7 ms·

Is the comment that "the proof is wrong" from the author himself?

Etheryte 9y ago
Yes, both the article ("A Solution of the P versus NP Problem") and the comment on it ("The proof is wrong") are written by Blum. It's both very nice and honorable that the author is pointing out his own errors publicly.
- molyss 9y ago
  In retrospect, I think the initial abstract of the paper ("Berg and Ulfberg and Amano and Maruoka have used CNF-DNF-approximators to prove exponential lower bounds for the monotone network complexity of the clique function and of Andreev's function. We show that these approximators can be used to prove the same lower bound for their non-monotone network complexity. This implies P not equal NP.") was also a way to have as many people as possible double check the proof, due to the very strong result of the paper. In other words, he might not have been building up the hype but instead was making sure he wouldn't have to retract a paper with a (more or less) obvious mistake in it. That's how science should be done rather than behind closed doors !
  - quantdev 9y ago
    I don't understand what you're trying to say. How would his abstract be different if he wasn't trying to get as many people to look at it? Many results in math establish a famous theorem by proving something more abstract that "easily" implies the famous result, like with Fermat's Last Theorem.
    - colanderman 9y ago
      Perhaps by leaving off the last sentence, "this implies P not equal NP", and changing the title. That sentence does not change the meaning of the paper; it just adds an eye-catching (and already accepted as true) implication.
      - quantdev 9y ago
        I suppose, though it would be very strange and disingenuous to leave off the most important implication.
        munificent 9y ago
        Well, Turing called his famous paper "On computable numbers, with an application to the Entscheidungsproblem" without really state that the "application" is that he solved it.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

Yes, both the article ("A Solution of the P versus NP Problem") and the comment on it ("The proof is wrong") are written by Blum. It's both very nice and honorable that the author is pointing out his own errors publicly.

molyss 9y ago
In retrospect, I think the initial abstract of the paper ("Berg and Ulfberg and Amano and Maruoka have used CNF-DNF-approximators to prove exponential lower bounds for the monotone network complexity of the clique function and of Andreev's function. We show that these approximators can be used to prove the same lower bound for their non-monotone network complexity. This implies P not equal NP.") was also a way to have as many people as possible double check the proof, due to the very strong result of the paper. In other words, he might not have been building up the hype but instead was making sure he wouldn't have to retract a paper with a (more or less) obvious mistake in it. That's how science should be done rather than behind closed doors !
- quantdev 9y ago
  I don't understand what you're trying to say. How would his abstract be different if he wasn't trying to get as many people to look at it? Many results in math establish a famous theorem by proving something more abstract that "easily" implies the famous result, like with Fermat's Last Theorem.
  - colanderman 9y ago
    Perhaps by leaving off the last sentence, "this implies P not equal NP", and changing the title. That sentence does not change the meaning of the paper; it just adds an eye-catching (and already accepted as true) implication.
    - quantdev 9y ago
      I suppose, though it would be very strange and disingenuous to leave off the most important implication.
      - munificent 9y ago
        Well, Turing called his famous paper "On computable numbers, with an application to the Entscheidungsproblem" without really state that the "application" is that he solved it.

deleted 9y ago

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