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From: pmontgom@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Peter Montgomery)
Newsgroups: net.math
Subject: Re: Fermat's Last Theorem
Message-ID: <1670@sdcrdcf.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 15-Jan-85 00:57:54 EST
Article-I.D.: sdcrdcf.1670
Posted: Tue Jan 15 00:57:54 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 17-Jan-85 04:35:30 EST
References: <1622@sdcrdcf.UUCP> <1598@psuvax1.UUCP>
Reply-To: pmontgom@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Peter Montgomery)
Organization: System Development Corp. R+D, Santa Monica
Lines: 37
Summary: 

> The abstract reads in full:
>
> 816-11-188      CHIEN WENJEN, 4297 Candleberry Avenue, Seal Beach, CA 90740.
>                 "Fermat's Last Theorem".  Preliminary Report
>
>     The missing proof of Fermat's Last Theorem has been rediscovered.
> The proof is elementary, zigzag, and truly wonderful as claimed by Fermat
> nearly three and a half centuries ago.  The relation
>  p    p    p
> x  + y  = z for any prime p > 2 is called Case I if none of the solution
> integers x, y, z is divisible by p and Case II if one of the integers is
> divisible by p.  In this article, unlike the classical work, we show
> first the nonexistence of Case II and then the impossibility of Case I.
> [Harold M. Edwards, "Fermat's Last Theorem - A Genetic Introduction to
> Algebraic Number Theory," or L. J. Mordell, "Three Lectures on
> Fermat's Last Theorem," and "13 Lectures on Fermat's Last Theorem" by
> Paulo Ribenboim.]

On January 9, at the AMS meeting in Anaheim, CA, Chien Wenjen's wife
announced that her husband had Parkinson's disease.  She gave the
presentation while he sat in the rear of the overcrowded room in his
wheelchair.  She said he is now retired and has had time to study the
problem, and thanked a D. H. Young for bring it to her husband's attention.
Then she read the abstract as printed in the AMS and said he would publish
in the near future.  No technical details were presented and there were
no viewgraphs.
					      p    p    p
Also, the printed abstract used the equation x  + y  = x  rather than
 p    p    p
x  + y  = z .  Of course it is elementary if we use that equation.
-- 
			Peter Montgomery

	{aero,allegra,bmcg,burdvax,hplabs,
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