The walls of the cell where Christopher Havens was serving a 25-year murder sentence were covered in notebook paper. The sheets filled with numeric and Greek scratchings had quickly overwhelmed his modest desk and were now forming a patchwork wallpaper that spread from that corner and began to wrap around the 8x12 room. The neatly nesting equations of the continued fractions guiding his chase could run on for 15 feet as he hunted for patterns that might offer a clue.
Some pages were complete nonsense, grasps into the unknown with whatever method appeared to him. Other pages made progress. They showed promise in his self-taught number theory education. Though Havens didn’t know this yet. He also didn’t know his problem didn’t have an answer. Guards and other inmates would do double-takes as they passed. He looked like a freak, but that didn’t matter anymore. He was getting somewhere. He was leaning into sticking out. Fitting in had gotten him into prison in the first place.
Diver deeper into Christopher's journey with math while incarcerated: bit.ly/3aOLgja
Popular Mechanics
The walls of the cell where Christopher Havens was serving a 25-year murder sentence were covered in notebook paper. The sheets filled with numeric and Greek scratchings had quickly overwhelmed his modest desk and were now forming a patchwork wallpaper that spread from that corner and began to wrap around the 8x12 room. The neatly nesting equations of the continued fractions guiding his chase could run on for 15 feet as he hunted for patterns that might offer a clue.
Some pages were complete nonsense, grasps into the unknown with whatever method appeared to him. Other pages made progress. They showed promise in his self-taught number theory education. Though Havens didn’t know this yet. He also didn’t know his problem didn’t have an answer. Guards and other inmates would do double-takes as they passed. He looked like a freak, but that didn’t matter anymore. He was getting somewhere. He was leaning into sticking out. Fitting in had gotten him into prison in the first place.
Diver deeper into Christopher's journey with math while incarcerated: bit.ly/3aOLgja
3 years ago | [YT] | 4