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From Computational Complexity

What is a natural question? Who should decide?

(Thanks to Timothy Chow for inspiring this post.)My survey on Hilbert's Tenth Problem(see  here) is about variants of the problem. One of them is as follows: For...

From Computational Complexity

Why do countries and companies invest their own money (or is it?) in Quantum Computing (Non-Rhetorical)

 There have been some recent blog posts by Scott (see here) and Lance (see here)  about the hype for SHORT TERM APPLICATIONS of Quantum Computing, which they both...

From Computational Complexity

Trump, Facebook, and ComplexityBlog

 I care about the Facebook decision to ban Trump, but I do not have a strong opinion about it. I have heard arguments on both sides now, from up and down, and still...

From Computational Complexity

The Mythical Man-Month, Hen-Day, and Cat-Minute (Fred Brooks Turned 90)

 The Mythical Man-Month is a great book which talks about the (obvious in retrospect) fact that putting more people on a project may slow it down. It was by Fred...

From Computational Complexity

Ferrer's Diagrams can be used to prove X theorems about partitions. What is X?

1978: I took an excellent  ugrad course in combinatorics from James C Frauenthal (he sometimes wrote his name as the biniomial cofficient (J choose F))  and hehere...

From Computational Complexity

An Investment Puzzle and Speculation as to Why Some Think it's Hard

 This is a Guest Post by David Marcus. He gives a puzzle and its solution, which is interesting, and then speculates as to why some people get it wrong.  ---...

From Computational Complexity

Is the following reaction to getting the first COVID shot logical?

 Alice works at a charity that puts together bag and box lunches for children.They all wear masks and they are 12 feet apart and very careful, and nobody thereI...

From Computational Complexity

Do any NP-reductions use deep mathematics? Non-rhetically

BILL: Lets say we didn't know that FACTORING NPC --> NP=coNP.then what direction would we think Factoring in P or NPC?  STUDENT: In P. After all, Number Theory...

From Computational Complexity

The key to my Taylor series problem: Buddy can you spare a penny, nickel, dime, or quarter

 In my last blog post I posed a question about finding the coeff of x^100 in a particular Taylor Series. The question and answer are given  here:The key to the...

From Computational Complexity

A Taylor Series Problem

 I post a problem today and its solution on Thursday.Comments are fine, though if you don't want to get a hint, don't read them. Find the coefficient of x100 in...

From Computational Complexity

I didn't understand The Art Market before the NFT sale, and I understand it less now

 (This post is a sequel to my post from Feb 13, 2007 which you can find here. While the gap from 2007 until 2021 seems large, its not as long as the gap between...

From Computational Complexity

When do I need to warn about Spoilers?

In a recent post here I mentioned in passing a plot point from the last season of The Big Bang Theory. Note that the last season was in 2019.  WARNING- do not read...

From Computational Complexity

Using number-of-PhD's as a measure of smartness is stupid.

In Thor:Ragnorak Bruce Banner mentions that he has 7 PhDs. Gee, I wonder how he managed to slip that into a conversation casually.  Later in the movie:Bruce: IDouble...

From Computational Complexity

Good Names and Bad Names of Game Shows and theorems

 In my post on Alex Trebek, see here, I noted that Jeopardy! is not a good name for the game show since it doesn't tell you much about the show. Perhaps Answers...

From Computational Complexity

Two examples of Journalists being... Wrong. One BIG one small

 Journalists sometimes get things wrong.This is not news, but it is interesting when you KNOW they are wrong. 1) Scott Aaronson has a GREAT example regarding an...

From Computational Complexity

The Victoria Delfino Problems: an example of math problems named after a non-mathematician

 If you Google Victoria Delfino you will find that she is a real estate agent in LA (well, one of the Victoria Delfino's you find is such).  After this blog isVictoria...

From Computational Complexity

Grading policies during Covid-No easy answers

 Because of COVID  (my spellecheck says covid and Covid are not works, but COVID is) various schools have done various things to make school less traumatic. Students...

From Computational Complexity

Answers to the Prez Quiz, and some interesting history

I posted a presidential quiz (that is, a quiz about presidents, not a quiz that is so majestic it can be called presidential) on Thursday Jan 21.Here is the link...

From Computational Complexity

Presidential Quiz: Three ways to take it

 Every four years around the time of the inaugural I post a presidential Quiz! I do that today, and I will post the answers on Monday.  I am tempted to joke that...

From Computational Complexity

The ACM History Committee call for proposals looks wrong

 In November I (and prob everyone in the ACM) got an email that was a call for proposal from the ACM History committee. Here is a pointer to it. One of the passages...
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