Infinity Is Worth No More Than -1/12
On 16 January 1913, a confused manuscript reached the famous mathematician G. H. Hardy in Cambridge. Other researchers have received similar letters before, and rejected it due to the seemingly incoherent formulae mixed with trivial mathematical results. Professional mathematicians are used to receiving manuscripts by amateurs who believe to have solved famous problems, but this particularly odd scribble caught the eye:
\[ 1+2+3+4+5+6+\ldots+\infty=-\frac{1}{12} \]
Did this amateur mathematician really think that the sum of all natural numbers, a value that will exceed any given boundary at some point, will wind up being a negative fraction?
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