this post was submitted on 07 Mar 2025
239 points (100.0% liked)

Greentext

5908 readers
706 users here now

This is a place to share greentexts and witness the confounding life of Anon. If you're new to the Greentext community, think of it as a sort of zoo with Anon as the main attraction.

Be warned:

If you find yourself getting angry (or god forbid, agreeing) with something Anon has said, you might be doing it wrong.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 65 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (3 children)

I hate how every article written about it seemed hell bent into trying to make it look like it was some random weeb who channeled his love for anime to come up with a proof when most people in that thread were mathematicians who knew exactly what they were trying to prove. The board is literally called Science & Math. Fucking journalists, man.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

mathematicians who knew exactly what they were trying to prove.

*weeb mathematicians who knew exactly what they were trying to prove and channelled their love for Haruhi to come up with a proof

[–] [email protected] 14 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Well, yeah, it's 4chan, that's a given. What I'm trying to say is that it wasn't some Good Will Hunting situation. It was competent people doing what they do for a living.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah. Good Will Hunting scripts make money...

I'm also not a fan of the title. They didn't "stumble upon" the proof, they walked directly towards it lol.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 weeks ago

"The hacker named 4chan"

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I don't personally think Anon knew exactly what he was trying to prove (otherwise he would have published the proof already), but it is definitely true that the problem was posted on a forum that specifically catered to people with the kinds of skillsets that would be capable of solving these problems. Most likely Anon probably just saw this as a simple math challenge without any deeper meaning

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Everyone else in the thread was talking about the traveling salesman. I won't completely rule out that he, personally, didn't know because mathematicians are weird af and it is possible that he came to the thread, didn't read any comment on it and just posted the solution, but it would be very strange.