7 ms·
The shortest papers ever published (2016)
- schoen 3y ago(2016)
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- aghilmort 3y agothe writer’s block paper is art!
- ForOldHack 3y ago.
- pugworthy 3y agoOr even less so.
- fghorow 3y agoHmm. I'm wondering how the short lengths of these papers might cause them to have lower information-theoretic entropy than the (in)famous "chicken" talk[1]? [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL_-1d9OSdk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL_-1d9OSdk
- khazhoux 3y agoWe should note, however, that that work was disproven in 2019. As it turns out: Not chicken.
- fghorow 3y agoSo C = NC?
- ForOldHack 3y agoWhat I do have are a very particular set of skills. Skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you.
- dessimus 3y agoHaven't you read up on your NC-hard and NC-complete problems?
- sltkr 3y agoChicken't.
- fsckboy 3y ago> As it turns out: Not chicken. so... egg?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- quickthrower2 3y agoCan someone explain the n^2 + 2 triangles paper?
- brap 3y agoAbstract: probably
- khazhoux 3y agoYes
- quickthrower2 3y agoGood!
- rawling 3y agoThe paper doesn't answer the problem in its title (n²+1) but demonstrates two different "advancements" towards it (n²+2) > We have posed a fine (in our opinion) open problem and reported two distinct “behold-style” proofs of our advance on this problem. There's also a linked PDF which, if I'm reading it correctly, trivially proves n²+1 is impossible.
- scatters 3y agoIt exhibits two distinct constructions both of which demonstrate that n^2 + 2 unit equilateral triangles are sufficient to cover an equilateral triangle of side n + ε. The obvious area argument shows that at least n^2 + 1 are required. A small modification of the second figure can show that for any non-equilateral triangle, n^2 + 1 such triangles will cover a similar triangle of length ration 1 : n + ε; it remains (as of 2010, at least; see [1]) an open problem whether a construction of n^2 + 1 triangles exists in the equilateral case. 1. http://www.wfnmc.org/mc20101.pdf http://www.wfnmc.org/mc20101.pdf
- jessenaser 3y ago[dead]
- jessenaser 3y ago[flagged]
- dang 3y agoRelated: The Shortest Papers Ever Published (2016) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15737611 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15737611 - Nov 2017 (93 comments)
- monero-xmr 3y agoAs a rule, when trying to convey information, I try to write and speak plainly. I try to avoid jargon. I have found many academic papers in the faux sciences to be extremely dense and full of terms that are only known to the priests of that arcane subject (still subsidized by taxes as if the result is a common good). If you have a point, say it. There is no need to write in legalese. When I see supposed research written like this, I assume it’s a grift written just for the tiny group of academics tenured in that subject, who review each others’ papers every year, buy each others’ books, and keep the perpetual motion machine of funding running until they hit retirement.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- throwaway167 3y agoVertical knowledge.
- maxbond 3y agoIt is a valuable skill to be able to communicate in plain language, and a valuable skill to be able to understand dense language. Communication requires investment from both parties. If you can't be bothered to look up their terminology, that's all well and good, it's you're time to spend, but your lack of investment doesn't imply that it's a grift. May I ask if these "faux sciences" contradict your political or ideological positions, and is it possible that is the real issue here?
- bjelkeman-again 3y agoSome journals I think have length restrictions on papers, leading to very densely written papers.
- doomrobo 3y agoA recent 5-page cryptography paper ended up winning a best paper award (albeit for an extended version) https://eprint.iacr.org/archive/2020/945/1596227165.pdf https://eprint.iacr.org/archive/2020/945/1596227165.pdf
- behnamoh 3y agoI was hoping that LLMs would help with "writer's block", but their limited context window has been a PITA. Has anyone have had any success with ROPE scaled models or claude 100k?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sprobertson 3y agoHave you tried MemGPT or RAG in general? I'm not convinced long context alone will solve the issue (at least not very soon), some kind of retrieval and especially self-retrieval is good.
- ramraj07 3y agoWhen I saw this paper about “Royalactin” in Nature [1], it was fascinating subject matter for one but I was impressed that it was a single author non theoretical original research article in a high impact journal. I thought it was baller. Have been trying to search for anything similar published in recent times and have come across empty. I feel it’s emblematic how impossible it is to make any great biology breakthrough nowadays as a lone wolf. But one can aspire! The guy who published it seems kooky as well. Would love to interview him some day! 1. https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10093 https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10093
- 3abiton 3y agoNow with LLM, that might not be far fetched.
- dillydogg 3y agoI don't see how LLM would allow someone to do all of the experiments found in this paper. How do you think an LLM would promote more lone wolf science? There's some solid microbiology here which underpins the quality of the science.
- FireBeyond 3y agoVaguely related but I remember the tale of an author on vacation after publication of his latest novel. He telegramed his publisher to enquire about reception: “?” Publisher replied: “!”
- oh_sigh 3y agoVictor Hugo inquiring if Les Misérables was selling well.
- FireBeyond 3y agoThat's the one, thank you!
- arnaudvalette 3y ago! evokes to me the "good move" chess notation, but also the MGS way of telling the player when the AI has spotted Snake. It eventually leads me to hear the MGS exclamation mark sound when I play or assist to a game of chess and that I spot a good move.
- arrowsmith 3y agoFor those who played less PlayStation as a child than I did: MGS = Metal Gear Solid
- MalcolmDwyer 3y agoI can't say I remember the associated sound, but the on-screen "!" goes all the way back to the original Metal Gear for NES.
