During my senior year of college (late 93), Marilyn vos Savant wrote a full-page article in which she criticised Andrew Wiles’ proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem. In addition to a number of nasty personal comments she made about Wiles, her proof (IIRC) basically was this:
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It has been proven impossible to perform the construction known as “squaring the circle”
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In the late 1800’s, some rebellious mathematicians starting making up ‘alternative’ non-Euclidean geometries.
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In some of these geometries, it is possible to square the circle.
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Since squaring the circle is impossible, non-Euclidean geometries are obviously wrong.
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Wiles’ proof of FTL uses non-Euclidean geometry.
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Therefore, Wiles’ proof is obviously wrong.
Now, even as a history major, I could see how ridiculous this was, and I remember the huge furor that erupted over on sci.math, which included a number of people worrying that the FTL proof would turn out to be incorrect for other reasons, but MvS would crow over how she had “proven” Wiles was wrong long before any of these so-called scholars had.
Anyway, Wiles’ proof has since been confirmed, but I don’t recall ever seeing MvS print any kind of retraction or follow-up to her initial criticism. Did she ever admit she was wrong, and if not, did she at least print an apology for the cheap shots she took at Wiles’ personal life?
I checked the Fermat page at the Marilyn Is Wrong website, but there was no mention of a follow-up or retraction by MvS. Also, the comments on her book about FTL don’t indicate that she’s changed her mind (not publicly, anyway).
–sublight.