Hooray! A light day!

Trying to see how far I can push it before being late, I got up at 7:30 AM, leaving at 7:45. I excitedly got to the 76 bus right when it came, and in the end, I was still plenty early for class. Perhaps I was still a bit too sleepy for algebra, however. Why is it always so early in the morning?!


Today in AAL we discussed faithful and transitive actions. Nothing very complicated- but it was some new terminology and ideas, and I'm sure I won't have a problem understanding the notes when I review them. We also have our first 3 h/w problems, due next Wed. He holds office hours the first hour of class on Tuesday, but I'm sure I've solved some of them last term. Good thing I brought my notes and h/ws with me! For example, one problem was to show the conjugates of G formed a subgroup of G.

Then was my first number theory class, NUMA. There are two sections, one taught by all of your favorites, Szabo. I decided to give the other a try, but many had experienced his teaching style in CLA and were reluctant to take him. There were 19 people in the other prof's section, and 4 in his. He came over to our classroom, said something to the Prof in Hungarian, and asked for some of us to come over. Number theory is important to me, so a good class is important to me, but I decided to give him another shot. Me and some others went to the other classroom to try him out.


Szabo teaches in the department of number theory and algebra, and is an algebraist, but his first love is number theory. He says it is "big fun!" When he was 17, there was a soccer game after school, but it was canceled, and instead he solved a number theory problem that was proposed by Erdos, and had since been unsolved. He didn't realize the significance of it, though, but later when on to publish his work. However, he failed his second term in number theory, and the undergrad level, and that affected him, so he decided algebra was his future.


So, you can see, he is a really smart guy. That class I sat in on was absolutely great. He asked us some very interesting questions about cannibals eating scientists. Say you have n scientists that are captured by hungry cannibals. They will eat them for breakfast. They are cruel, so they will put a green or red hat on each scientist's head. The n will be lined up, and the first to answer will be in the back. Every guy can only see all the hats in front of him. The scientists can say, "Red," or "Green." If your hat matches what you say, you live. How many scientists can be saved?


The answer is quite tricky, and it does require some thought. You can see Szabo emphasizes problem solving. Of the 2 classes each week, the second will be a problem solving class. This is what is important in number theory. For the second hour, we briefly discussed Mersenne and Fermat primes, and how little is known about prime numbers. I heard the other section of number theory was discussing primes more, but I think I am very likely to stick in his section. This is the book I bought for the course. He says it is not required, and he hands out .pdf notes, but this is a very high quality book, and will be a great reference for me as well as I continue number theory.


I was wanting to try Conjecture and Proof today (which I heard showed a couple ways to show that the square root of two is irrational), but due to the great number theory class, I chose to try Galois one more time. I ate a yummy 400 ft pasta for lunch before class started, and Szabo started off class with his greeting, "Welcome boys and girls!"


This time class was much better, and we went through some proofs and the like. That being said, I don't understand fields and rings well enough to take the class. The last 45 min I completely zoned out, unless Szabo started telling one of his jokes. His favorite involves meeting girls in a bar. He says to never tell them that you're a mathematician. Just say, my work involves Unique Factorization Domains, or Quaternions, and then they will be impressed and like you.


Even though class was done at 2, I was stil tired. I went back, napped for 3 hours, and made myself my dinner. I finished up the old rice, and made stir fry with shrimp. The shrimp were really small and I could barely taste them, but it was still good. I also drank the milk I had bought yesterday. This one tasted extremely normal, which made me happy.

I then did the dishes, and I reviewed the first month and a half of material from last term's group theory course. It will be very important for me to be extremely comfortable with that material.

Tomorrow- class from 8 to 6!! Including my first Logic and Graph Theory classes. I hope I survive.....