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# I apologise for moving this brilliance down the board with a POAT
(I helped save b3ta! thecrapgatsby isn't listening LALALALALALA, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 9:43, archived)
# I must confess to being too thick to understand yours
:(
(I helped save b3ta! HappyToast Groat froth, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 9:51, archived)
# He's calling Stephen Fry a marvellous poof
as part of a pun on Fermat's last theorem, whose birthday this is.
(I helped save b3ta! boris the spider, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 9:53, archived)
#
(I helped save b3ta! prodigy69 broke b3ta and made everyone leave, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 9:59, archived)
# ^ what she said
(I helped save b3ta! J Peasemould Gruntfuttock Alpha Mike Foxtrot, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:23, archived)
# I know the phrase "Fermat's last theorem"
but have no idea what it is or how it quantifies the marvellousness of poofs
(I helped save b3ta! HappyToast Groat froth, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 9:59, archived)
# Aha. This makes more sense
Fermat wrote something like "x^n+y^n=z^n only when n=2. I have concocted a marvellous proof of this but this margin is too narrow to contain it". Conventional wisdom is that Fermat was trolling generations of mathematicians and didn't have a proof at all.
(I helped save b3ta! boris the spider, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:10, archived)
# You've put that far more succinctly than I could!
(I helped save b3ta! thecrapgatsby isn't listening LALALALALALA, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:12, archived)
# I'm not sure I didn't steal it from someone else :(
But if they don't pop up to claim it I'm happy to take all credit.

It's impossible for Fermat to have had anything similar to the actual proof of the theorem, since it relies on maths developed in the 20th century. At this point, Stephen Fry (prompted by a researcher who's been reading Wikipedia in the back room) would doubtless say that it seems likely an elementary proof could be found (due to Friedman's Grand Conjecture, of which I've never heretofore heard), but it would be insanely long.

/just been reading Wikipedia blog

Also, clicks to both images, since I've been insanely rude :)
(I helped save b3ta! boris the spider, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:17, archived)
# I like the romantic notion that he really did have a proof that everyone has since overlooked
(cos he was a great big genius), but Simon Singh's book (which is fantastic) makes the point that he probably had a flawed proof along the lines of some of the later attempts.
(I helped save b3ta! thecrapgatsby isn't listening LALALALALALA, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:25, archived)
# I much prefer the idea that he was trolling everyone
I like to think that mathematicians back in them olden days weren't as po-faced and serious as we all believe and instead liked to arse around like the rest of us.
(I helped save b3ta! boris the spider, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:46, archived)
# Fermat was an amateur mathematician, so this was his arsing around.
Also, I have met Andrew Wiles, as he went to my college.
(Pie of Meat ___°¬¯O¯____\o/_____/\_,____Y¯¯Y, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 11:31, archived)
# clever guy
but not clever enough to write on a bigger bit of paper
(I helped save b3ta! HappyToast Groat froth, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:17, archived)
# Or maybe
clever enough not to bother, leaving us convinced in later centuries of his genius. I mean, who can remember Fermat's Penultimate Theorem? But the Last Theorem, that made him a legend!

The first mathematician to truly understand great PR.
(I helped save b3ta! boris the spider, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 10:18, archived)
# it's a long winded way of making a play on the words proof and poof.
(I helped save b3ta! Pasanonic 's been known to cause insanity in laboratory mice, Wed 17 Aug 2011, 12:38, archived)