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If you really want to know the actual reason the title reads "new erdős paper" it is this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s_number https://en.wikipedia
by logicallee 11y ago
If you really want to know the actual reason the title reads "new erdős paper" it is this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s_number https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s_number
obviously this is not an actual new erdos paper, but without these shenanigans everyone's erdos number would slowly but surely increase, as first nobody new could have co-published with him (too young) and soon the same applies to his co-authors.
while it might have been cute back in that era, today I think it should be treated as a historical thing.
- masterzora 11y agoI'm not sure what you mean by "shenanigans". Erdős was legitimately a collaborator. Going by the article, Graham and Erdős worked together to try to tackle a similar problem but never managed to make it work. Then Graham and Butler built on that to arrive at this. It doesn't seem relevant that Erdős' contribution happened decades ago.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- ealexhudson 11y agoClearly it doesn't happen often; but if someone makes a significant contribution to a paper the length of time it took to produce is irrelevant. It has happened before to non-number-people (e.g. http://www.anoleannals.org/2012/01/03/posthumous-co-authorship-what-are-the-rules/ http://www.anoleannals.org/2012/01/03/posthumous-co-authorsh...), and it doesn't seem like someone added Erdős' name inappropriately..