Showing papers in "Bulletin of The London Mathematical Society in 1979"

A Note on the Irrationality of ζ(2) and ζ(3)

Abstract: At the “Journees Arithmetiques” held at Marseille-Luminy in June 1978, R Apery confronted his audience with a miraculous proof for the irrationality of ζ(3) = l-3+ 2-3+ 3-3 + The proof was elementary but the complexity and the unexpected nature of Apery’s formulas divided the audience into believers and disbelievers Everything turned out to be correct however Two months later a complete exposition of the proof was presented at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Helsinki in August 1978 by H Cohen This proof was based on the lecture of Apery, but contained ideas of Cohen and Don Zagier For a more extensive record of this little history I refer to A J van der Poorten [1] Apery’s proof will be published in Acta Arithmetica