Definition:Fermat Pseudoprime/Base 4/Mistake

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Source Work

1986: David Wells: Curious and Interesting Numbers:

The Dictionary
$217$


Mistake

The second smallest pseudoprime to base $4$ ($15$ is the smallest).
$4^{216} - 1$ is divisible by $217$ although $217$ is not prime but $7 \times 31$.


Correction

The author is correct in that $217$ is indeed not prime, but $7 \times 31$.

Also, $15$ is the smallest pseudoprime to base $4$.


However, $217$ is not a pseudoprime to base $4$.

It is in fact the $3$rd pseudoprime to base $5$:

$5^{216} - 1$ is divisible by $217$.


In David Wells: Curious and Interesting Numbers (2nd ed.), this section has been removed.


Sources