My personal favorite along these lines are the Busy Beaver numbers. It's not just huge... it's actually impossible to calculate (beyond very low inputs).
Ridiculous Math Problems
11–20 of 41 posts
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#12For more ridiculous math problems I want to submit: The Jewish Problems[0].
These were used when Jewish people were trying to get into grad school in Russia in the '70's. Basically designed so Jewish people wouldn't get in.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#13For more ridiculous math problems I want to submit: The Jewish Problems [0]. These were used when Jewish people were trying to get into grad school in Russia in the '70's. Basically designed so Jewish people wouldn't get in. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
The interesting part of thost problems is that once you learn how to answer one, you can answer almost all of them. Of course, that was the issue, the answer wouldn't be accepted. It was a shame these problems were used in that manner.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#14For more ridiculous math problems I want to submit: The Jewish Problems [0]. These were used when Jewish people were trying to get into grad school in Russia in the '70's. Basically designed so Jewish people wouldn't get in. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
Did this cause a toxin like stimulation making jewish students better because they tried to reach impossible goals ?
It happened in music a few times.. people invented techniques and subgenres because they tried impossible things or had below useful instruments.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#15For more ridiculous math problems I want to submit: The Jewish Problems [0]. These were used when Jewish people were trying to get into grad school in Russia in the '70's. Basically designed so Jewish people wouldn't get in. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
Did this cause a toxin like stimulation making jewish students better because they tried to reach impossible goals ? It happened in music a few times.. people invented techniques and subgenres because they tried impossible things or had below useful instruments.
I doubt it. Those problems are close to impossible to solve for ordinary students, therefore many talented but not necessarily genius students lost the opportunity to get good education. I'm a firm believer that students need to be pushed to stay in their discomfort zone, but Jewish Problems can easily push most students into panic zone.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#16For more ridiculous math problems I want to submit: The Jewish Problems [0]. These were used when Jewish people were trying to get into grad school in Russia in the '70's. Basically designed so Jewish people wouldn't get in. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
Did this cause a toxin like stimulation making jewish students better because they tried to reach impossible goals ? It happened in music a few times.. people invented techniques and subgenres because they tried impossible things or had below useful instruments.
When the impossible goal is to solve a 10x hard problem in 1x time live during an oral exam, no. But it did have a filter effect, so that the Jewish students who did pass the entrance test were much higher ability than their average peers.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#17A ridiculous problem I remember seeing was approximately this one: a/(b+c) + b/(a+c) + c/(a+b)=896. a,b,c positive integers I think it probably used random symbols instead of letters and didn’t have the integer requirement. Indeed if you allow real numbers or 0 then it is easy to find a solution. I think it didn’t go particularly viral because it was too hard. I think there’s a slightly easier version if you replace…
The version I first saw used '4' instead of '896'. Which frankly made the answer large enough that no reasonable amount of brute force could find it. A good write up can be found here: https://www.quora.com/How-do-you-find-the-positive-integer-s...
That is fascinating thank you, and a great lead into some more advanced topics.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#18"If a ship has 26 sheep and 10 goats on board, how old is the ship's captain?"
oh boy
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#19For more ridiculous math problems I want to submit: The Jewish Problems [0]. These were used when Jewish people were trying to get into grad school in Russia in the '70's. Basically designed so Jewish people wouldn't get in. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
These days Harward denies entry to Jews based on quotas.
Re: Ridiculous Math Problems
#20This reminds me of the riddle by the good soldier Svejk:
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"Would you know how to calculate the diameter of the globe?"
"No, I'm afraid I wouldn't," answered Svejk, "but I'd like to ask you a riddle myself, gentlemen. Take a three-storied house, with eight windows on each floor. On the roof there are two dormer windows and two chimneys. On every floor there are two tenants. And now, tell me, gentlemen, in which year the house-porter's grandmother died?"
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https://english.radio.cz/good-soldier-svejk-a-literary-chara...