touche' :D :D :D

Frank Plumptorn Ramsey, who proved the unproveable and who first introduced the notion of n-degrees (six?) of separation. He died at the age of 26.

I'll be darned, I thought it was that kuh-razy Hungarian Paul Erdos. I have an Erdos number of 3. Which means you (all who read this) have an Erdos number no greater than 4, I guess. Somehow that doesn't seem quite in the spirit of Erdos. Not from "The Book".

B

Ramsey founded, duh, Ramsey theory. A branch of Combinatorial Math which asserts that given a sufficiently large set, order develops... or something like that. A classic problem is the party problem. What is the least amount of guest you need to invite to a party such that at least one guest knows another, or once again, something like that. I don't pretend to understand much, let alone what Erdos did with Ramsey's work. I'm not a Mathematician.

Edit: I've actually only read one of Ramsey's papers, and then only parts of it. It was about probability and degree of belief. I never quite got that either.

I use math a lot in my work but nobody would ever reasonably confuse me with a real mathematician. I'm reading a biography about an Irish teenager who is a math whiz, "In Code". My Mother gave it as a present to one of my girls, who started it and said, "Its about math. It's boring." So I picked it up. I was immdediately struck by how carefully consistent her parents were in guiding their children to analytic thinking. Wow. You'd either get gifted kids or Unibombers.

Please, if there were an all powerful God, please don't let my kid grow up to be a Mathematician! :P

Once a year ESPN broadcasts the Mathcounts competition. These kids are arguably the most creative problem solvers I've ever seen.

Well you got your intellectual and then you got your smart. For smart let me propose Glenn W. Turner, a 8th grade dropout who had been born in a charity ward with a harelip and a bad speech impediment. He was a scammer, spent some time in jail but over 800 millionaires were created and the parent company, Turner Enterprises, originally Koscot and Dare to Be Great grew into 78 companies and in 21 countries. This was back in the seventies when a $1,000,000 was actually quite a lot. His pitch was simple – give me $5,000 and I’ll show you how to go out and get people to give you $5,000 for teaching people how to give them $5,000. To this day people admire this guy. This all worked especially well in the southeast.

hi all
this is a no brainer-- ISAAC NEWTON