This is like if John du Pont published a 3,000 page proof of P=NP that made no reference to the well known problems with proving it, circumvented peer-review an

This is like if John du Pont published a 3,000 page proof of P=NP that made no reference to the well known problems with proving it, circumvented peer-review and appealed directly to the general public. Remember: no-one ever claimed the prize for disproving the TimeCube guy either.