Where does new mathematics come from? The great French mathematician Henri Poincaré, a brilliant expositor of the scientific method, described how he grappled for months with an arcane problem in function theory. Exasperated by lack of progress, he went on vacation and forgot about the problem. But, as he was boarding a bus in Caen, the answer came to him in a flash. He was later able to return to his office and complete a proof of the result [TM229 or search for “thatsmaths” at irishtimes.com].
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