However, his work sparked interest in the problem. But he, too, found a mistake and retracted it. (known to his students as "Jesus, he's confusing") also published a solution. Whitehead rediscovered it in the late 1930s. After his death in 1912, the question lay dormant for decades, until an Oxford professor named J.H.C. But then, he saw a flaw in his work and retracted it. Poincaré thought the conjecture would be easy to prove, and he even published a solution. Poincare believed that objects like the knife were related to spheres, while objects with holes and loops in them were not. No matter how hard you try, you can't crush it into a ball without closing up the finger holes. Without punching a hole in it or closing a loop, can you squish it into a ball? Yes, of course. It claimed that any object without a loop is essentially a sphere. THE VICTIMS Poincaré's conjecture seemed simple enough. Little did he know his side note would become one of the greatest challenges in the mathematical world. It was a side note to a larger problem, and he figured he'd work out the details later. In the process of creating topology, Poincaré tossed out a conjecture that seemed to be true. Poincaré's goal was to classify objects by identifying their basic form, much the same way botanists classify new species of plants. Think of it as a twisted version of geometry, in which shapes stretch, bend, and fold inside out. At the turn of the century: Poincaré invented an entirely new field called algebraic topology and today, it's one of the most complicated and vibrant branches of mathematics. But his most legendary achievement was something no one noticed until much, much later. To this day Poincare holds the record for the most physics Nobel Prize nominations, though he never actually won one. and Sweden gave him a small fortune in prize money.When a hole appeared in his calculations, he plugged it up by essentially inventing chaos theory: Kings were tripping over themselves to make him a knight THE MAN BEHIND THE MADNESS Henri Poincaré In 1885, all of Europe was talking about Henri Poincaré, a 30-year-old genius who'd mathematically proven why the solar system holds together. By the time Grigori Perelman proved the Conjecture, the solution was worth $1 million. But as years passed, they'd be left with nothing to show for their lives' toil but dead ends. It first, its simplicity would seduce them, and they'd become convinced the answer was near. Its siren call had lured generations of mathematicians to intellectual graves. He solved the most difficult math problem of the 20th century -the Poincaré Conjecture. (Image credit: Wikipedia user Salix alba) In 2002, a reclusive Russian genius named Grigori Perelman put an end to more than 100 years of suffering in the mathematical community.
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