I don't understand why a real mathematician would want to work for the NSA. Suppose you had some amazing insight into a problem. Your work would almost certainl

I don't understand why a real mathematician would want to work for the NSA. Suppose you had some amazing insight into a problem. Your work would almost certainly be classified, and you would be forbidden from sharing your achievements with the rest of the world. Worse, someone else could reinvent that same idea taking credit for it. A beautiful equation or elegantly simple proof can only be realized when shared with the world. I would hope that a real mathematician would realize this before deciding to work for an intelligence agency.