Prime Numbers, Friends Who Give Problems

A Trialogue with Papa Paulo

Nonfiction, Science & Nature, Mathematics, Number Theory, Recreations & Games

• Author: Paulo Ribenboim
• ISBN: 9789814725835
• Publisher: World Scientific Publishing Company
• Publication: October 27, 2016
• Imprint: WSPC
• Language: English

Prime Numbers, Friends Who Give Problems is written as a trialogue, with two persons who are interested in prime numbers asking the author, Papa Paulo, intelligent questions. Starting at a very elementary level, the book advances steadily, covering all important topics of the theory of prime numbers, up to the most famous problems. The humorous conversations and the inclusion of a back-story add to the uniqueness of the book. Concepts and results are also explained with great care, making the book accessible to a wide audience.

Contents:

• What are Prime Numbers?
• Division is Harder than Multiplication
• Another Paulo! Is a Dialogue of Three Possible?
• How Natural Numbers are Made Out of Primes
• Tell Me Which is the Largest Prime?
• Trying Hard to Find Primes
• A Formula, A Formula, Please
• Paulo Came with a Lasso
• Beautiful Old Elementary Arithmetic
• The Old Man Still Knows
• Can You Tell Me All About Congruences?
• Homework Checked
• Testing for Primality and Factorization
• Fermat Numbers are Friendly. Are They Primes?
• This World is Perfect
• Unfriendly Numbers from a Friend of Fermat's
• Paying My Debt
• Money and Primes
• Secret Messages
• New Numbers and Functions
• Princeps Gauss
• Gathering Forces
• The After "Math" of Gauss
• Primes After Dinner: Bad Dreams?
• Primes in Arithmetic Progression
• Selling Primes
• The Great Prime Mysteries
• Mysteries in Sequences: More But Not All
• The End and the Beginning

Readership: College students, high school teachers and beginners interested in number theory and important facts about prime numbers.
Key Features:

• Engaging short chapters, though written simply, are accurate and filled with substantial and up-to-date information concerning open problems
• This book is unique as it is written to pique the reader's curiosity in wanting to see proofs of theorems mentioned in the conversations throughout the book
• Although the book is not a textbook, it contains a large amount of important information and will be of interest to those who want to learn the most important facts about prime numbers
• The author is a well-known figure in number theory and his previous books were great successes