The 23 Toughest Math Questions

coondoggie sends in a Network World post that begins "It sounds like a math phobic's worst nightmare or perhaps Good Will Hunting for the ages. Those wacky folks at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency have put out a research request it calls Mathematical Challenges, that has the mighty goal of 'dramatically revolutionizing mathematics and thereby strengthening DoD's scientific and technological capabilities.' The challenges are in fact 23 questions that, if answered, would offer a high potential for major mathematical breakthroughs, DARPA said." Some of the questions overlap with the Millennium Prize Problems of the Clay Mathematics Institute, which each carry a $1M prize.

Comments

The answer

[Anonymous Coward]

42

Re:The answer

[Yvan256]

If you think you're unhappy.... I got 35 of the 23 questions right and I don't even know how I did that.

Like high school all over again.

[NotBornYesterday]

Does anyone else here feel like we're being asking us to do someone else's math homework for them?

Re:Like high school all over again.

[Catil]

Yes, except we won't get paid this time.

Re:Like high school all over again.

[TheLostSamurai]

Yes, except we won't get paid this time.

Don't you mean we won't get beat up if we don't?

Re:Here's a tough one.

[larry bagina]

How did the mathematician solve for constipation?

He worked it out with his pencil!

Re:Here's a toughy

[IceCreamGuy]

Dude, this question is pretty irrelevant, I mean, when would a situation like that ever arise?

Re:Here's a tough one.

[Merls the Sneaky]

Why?

"Because calculators are a pain in the ass."

Re:Come together right now

[iocat]

Huh... I just figured out a neat, elegant solution to #17, but there's not quite enough space in this margin to fit it in...

Re:no

[erstazi]

77 is better. You get 8 more.

Re:They missed one

[Jade E. 2]

Oooh, I remember that one. If a train leaves Chicago at 8:30 headed for Denver traveling at 45 MPH, and at 8:45 it's parent company declares bankruptcy because Congress refused to bail out the bank that owned a controlling stake in them, and it's going the wrong direction due to a glitch in one of the two data centers that handle the entire nations routing, and the train derails in Pennsylvania at 9:00 due to track damage that was never repaired from the last hurricane, killing most of the people on board, where do they bury the survivors?

I can't believe they left that off the list!

wrong

[thermian]

For any result greater than 3 the answer is 'A suffusion of yellow'