[FOM] consistency of PA?

[Karlis Podnieks]

Thanks to Bryan Ford and Randall Holmes for wonderful moments... (of
thinking "what, if, really...").

Before, I've received several inconsistency proofs of PA (only from amateur
mathematicians). One of them (about 5 years ago) was quite serious, and even
more complicated than Holmes'.

"Must" PA be inconsistent? My idee fixe:

If ZFC proves that Goldbach's Conjecture is consistent with PA, then ZFC
proves [that] Goldbach's Conjecture [is true]. Is this a "normal"
phenomenon, or something like Michelson-Morley? Couldn't it be another
starting point for an inconsistency proof?

(Students could read about the phenomenon at
http://www.ltn.lv/~podnieks/gt6a.html#s67.)

Best wishes,
Karlis.Podnieks at mii.lu.lv
www.ltn.lv/~podnieks
Institute of Mathematics and Computer Science
University of Latvia