Timeline for Is the number of "breakthroughs" in mathematics decreasing, as it is claimed to be in other sciences?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
20 events
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| Feb 17, 2023 at 18:26 | comment | added | Moishe Kohan | @BradyGilg: Why do you think I was complaining? I was merely stating my opinion about the quality of the source used in this answer (actually, if you are a research mathematician, you would easily see that this is more than a mere opinion). As far as editing, it would require quite a bit of effort and time on my part to edit that page to the point I would find satisfactory. And, sadly, these I do not have. | |
| Feb 17, 2023 at 16:10 | comment | added | Brady Gilg | @MoisheKohan If you see omissions, then contribute them! It does no good to just lay back and complain. | |
| Jan 29, 2023 at 9:08 | comment | added | Ali Taghavi | BTW I wonder was not the Morley trisector theorem worth of mentioning in wikipedia? | |
| Jan 29, 2023 at 9:07 | comment | added | Ali Taghavi | @RolandBacher " I think the later had far deeper implications than computations of digits for π". I think the time difference should be taken into account. For example, wikipedia: "Archimedes proved that the value of π lies between 3 + 1/7 (approx. 3.1429) and 3 + 10/71 (approx. 3.1408)" | |
| Jan 23, 2023 at 19:55 | vote | accept | xeng | ||
| Jan 23, 2023 at 13:33 | comment | added | Timothy Chow | It may be worth mentioning that the Park et al. paper has a very explicit description of what they calculated, namely something they call the "CD index," which is supposed to detect papers that are highly cited, but whose predecessors are not cited along with it. In principle, it should be possible to replicate their calculation with the mathematical literature as long as one has access to a database of citations, but I'm not sure how to do this. Maybe zbMATH can help? (It doesn't help that the $cd$-index means something in math.) | |
| Jan 23, 2023 at 10:45 | history | made wiki | Post Made Community Wiki by Stefan Kohl♦ | ||
| Jan 23, 2023 at 10:44 | comment | added | mlk | When looking at that list, there is an abundance of events that are more computer science than mathematics. Considering that the 1960's was about the decade when computers became widespread enough that most universities had access to some, this might be an explanation for the bump. Also in general, as defining "breakthrough" is hard, I believe that people who create such a list, will tend to even things out to make such a list more uniform, so I don't think it is that significant of a source. | |
| Jan 23, 2023 at 8:48 | comment | added | AnoE | /re the comments: As long as the omissions and choices are of similar (bad) quality over the whole timespan of the list, it does not matter - the interesting point is not the number on the Y scale, but the trend, and TBH even that bump in the middle would fly under the radar on a quick view - the graph seems almost linear overall. Especially considering the two big events in the 1910's and 1940's which surely have some kind of effect, both immediate and indirect. | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 16:31 | comment | added | Moishe Kohan | The list is bizarre (not just by the inclusions, but also omissions) and reflects the level of mathematical sophistication (or lack of thereof) of people who edited the list rather than the actual development of mathematics. | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 16:16 | comment | added | Roland Bacher | The Wikipedia list is indeed a bit curious: Computing digits of $\pi$ is mentionned several times but (for example) the discovery of the Jones-polynomial is missing. I think the later had far deeper implications than computations of digits for $\pi$. | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 15:05 | comment | added | Jukka Kohonen | @Carlo, I'll do it 30 years from now, once we have seen which obscure 2010s findings were rediscovered in 2047 and found to be breakthroughs that were neglected. | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 14:15 | comment | added | Carlo Beenakker | this could be an invitation to add missing entries to the Wikipedia list... | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 13:39 | comment | added | Aphelli | I’m not going to start saying names, but I think (following Carl-Fredrik Nyberg Brodda’s comment) that anyone looking at the list would find that it overlooks a significant number of breakthroughs from their field, which may undermine the conclusion about the rate slowing down. | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 13:30 | comment | added | Jukka Kohonen | +1 for an interesting choice of data. Additional observation: This is the view of the past achievements as of January 2023. Possibly, some 1965–2015 achievements that are currently not listed, might be viewed more favorably 20 or 50 years later. There could be a myopic bias about the recent achievements. (To be fair, that bias could be negative or positive.) | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 12:53 | history | edited | Carlo Beenakker | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jan 22, 2023 at 12:40 | history | undeleted | Carlo Beenakker | ||
| Jan 22, 2023 at 12:40 | history | edited | Carlo Beenakker | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jan 22, 2023 at 11:59 | history | deleted | Carlo Beenakker | via Vote | |
| Jan 22, 2023 at 11:54 | history | answered | Carlo Beenakker | CC BY-SA 4.0 |