# Question from "A Beautiful Mind" (book)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-from-a-beautiful-mind-book/738391>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [November 23, 2015, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-from-a-beautiful-mind-book/738391 "2015-11-23T23:47:08Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\
**Post date:** [November 23, 2015, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-from-a-beautiful-mind-book/738391/1 "2015-11-23T23:47:08Z")

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In Sylvia Nasar’s “A Beautiful Mind” she notes that John Nash’s second son was referred to by Nash as “Baby Epsilon” which she says is “a tongue-in-cheek reference to a well-known mathematical anecdote about a famous mathematician who believes that all infants are born knowing the proof of the Riemann hypothesis and retain that knowledge until they are six months of age.”

Has anyone heard of this “mathematical anecdote”? It seems more likely to me that “Baby Epsilon” is just a reference to the common use of “epsilon” in mathematics to refer to a very small quantity.

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**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\
**Post date:** [November 24, 2015, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-from-a-beautiful-mind-book/738391/2 "2015-11-24T00:04:02Z")

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I’d be willing to guess that the “famous mathematician” is [Paul Erdős](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Erd%C5%91s). He’s well known for referring to children as “epsilons.” I can’t remember seeing/hearing the particular “well-known mathematical anecdote” you refer to (though I did read _A Beautiful Mind_, years ago, so I must have at least run across it there), but it sounds like something Erdos would say.

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**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\
**Post date:** [November 24, 2015, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-from-a-beautiful-mind-book/738391/3 "2015-11-24T00:17:56Z")

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> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#):
>
> I’d be willing to guess that the “famous mathematician” is [Paul Erdős](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Erd%C5%91s). He’s well known for referring to children as “epsilons.” I can’t remember seeing/hearing the particular “well-known mathematical anecdote” you refer to (though I did read _A Beautiful Mind_, years ago, so I must have at least run across it there), but it sounds like something Erdos would say.

Thanks.