans.

Fortunately, Hilbert was well prepared and hired several Italian chefs to prevent the French from getting mad.

At the dinner table, Li Yu took the opportunity to tell Zemelo his conjecture about game theory.

Cemelo was very interested when he heard it and had a chat with Li Yu.

Borrell naturally knew Li Yu's name and quickly joined in: "Such a huge number coincides with an idea I had some time ago."

Zermelo seemed to have not just had a debate with him at this time, and asked like a normal person: "What do you think?"

"It's not quite like game theory," Borrell said. "My conjecture comes from probability theory."

Probability theory is currently very unpopular in physics, but it has always been a hot topic in the field of mathematics. Zermelo said: "Please explain it in detail."

"Let's imagine a million monkeys trained to press typewriter buttons at will," Borrell said. "They work under the supervision of an illiterate foreman. These monkeys work hard for 100 hours a day. And equip them with 10 million typewriters of various models.

“The job of the illiterate foreman was to collect sheets of paper covered with letters and join them together to bind them into scrolls.

"Then a year from now, we may find the contents of some books in these scrolls. Not only may there be any books, they may even be written in any language. Maybe those books are also treasured by the most wealthy people in the world. in the library.

"In a sufficiently large space and time, this possibility may occur in an instant, and this possibility of significant deviation from most situations is considered the most likely phenomenon in statistical mechanics..."

Li Yu was suddenly enlightened upon hearing this, and suddenly realized that the person who proposed the famous "Infinite Monkey Theorem" was the French mathematician Borrell in front of him.

After nearly a hundred years of interpretation, the infinite monkey theorem has developed into: infinite monkeys can produce specific articles in infinite time, and can even type "Hamlet".

As several people discussed, Hilbert, Minkowski and others also joined in.

Soon, they were talking about pure mathematics. There happened to be a blackboard in the room, and Minkowski took the chalk and started to list equations.

Li Yu from the Advanced Mathematics Bureau didn't want to get involved, and the others basically gathered around, leaving only Li Yu and Russell.

Russell held his pipe in his mouth and said, "Academician Li Yu, it turns out you don't like to join in the fun either."

Li Yu knew in his heart that he was joking, so he replied: "Both each other. But I think Mr. Russell doesn't come close, maybe because his German is not good enough?"

"Mr. Li Yu is indeed a person who understands humor," Russell laughed. "My German is indeed not good enough, but there is nothing wrong with speaking English in Göttingen. Because 40 years ago, this place belonged to the Kingdom of Hanover, which was thousands of miles away from the United Kingdom. Inextricably linked. Haven't you noticed that English is still used in many places in Göttingen. Even the name of the Göttingen Science Society is in English."

Li Yu said: "I really don't know much about this history."

Russell took a drag on his pipe and continued: "I would rather learn Chinese now."

Li Yu said: "German is more or less an alphabetic script and is related to English. Chinese is a square script. If Mr. Russell wants to learn it, it will not be an easy task."

Russell was a very knowledgeable person, and he immediately said unconvinced: "If I, Russell, want to learn, there is nothing I can't learn!"

Li Yu has heard this sentence countless times.

Li Yu said: "Chinese is an illogical language and has strong combination skills. Sir, you have to think carefully."

Russell said: "What combination ability? Tell me."

"It's so strong that it can't be described in English." Li Yu said.

Russell said: "Don't brag, I don't think I can't express it in English."

"Okay, wait a minute."

Li Yu found a piece of paper and wrote on it: March 33 is the thirteenth day of the week.

Then it took a lot of effort to explain to him what this sentence meant.

Li Yu said: "You see, it's basically impossible to say such a thing in English."

Russell looked at the short line of Chinese on the paper and opened his mouth: "It's so casual!"

Li Yu smiled and said: "In Chinese, it should be 'casual'."

"I mean it can be combined at will just like numbers," Russell was completely convinced. "I will definitely go to China to stay for a long time in the future."