Timeline for Should one attack hard problems? [closed]
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
24 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jul 8, 2015 at 22:09 | history | closed |
Johannes Hahn Lucia Stefan Kohl♦ Chris Godsil Yoav Kallus |
Opinion-based | |
| Jul 8, 2015 at 17:12 | review | Close votes | |||
| Jul 8, 2015 at 22:09 | |||||
| Jul 8, 2015 at 16:24 | answer | added | Sylvain JULIEN | timeline score: -1 | |
| Mar 11, 2013 at 13:58 | comment | added | Gerald Edgar | The simple advice (for an academic mathematician) on whether to work on a hard problem: "Not until after you are tenured." | |
| Mar 11, 2013 at 8:44 | answer | added | Piero D'Ancona | timeline score: 19 | |
| Mar 11, 2013 at 4:40 | answer | added | Paul Burchett | timeline score: 3 | |
| Mar 11, 2013 at 4:22 | answer | added | fedja | timeline score: 60 | |
| Mar 1, 2013 at 12:39 | history | reopened |
user10891 user2995 Joel David Hamkins algori Joseph O'Rourke |
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| Feb 27, 2013 at 14:19 | comment | added | David White | This question has been closed and currently has 3 votes to reopen. Before the comments get out of hand here, I wanted to have a meta thread. Please upvote this comment so it appear above the fold and please carry discussion of whether this should be open or closed to: tea.mathoverflow.net/discussion/1546/… | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 14:18 | comment | added | Abdelmalek Abdesselam | I think Frank is right. Not a good idea and not very fair to close this question. | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 14:06 | comment | added | user9072 | Well, this is just because I was not yet active on MO then ;) Kidding aside, on the one hand it is really true that earlier in the sites history there was a higher tolerance, yet on the other hand and more importantly it also depends on the precise nature of the question. This one is way too vague in my opinion. What's a 'hard problem' even? You mention P vs NP and what else. If you want to start a more detailed discussion please create a meta thread, link at the top, extra signup necessary but easy and instant. | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 13:52 | comment | added | user10891 | @quid I'm disappointed this question got closed. I take advice requests are not welcome here. Funny that on the right side there are many questions of the same style that are not closed. For example mathoverflow.net/questions/33033/… or mathoverflow.net/questions/14607/when-to-start-reviewing | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 13:44 | history | closed |
Andrew Stacey user9072 user6976 Todd Trimble Steven Landsburg |
not constructive | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 13:10 | answer | added | Alexandre Eremenko | timeline score: 11 | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 13:02 | history | made wiki | Post Made Community Wiki by S. Carnahan♦ | ||
| Feb 27, 2013 at 11:25 | comment | added | user9072 | Voted to close as subjective and argumentative. Also various people wrote on this elsewhere (see comment just above for example); this should suffice. | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 10:52 | answer | added | Liviu Nicolaescu | timeline score: 34 | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 10:28 | answer | added | Olivier | timeline score: 12 | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 10:00 | answer | added | user22882 | timeline score: 19 | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 9:50 | comment | added | Ulrich Goertz | Surely one should strive at finding a balance ... where it lies, will depend on many factors. I liked reading what Tao (terrytao.wordpress.com/career-advice/…) and Hamming (cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html) wrote. | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 8:51 | comment | added | JBorger | I've never heard of anyone accidentally solving a hard problem. Trying is at least a necessary condition. How to go about it and which problem to pick, that's a different matter. | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 7:42 | comment | added | user30035 | I'm not sure this is an ideal MO question because it doesn't have a unique answer, it just has people's opinion. But here's my opinion. I've supervised over 10 PhD students to completion and one thing I know is that if you give a PhD student a problem for which there is a non-zero chance that after 4 years they have done nothing worth publishing (e.g. because the problem has been studied for so long by so many people that 4 years isn't enough), then you have just ruined that person's math career. On the other hand, at least once a month I try to work on a famous unsolved problem for a bit. | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 7:32 | comment | added | David Roberts♦ | It's a balance ... | |
| Feb 27, 2013 at 7:27 | history | asked | user10891 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |