Everything is counted.
From the literary point of view, every mathematician has his destiny. Euclid’s eternal name lies in geometry. Zu Chongzhi’s lasting legacy lies in pi. If Newton was not proficient in mathematics, even if he was knocked unconscious by a falling apple, he would not realize gravity. Similarly, if Gauss didn’t invent Gauss algorithm and Gauss function, how can he be called "prince of mathematics"? What people think of Hilbert today is undoubtedly his 23 "Hilbert problems" and his self-confidence as clear as mathematics: "We must know. We will know. " Chen Jingrun, a bookworm, has become a household idol, all because of Mr. Xu Chi’s Goldbach Conjecture.
Zhou Congyao was born for mathematics, which is a gift and a private gift from God.
God not only gave him talent, but also gave him the soil to grow up in. It is a small place, Donggou, Funing County, Jiangsu Province, which is unknown.
Zhou Congyao entered Donggou Middle School, a small school with poor resources, but he met Pan Bingjie, an exceptional wizard, who was born as a cowherd, didn’t graduate from primary school, and taught himself. He worked all the way from the first-generation teacher to the third-year math teacher and the teaching director of Dongzhong Middle School.
Under the guidance of Mr. Pan, Zhou Congyao came to the fore in junior high school. In 1962, a math contest was held in Beijing. Participants are limited to senior two and senior three students. In the final game, the best is chosen, and the best is chosen. Therefore, the difficulty coefficient is particularly large. Hua Luogeng (director of the competition Committee) predicted: "Whoever can score 60 points will have the hope of winning the championship."
Tang Shouwen, a senior three student in Beijing No.65 Middle School, won the prize in themoon: he scored 86 points in the exam! Hua Luogeng was overjoyed and specially hosted a banquet for Xiao Tang at home as a reward.
Hua Luogeng didn’t know that Zhou Congyao, a junior three student in Donggou Middle School, thousands of miles away, could get more than 60 points in this set of questions!
高中，整体起飞。当地土话讲：“兵怂怂一个，将怂怂一窝。”反之亦然：“学生强强一个，老师强强一班。”周从尧是六五届，他考进了清华，是七人之一。但是，进数学系，而且执着终生，步步踩在命定的数上，则是唯一。
天才碰上了“文革”，这是“无理数”。大学毕业分配到湖南西洞庭湖农场，人们领略了他的数，体力加毅力的数：吃饭，最多能吃十七个馒头；挑担，能挑三百六十斤；插秧，有同学戏称其为“插秧机”。
得其所哉！是在农场再分配之后，周从尧进入了湖南计算技术研究所。倘若把周从尧比作冰山，世人只晓得他露出海面的部分：获奖专业户。国家级的，有全国科学大会奖、国家科技进步奖；省部级的，六项，具体名称略；市级以下的，举不胜举。
世人不晓得的，自然是海面下的部分：理论数学研究。这是他的挚爱。那些年，他在纠缠华林猜想。
这是18世纪的老问题，祖父的祖父的祖父级的了。我国参与这一问题研究的，前有华罗庚，后有陈景润，都取得了阶段性的成果。1982年，周从尧在陈景润的基础上又有突破。但在公布时间上，比印度学者晚了一步——科学研究没有亚军可言，他只有继续潜回水底。
In those years, Zhou Congyao and I were both assigned to Changsha, so we knew it very well. Then, I returned to Beijing. Then, at the beginning of the 21st century, Zhou Congyao retired and moved to Beijing for a long time. What we talked about the most was literature. Wilstrass said that a mathematician who is not a bit poetic will never be a complete mathematician, and he believes it. Of course, I often talk about mathematics. For me, it is a supplementary course and an extension. If I use the words of Wilstras flexibly, I can write: a writer without "numbers" in his mind will never be a writer in the perfect sense.
Time flies, and we are both in our twilight years. Listening to him, he said that he is still tug-of-war with mathematics. Let’s take it as inertia. I think, just like me, despite the decline of my memory and the exhaustion of my thinking, I still write and draw and enjoy myself every day.
Until one day, in June, 2019, Zhou Congyao told me that he published a paper in China Science and Technology Papers Online, which was highly praised by his peers. I asked him how to use the high method, and he showed me the original text: "The author first discovered and proved the most practical negation of congruence judgment by elementary methods, without BSD conjecture. The proof process is novel and unique, and it has great innovation in theory … It is a good innovative research paper on number theory research. " This surprised me.
Hardy said that mathematics is a game for young people. When he said this, he was old and was writing sad memories. There may be exceptions (that is God’s privilege), but it can’t be wrong in general, so there is a hard rule in the Fields Prize: the winner should not be over 40 years old.
At this time, Zhou Congyao is over the age of ancient times.
Remember a shot: besides mathematics, Zhou Congyao likes painting and inherits his grandfather’s genes. I also like walking, out of healthy instinct. He lives in the Second Ring Road and often walks and thinks along the streets. One day, I drove by Andingmen and saw him holding his head high and striding on the sidewalk. At that time, I stared at his white hair, which was really white, as white as snow! Then, staring at his fast-moving back, it was really fast, as fast as the wind! This is not painting, not photography, but-mathematics, pure and clear mathematics.
Then, good news kept coming, and he threw out five papers in a row. The last article, the sixth article, was published in March, 2021, with the title of "Major Improvement of Fermat-Guan Xungui’s Discrimination Theorem of Congruence and Ten New Algorithms". His six papers include more than 25 theorems, a criterion, a new function, two postulates and ten new algorithms. It can be said that in this direction, he has climbed to a relative peak. Although he found ten new algorithms at a time, he solved many types of congruence calculation; But he also found that more difficult problems followed. This kingdom, like a universe, is boundless. Colleagues-naturally also encountered new troubles-I don’t know how to express it.
Waiting, only waiting for the authoritative referee. Zhou Congyao didn’t have time to wait, so he wrote a pamphlet "past lives with Remainder in Millennium Problem" to popularize science.
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