/sci/ - Science & Math

"This is a very interesting and exceedingly tough problem which was
proposed at the MMO 1985. It is due to Euler, who never published it. It was
taken from his notebook by the proposers. No participant could solve it. It became
a subject of controversy among mathematicians. A prominent number theorist
wrote in the Russian journal Mathematics in School that it was well beyond the
students and required algebraic number theory. I proposed it to our Olympiad
team. One student Eric M¨uller gave a solution after some time, which I did not
understand. I asked him to write it down, so that I could study it in detail. It took
him some time to write it down, since he solved not only this problem but along
with it also over a thousand other problems on 434 pages, all the problems posed
by the trainers in three years. I found the solution of our problem. It was correct."

--Engel: Problem-Solving Strategies (Springer 1998), p.126

>>6957735
>Mathematicians generally have some faith
this is so true