Re: My Wikipedia experiment, prime counting

From: ošin (ošin_at_ragnarok.com)
Date: 02/06/05 

Date: Sun, 6 Feb 2005 12:37:46 -0800

> There are LOTS of amateur mathematicians. However, professional
> mathematicians claim that they don't do any research of note.

I have never heard any professional mathematicians make the claim that
amateurs cannot do any good research. But lets face it, the odds are against
it. Amateur mathematicians typically do not have the training and discipline
to take modern math anywhere new and exciting. If they did, why would they
not turn professional? The days of the amateurs passed at least a hundred
years ago. A long time ago, surgery was performed by barbers, but today, the
state of the art has progressed to the point that only professional surgeons
are permitted to operate. Hackers need not apply. In math, most of the ideas
that would be within the grasp of amateurs have already been discovered. Not
all, but most. So the odds are against you.

> As for prime numbers, in mathematics there are two types of integers:
> primes and composites.

Wow. What an insight!

> With such a distinction, it makes sense that there would be interest in
> them.

Duh.

> It's like how in the world there are mostly two kinds of people: male
> and female.

Your analogies are so wonderful at making even the simplest ideas
inaccessible to the professionals.

> Now, also, if you take a course in computer programming there is a
> chance you will get an assignment to write a prime counting function.

No. You will not get an assignment to write a prime counting function. You
might get an assignment to write an algorithm that computes the prime
counting function.

> If you use mine, you can shock your teacher by doing a few things to
> speed up the basic formula, into very fast algorithms, and I put one
> such sped up program on the Internet: PrimeCountH.java

Shock your teacher indeed... She will be shaking her head in pain...

> Mainly I guess playing with math is something for people who like
> intellectual puzzles where you can work on something for years that's
> not made up, where there isn't some answer you can look up, and if you
> find the answer, it's immensely satisfying.

How would you know?

> Also, you know that what is true mathematically is absolutely true,
> without regard to feelings, people's needs, the current social climate,
> political parties, the state of the economy, the weather in Timbuktu,
> the stock market, price of oil futures, morality of contraception, or
> any of a host of other issues where social rules dominate.

Yes James.... We know that you worship the absoluteness of mathematics....
yawn......

Relevant Pages

  • Re: My Wikipedia experiment, prime counting
    ... Amateur mathematicians typically do not have the training and discipline ... The days of the amateurs passed at least a hundred ... inaccessible to the professionals. ... You will not get an assignment to write a prime counting function. ...
    (sci.math)
  • Re: My Wikipedia experiment, prime counting
    ... Amateur mathematicians typically do not have the training and discipline ... The days of the amateurs passed at least a hundred ... inaccessible to the professionals. ... You will not get an assignment to write a prime counting function. ...
    (sci.physics)
  • Re: Presumption of amateur status
    ... of posters here making what I believe is a poor ... What they're looking for is a physics karioke venue, ... they believe is inhabited only by amateurs. ... the reason that there are so few professionals in sci.physics ...
    (sci.physics)
  • Re: Pro & amateur astronomers ?
    ... Professionals don't because these days everything is computer ... The scope observing sequences are carefully optimised to ... The pros provide a list ... of likely targets and the amateurs monitor them. ...
    (sci.astro.amateur)