@t.b. : did you have time to look at my last comment.........i wonder what is involved in the difference between method 1 and method 3 in picking a chord...in this page en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand_paradox_%28probability%29
They compared it with some other algorithms and they claim: _Our PageRank based method outperformed both humans as well as algorithms by Keener and by Redmond by predicting more winners correctly._
@Srivatsan well, I guess it's because the first answer is very long and heavily upvoted, so they look at that one. By the time they get to the second version they're tired of the problem.
Is there a badge for reaching daily rep limit several days in a row? (For 3 days, it could be called hattrick badge :-) Brian M. Scott's reputation in last days looks impressive.
@Srivatsan well, I thought about the problem when it was posted with little success. Then there was the now deleted answer and a bit later the comment by user8268 appeared. I was happy with that, but when I was having fun with Geogebra, it felt like a nice thing to work out in detail.
@ZeeshanMahmud You need to do more than visit the front page. It isn't exactly specified what you need to do, but you need to read a few questions, I think, in order for the day to count as "visited the page".
tb Of course, what you said makes sense to prevent a badge going to someone who writes a script to visit the site everyday without doing any real work.
I believe badges and rep are similar to scientometrics in this sense: If someone cares about doing good math/giving good answers and help improving MSE he'll probably get good numbers (of rep points/scientometric measurements). But if one only cares for number of papers and citations/badges and rep points, there are certainly ways how to "twist the system" in your favor.
@MartinSleziak Do you think it's worth opening up a question thread on the quotation "In mathematics the art of asking questions is more valuable than solving problems."
@Skullpatrol I dont' know. But the worst thing that could happen to you is that it will get closed. If you are really interested in this and you think you can get some interesting answers there, go ahead and ask the question.
@Skullpatrol If I see such question, I don't have strong feelings that it should be closed. But other MSE members might feel differently - you won't find out until you try.
Here are some people putting sweat and blood in answering questions.......and you say art of asking questions is great.........ofcourse you are damn right ! @Skull
@Skullpatrol It's definitely not the same thing, but it reminded mi a little Dyson's Birds and Frogs: ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200212p.pdf This paper is a very interesting read for any mathematician. (I believe I read it because it was mentioned at MO or MSE.)
I think I've read Dyson's paper because I've seen it in this thread: mathoverflow.net/questions/2144/… The upvotes show that there are at least a few people that enjoyed it.
@Srivatsan Not JvN but George Cantor wrote: "In mathematics the art of asking questions is more valuable than solving problems." on the front page of his PhD dissertation paper.
@Srivatsan Yes, one of his profound lyrics include: Jack and Jill went up the hill// Each with a buck and a quarter//Jill came back with $2.50.. a working girl
@Matt : assume a periodic function which is smooth everywhere except at a point where it isn't differentiable and let a_k be its Fourier series coefficients. Now form a new Fourier series with coefficients i*k*a_k, i need to know the convergence of this series ?
@Skull : I do not want to get into such trivial arguments.........please talk about some mathematics rather than how mathematics works
In re mathematica ars proponendi pluris facienda est quam solvendi. In mathematics the art of asking questions is more valuable than solving problems. Doctoral thesis (1867); variant translation: In mathematics the art of proposing a question must be held of higher value than solving it.
@Skullpatrol You claimed two things 1. "he did put it on the front page of his PhD dissertation paper" -- he didn't. 2. "The same paper that changed mathematics forever ... with set theory." -- it didn't. In fact his dissertation has nothing to do with set theory.
[1] One can hear an read that Cantor came up with the idea of sets incidentally searching trigonometrical series. Although this sems to be a simplification, it can serve as an explanation of Cantor‟s neophitic faith to the idea of sets about which he had never hear before.
if 'f' is not a differentiable function then the it can be said that the Fourier coefficients decay faster than 1/k but cannot say whether they decay faster than 1/k^2
[Cantor 1932, 31]: "In re mathematica ars proponendi quaestionem pluris facienda est quam solvendi." http://books.google.sk/books?id=vrQLbbxGNMsC&pg=PA39&dq=%22in+re+mathematica+ars+proponendi%22 Maybe 31 refers to page number?
The reference is to 1932 Gesammelte Abhandlungen mathematischen und philosophischen Inhalts, ed. E. Zermelo, Berlin, Springer. Reprint Hildesheim, G. Olms, 1966.
@tb Can we agree to postpone all these details, and could you give me your opinion: do you think it's worth opening up a question thread on the quotation, since this is a question/answer web site about mathematics. "In mathematics the art of proposing a question must be held of higher value than solving it."
Sure otherwise I wouldn't say it here ; ) So yesterday in class I spoke to a (female) class mate. Don't know how we ended up on *that* topic but she said she got asked by someone what her major was. When she said "Maths." the response was "What? You don't look like that."
@JM But being told that you don't look like someone who can do maths sucks. Anyway, she said she used to wear contacts and now switched to glasses and she said it's working, people tend to treat her with more respect : )
In how many ways a 4×4 game board can be colored using four colors (red,green,blue, yellow, green) in such a way that each small square has a single color and the board looks exactly the same from all sides?
@Matt Oh, certainly I agree. Unfortunately, most people have this tendency towards "snap judgment". Even if you're smart, if you don't "look smart", they'll still dismiss you. It's cruel, but true. :(
The questions about propositional logic, truth tables and stuff like that do not fit boolean-algebra, tag logic would be a better fit. The boolean-algebra tag is intended for boolean algebras as structures $(B,\wedge,\vee,\neg,0,1)$. Am I right? We have a bunch of such questions: math.stackexchange.com/search?q=[boolean-algebra]+truth+table
Tag wiki: Boolean algebras are structures which behave similar to a power set with complement, intersection and union. Questions regarding Boolean algebras as structures, or regarding functions defined from/to Boolean algebras fit into this tag very nicely.
Btw I remember there was a question asking for the prove of the identity $ Proving \binom{n}{r} = \binom{n-1}{r} +\binom{n-1}{r-1}$ .. could anybody help me to find the url ?
Possible Duplicate:
Proving ${{n} \choose {r}}={{n-1} \choose {r-1}}+{{n-1} \choose r}$ when $1\leq r\leq n$
can someone explain to me the proof of $${n+1\choose k} = {n\choose k} + {n\choose k-1}$$
Thanks in advance!
@MaX In this case - I remembered that I had this question open in my browser recently and that the question started with "Why". When I started typing "why" in the address bar, it appeared among recently visited pages which contain the word "why" in the title.
Possible Duplicate:
Proving ${{n} \choose {r}}={{n-1} \choose {r-1}}+{{n-1} \choose r}$ when $1\leq r\leq n$
can someone explain to me the proof of $${n+1\choose k} = {n\choose k} + {n\choose k-1}$$
Thanks in advance!
