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arXiv · 1512.02685

Surprising symmetries in distribution of prime polynomials

Dinesh S. Thakur
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Abstract

The primes or prime polynomials (over finite fields) are supposed to be distributed `irregularly' , despite nice asymptotic or average behavior. We provide some conjectures/guesses/hypotheses with `evidence' of surprising symmetries in prime distribution. At least when the characteristic is $2$, we provide conjectural rationality and characterization of vanishing for families of interesting infinite sums over irreducible polynomials over finite fields. The cancellations responsible do not happen degree by degree or even for degree bounds for primes or prime powers, so rather than finite fields being responsible, interaction between all finite field extensions seems to be playing a role and thus suggests some interesting symmetries in the distribution of prime polynomials. Primes are subtle, so whether there is actual vanishing of these sums indicating surprising symmetry (as guessed optimistically), or whether these sums just have surprisingly large valuations indicating only some small degree cancellation phenomena of low level approximation symmetry (as feared sometimes pessimistically!), remains to be seen. In either case, the phenomena begs for an explanation. (Version 2: A beautiful explanation by David Speyer and important updates are added at the end after the first version.)

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Dinesh S. Thakur. 2015-12-04. Surprising symmetries in distribution of prime polynomials. https://arxiv.org/abs/1512.02685

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