- analog31 3y agoAlong with short papers, there are short titles. I. I. Rabi tried to get a paper published in a German journal with a one-word title: "Molekularstrahlenablenkungsmethode" The journal turned it down. https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/4836 https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- MenhirMike 3y agoWhich is weird because it's a perfectly simple and understandable word. Did they want to rephrase it to the more complex "Methode zur Ablenkung molekularer Strahlen"?
- dragon96 3y agoThough not quite as short, the Watson and Crick paper is another famously short paper: https://dosequis.colorado.edu/Courses/MethodsLogic/papers/WatsonCrick1953.pdf https://dosequis.colorado.edu/Courses/MethodsLogic/papers/Wa...
- tomcam 3y agoVery cool. It is also quite well written and fairly easy to understand, modulo my weak biochem skillz
- MBlume 3y agoThis neglects the classic paper published in The Annals of Improbable Research, The Effects of Peanut Butter on the Rotation of the Earth: https://improbable.com/airchives/classical/articles/peanut_butter_rotation.html https://improbable.com/airchives/classical/articles/peanut_b...
- belter 3y agoI call for the paper to be retracted! Peanut cultivation requires water with the corresponding extraction of groundwater. Extraction of large amounts of groundwater can cause land subsidence and change the local topography. If done on an extremely large scale...There could be a tiny effect on Earth's rotation.
- sigmoid10 3y agoYeah, this paper is a joke even among joke paper standards. It's just a random, one sentence hypothesis without any argument or even evidence.
- wodenokoto 3y agoMy high school math teacher told as about how students at his university competed for the shortest bachelor paper. Not getting a paper published is par for the course, but having to retake your bachelor examination is quite the hassle. The risk and associated bragging rights seemed quite big.
- ladams 3y agoI’m sure the faculty were thrilled with this tradition. Less pages for them to read!
- Arctic_fly 3y agoThose devious academics probably inspired it
- aquafox 3y agoNot a paper, but 2×3×5×7×11×13 + 1 = 59×509 is a short counter example to the widespread misconception that adding one to the product of the first n consecutive prime numbers always yields a prime number. The reason you get away with this in the infinitely-many-prime-numbers proof is that the new number may not be prime, but can be written as a product of primes that are distinct from the first n primes. Thus you still generate new prime numbers with this technique.
- tgv 3y agoI think this is not a problem because 59 nor 509 are in the list of prime numbers used (on the left side). Euclid's proof merely states that for every list of prime numbers, there's a new one, not in the list. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclid%27s_theorem#Euclid's_proof https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclid%27s_theorem#Euclid's_pr...
- Sniffnoy 3y agoYes, that's the point -- Euclid's proof doesn't require that, it works like you said; but it's a widespread misconception that it does work that way. It's a counterexample to the misconception, not to the real proof.
- _v7gu 3y agoUnder the assumptions of the contradicting statement, 59x509 is prime. You can’t factorize a number iff there are no prime divisors, and the right hand definition for prime numbers is much simpler for the purposes of the proof; no extra “prime” generation necessary.
- red_trumpet 3y agoYou are right, but I wouldn't emphasize this in the proof, for the following reasons: 1. Since you assume a contradictory statement, you can actually derive everything you want. So saying "it's true in that context" is pretty meaningless. 2. I think it adds an unnecessary step in the proof. "This new number is not divisible by any prime, therefore it is prime, contradiction as it is not in the list" compared to "It is not divisible by any prime, contradiction since any number is divisible by a prime". I think that is confusing. 3. For didactical reasons. It can leave the reader/student with the wrong impression that multiplying the first n primes and adding one always creates a new prime.
- noncovalence 3y agoMissing my favourite zero-word paper: "Can a good philosophical contribution be made just by asking a question?" https://doi.org/10.1111/meta.12599 https://doi.org/10.1111/meta.12599
- schleck8 3y agohttps://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/meta.12600 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/meta.12600
- baby 3y agoUDP RFC is like 3 pages
- ThePhysicist 3y agoBrian Josephsons' paper on the superconducting tunneling effect that's now named after him was one of the first (and last) papers he ever published and netted him a Nobel prize. It's just 2 pages long I think [1]. Can't be sure as I cannot get the full text since it's paywalled, pretty sure it's only 2-3 pages though. 1: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0031916362913690?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/003191...
- HighFreqAsuka 3y agoIn computational geometry, Raimund Seidel wrote a paper that proves an upper bound theorem for polytopes in two sentences in the abstract. The rest of the paper just comments on the result. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/092577219500013Y?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0925772195...
- ar-jan 3y agoIt's missing the shortest meaningful paper: Fiengo, Robert, and Howard Lasnik. 1972. “On Nonrecoverable Deletion in Syntax.” Linguistic Inquiry 3 (4): 528. https://i.imgur.com/vLntfCp.jpg https://i.imgur.com/vLntfCp.jpg
- eynsham 3y agoShort abstracts such as ‘yes’, ‘no’, &c of papers whose titles are questions are amusing but not as helpful as those whose titles straightforwardly state the answer (e.g., ‘X is Y’ is preferable to ‘Is X Y?’ with abstract ‘yes’).
- hanche 3y agoObliquely related, the shortest paper title I am aware of: H=W. By Norman G. Meyers and James Serrin, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 51 (1964), 1055–1056.