That THIS approach cannot work is so obvious that I did not even waste a minute to find the flaw.
@user21820 Sad. This person probably planned to never work and saw the ridicolous prize moneys. And decided that this is the way to avoid working. Well done, whoever decided to offer the prize moneys. My hate is with you.
@Peter Hahahaha... I don't think it's worth hating the prize setter, even though I disagree with the choice of millennial prize problems. Actually, this would happen even in the absence of a prize, and I think the best solution is to simply delete such nonsense as fast as possible without even inviting the poster to discuss it. The 4 comments on that thread from other users are simply encouraging such nonsense.
And as usual, there are 2 trolls. @XanderHenderson: Why can't moderators ban trolls who reopen crankery? It's just wasting everyone's time. =|
@TeresaLisbon @TheSimpliFire @vitamind: If any of you are around to contribute downvotes to the crankery mentioned by Peter, we can delete it once it reaches −3.
@vitamind Yea, because no reason is given as to why we should not use the example given, or why we want such functions in the first place. (And really basic mathematics suffices to know that you can just fix the values at naturals and then arbitrarily pick the rest.)
@XanderHenderson @quid: I think a moderator should proactively step in and leave a public comment regarding the above-mentioned crankery, since they want to appeal to emotion regarding deletion and call delete-voters rude and reposted the nonsense. CC @Peter @amWhy @vitamind
@amWhy This post was reopened. Note that MathJax needs tidying up, but I'm planning to do that. I just wonder if it's a duplicate though at this point.
So holding up on improvement while I look for a dupe.
This is the kind of post where Bill Dubuque would easily have found a dupe.
@TeresaLisbon And the edit was performed by @arcticchar, who is not always reliable. When I see an edit by the OP, I'll think more favorably. But AC's edit sent it to reopen, and that does not a good precedent make.
@amWhy I found a solution on AoPS. There are many occasions when I search for dupes and I wish that I could mark dupes on AoPS. Especially contest questions.I'll probably put the AoPS link up there anyway
@amWhy I think voting to close makes sense. It wasn't a difficult decision. The only thing that was going against closure was the fact that the user is new. It misses "context" in the sense that details about how the numbers were derived were missing. In particular, I'm surprised how the OP got $30$ for $31$ without doing any work. I know AoPS did as well, but the person there explicitly mentioned that they had to do some hand work.
I don't think it's actually easy to show that no number smaller than $30$ works for $31$ there. It requires more work than has been shown.
@TeresaLisbon Do not doubt your sense, your reasoning. Your reasoning is sound, and I could not challenge any decision you come to, for the reason that it is a sound decision. Similarly, @Jetendra, you've proven capable of making sound decisions. It is absolutlely okay to ask for input. But you have a right to suggest what you think, and why.
That post was undeleted actually. I was part of the deletion contingent, I still believe it requires deletion. It seems there was some controversy around it, but there's no two ways around it.
@BillDubuque Still needs 3 more close votes; I've voted to close for precisely the reasons you describe here, and in you comment. I suspect additional votes will come, but it seems the peak activity in this chat is closer to European &/or Indian time. Posts now get dealt with, but sometimes the wait is longer, for you and I.
@amWhy Thanks for the tip. I also added comments to the high rep answerers asking them to refrain from such. It might help to nudge them if they see some upvotes on such comments (or even downvotes for answering such types of questions instead of commenting to point out the obviious misreading / typo).
@BillDubuque After reading the earlier comment, I think they were referring to "which earlier posts that you are aware of would best answer that topic". I say that only after the most recent comment they wrote.
@amWhy Yes, of course that seems likely after the second comment, but there was no clue in the first comment that the info was going to be used for dupe targeting.
