User:Timothy Clemans/Fermat's Last Theorem/A

''Draft A is the structure of my ideas for the article on Fermat's Last Theorem that I will use in later drafts and I believe that I have completed this draft. If you see a typo or other error please contact me soon.'' Timothy Clemans 07:49, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Edit "remove superscript of 17th century and wikilink it per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) and add heading for supposed solutions" made after note written. Timothy Clemans 08:01, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

See Draft B

In number theory, Fermat's Last Theorem is the most celebrated of the deceptively simple problems (see Number Theory as Gadfly). It is an assertion about the family of Diophantine equations that states if n is greater than two, then there are no solutions to the equation an + bn = cn (Fermat equation) in non-zero integers a, b, and c. The first statement of Femat's Last Theorem was by the 17th century French mathematician and jurist, Pierre de Fermat, in the form of a marginal note to himself that he made in his copy of Diophantus' Arithmetica where he was inspired by Pythagorean triples. There have been many key developments that lead to a proof by Andrew Wiles with assistance from Richard Taylor in October of 1994 (see Modular elliptic curves and Fermat's Last Theorem).