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There are at least three exciting things here: 1. A well-known conjecture in number theory has been proven (by Terry Tao, natch). 2. Several elements in the p
by mhartl 11y ago
There are at least three exciting things here:
1. A well-known conjecture in number theory has been proven (by Terry Tao, natch).
2. Several elements in the proof arose from an innovative collaborative approach to mathematical research (the Polymath Project, specifically Polymath5).
3. The result will be published in a newly announced cost-effective open-access journal, giving the new journal a big early prestige boost.
Every one of these is a big deal; taken together, they give us a glimpse of the future of mathematics (which, per William Gibson, is already here, just not very evenly distributed).
- Natsu 11y agoI hope it's the future for a lot of fields, not just mathematics, but I'm very glad to see things like this happening and big kudos are deserved by all involved. Even the article here is better than most--I love how it linked even to the blog comment that gave Tao the impetus to investigate the connection and I would love to see things like this become standard for proper scientific reporting (i.e. if something happened online, give us a link). That should be standard practice, but it's so often neglected that it makes this article much more thorough than the average.