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Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#141

Post by genewitch »

Frotag wrote: post #118
gosub100 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

apparently only /b /pol and maybe 1 or 2 others are bananas. the rest is well moderated and civil.

/b/ is short for random so kind of seems like it's meant to siphon off / contain shitposts that would be distracting on other boards.

Its even in the rules for the other boards. Inflammatory nonsense goes in one of two or three boards, everything else has to be legal, nicer, you pick a word.

B has a tenuous grasp on reality as a whole, but individual comments and posts can be charming, informative, whatever. I used to read the nightly AI threads where people would ask "how did you..." And sometimes receive answers. I even asked a question about some new model I had not looking right and someone said "VAE" and I fixed the problem.

I don't recommend any chan unless you're the sort of person that doesn't flinch at cop videos, gore, extreme impurity, and potentially illegal topics.

There is gold there, but you really gotta dig in the excrement to find it. For most, that's probably not worth it.

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#142

Post by genewitch »

bntyhntr wrote: post #39

At one of my old jobs, the bathroom was locked with a 4 digit code followed by the key symbol. We jokingly made up "Bathroom Code" as an interview question/to nerd snipe each other instead of working, which was "assuming you don't have to press key, and that the bathroom door will unlock if the correct 4 digits are entered in order at any time, write the code to print the shortest possible test sequence to guarantee…

You know Ford/Lincoln had those buttons / touch strip in the door with the buttons labelled like [1|2] [3|4], and so on to [9|0]?

There's a permutation list claimed to be the shortest that I used to carry in my PDA to impress friends that had one of those sorts of cars. If I recall, it was guaranteed to open the door in something like 32 button presses, but it may have been less.

It was because there was no "start" or stop to the sequence, the computer would unlock if the sequence appeared intact anywhere. So a code 3,4,5,6 would trigger with 8,2,7,3,4,5,6,0,2

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#143

Post by genewitch »

dumbfounder wrote: post #135
slazaro wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that you just care about 4 digit codes (so you don't actually care about a generic algorithm that's not super slow in asymptotic time), can't you just solve it with an easy to code bruteforce algorithm? Or is the combinatorial explosion so big that it's actually intractable that way?

Think about this. You need to calculate the number of permutation for 4 digit codes. Then you need to arrange them in every order possible to brute force. So that’s 4!!. That’s a lot: roughly 620000000000000000000000 combos.

Or it's 10000?

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#144

Post by make3 »

WJW wrote: post #106
make3 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

does it still exist? this is an old story

You can literally type in the url mate. Just go and check for yourself instead of having to ask HN.

I mean, do people still use it in large amounts, is it popular, don't be so literal

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#145

Post by somenameforme »

dumbfounder wrote: post #135
slazaro wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that you just care about 4 digit codes (so you don't actually care about a generic algorithm that's not super slow in asymptotic time), can't you just solve it with an easy to code bruteforce algorithm? Or is the combinatorial explosion so big that it's actually intractable that way?

Think about this. You need to calculate the number of permutation for 4 digit codes. Then you need to arrange them in every order possible to brute force. So that’s 4!!. That’s a lot: roughly 620000000000000000000000 combos.

If you're not making some joke that I'm missing it's just 10^4 = 10000, which is a just a fancier way of saying 0000-9999.

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#146

Post by rincebrain »

Barrin92 wrote: post #69
hiccuphippo wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they were mathematicians, they would have published it, no?

A chess club I played at was frequented by a guy who used to work as mathematician but got fed up by it at some point and started to work as a chess trainer. Still did maths and blogged regularly but never bothered to publish academic work. There's a lot of people like that in maths. Very talented but dropping in and out of it or doing it recreationally.

I think Grigori Perelman, who solved the Poincare conjecture and declined the Fields medal and Millennium prize money for it, then said he has retired from professional mathematics to avoid the fame, might qualify as the most famous in recent memory.

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#147

Post by somenameforme »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #80
onetimeusename wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This story resurfaces every few years but the original post was on the /sci/ board in 2011. That was a loooooong time ago and although no one back then would have said 4chan was good (it was never good), it also doesn't surprise me it was originally posted there at that time. I don't think it would happen now.

4chan was great, but it very much was one of the oldest proprietors of the so called "normie filter". The biggest most offensive boards caused 95% of the trouble the site is known for. the smaller boards and threads could get some interesting stories and content (of all were of course, of reasonable falseness and potential homosexuality). The vibe was fine as long as you avoided the modern attitude and approach every…

There's something great about enforced anonymity. It gets rid of people saying what they think they should say, and instead simply what they think.

It reminds one of the wisdom of the masses experiments. If you take a bunch of people and ask them how many peas are in a jar, the average will come out extremely close to the right answer. But if you let those people collaborate, debate, and try to pick the smartest answer - it tends to be far less accurate.

It's part of the reason that I think decentralize everything is the way to go. You'll never reach the utopic highs that a perfect centralization might offer, but you'll also never reach the dystopic lows that a flawed centralization can impose.

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#148

Post by notpushkin »

DrillShopper wrote: post #137
crummy wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Copilot exists and people seem to be happy to pay for it.

(Some) people are also happy to pay to have someone piss on them, too. Do you think Microsoft should offer a Golden Shower tier of Copilot, complete with Trickle Down?

I’m sure that’s negotiable in their Enterprise offerings.

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#149

Post by notpushkin »

hiccuphippo wrote: post #14
nazgulsenpai wrote: post #3

It could have been a mathematician , you never know with that Anon guy.

If they were mathematicians, they would have published it, no?

Even without considering the reasons already mentioned... isn’t it more fun to be cited as an Anonymous 4chan poster?

Re: Anime fans stumbled upon a mathematical proof

#150

Post by nash »

dang wrote: post #74
layer8 wrote: post #2

Previous discussions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18292061 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23968618 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39325146 See also: https://mathsci.fandom.com/wiki/The_Haruhi_Problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superpermutation#Lower_bounds,...

Wow I had no idea. Thanks! Macroexpanded: Unscrambling the hidden secrets of superpermutations - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39325146 - Feb 2024 (8 comments) Mystery math whiz and novelist advance permutation problem - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36191831 - June 2023 (92 comments) An Anonymous 4chan Post Helped Solve a 25-Year-Old Math Puzzle (2018) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23968618 -…

I hope there is a specific order we should look at these threads.
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